[Wikipedia-l] Arbitration/mediation on en

[Jimmy Wales]

The Cunctator wrote:
> If it is to be an experiment, we should try to figure out beforehand
> what our metric of success is. Total success would be if neither
> committee ever needs to act. But the gradations in between are more
> complicated.

I think it's unrealistic to expect that the mediation committee would
never need to act.  Many times people do have real disputes, and if
they'll agree to mediation, and that resolves the dispute by just
getting the two parties to agree, then all the better.

I don't think it's unrealistic to expect that the arbitration
committee should have to act only rarely.

> For example, which is better: if a high or low percentage of cases
> reviewed by the arbitration committee end in sanction or banning?

Oh, I hope a very low percentage.  I'm hopeful that a good system for
mediation will reduce the number of cases where problems get to the
point that banning is necessary.  It's long been said, and I agree to
some extent, that Wikipedia tends to turn our problem users into
monsters.

> Which is better: if the arbitration committee agrees or disagrees with
> the mediators' actions?

Hmmm, I'm not really sure about that.  I suppose it's better if both
committees behave in a kind, loving, friendly, benevolent, and
rational manner, so that disagreements are rare, and that if
disagreements do happen, they happen under circumstances where
everyone agrees that the issue was complex and that both positions had
some merit.

> I think using bulletin boards for this is good, because I think it will
> be very important to establish a reviewable case history.

Unless someone objects strongly, I think that this is a very good
idea.

> The nearly immutable law of government is that while over the short term
> dangers to the health of society come from individual actors, over the
> long term the dangers come from the system.

I absolutely agree with this one.

> A good real world example of that is drugs; because it is a criminal act
> to use illegal drugs, millions of dollars and manhours and lives are
> spent in combatting drug use (the "war on drugs"). But if the drugs
> (such as marijuana) are decriminalized, a host of downstream costs to
> society disappear. There *are* different complications and needs
> (tobacco is a good example of the potential problems of having drugs be
> legal to use) but it's a lot easier to deal with drugs as a health issue
> than a crime issue.

Well, you're obviously using the right language to speak to me, a very
hardcore "libertarian" politically.  :-)

--Jimbo