Wikibooks talk:Resolving disputes

I'd like to get this down as official since it ties in with some of the arbitration proceedings we've had lately. Ideas? -within focus 01:39, 19 January 2007 (UTC)

Arbitration
I like the general text of this policy, but I am not sure that I like the idea of having anything about arbitration included here. If we talk about arbitration in this page, and it becomes an official policy (or guideline), then we have essentially created the need for an official arbitration process by accident (or "side effect", if it is not totally unintentional). I think that we as a community need to seriously consider whether we want to have arbitration at all, and if we do have it, we should start to lay down some guidelines about how it should be done. If we say here that arbitration is the final step in the dispute process, that implies that we have an arbitration system available to handle such disuptes, and at the moment we do not have such a system.

The current arbitration process created by User:Robert Horning is an interesting one, but many users have expressed problems with the particular methodology, the terminology, etc. That we have this process occuring already doesn't mean that the community wants arbitration, or that we want it in this particular way. My point is, we really need to answer alot of questions on this topic before we start writing references to it into our policy documents. --Whiteknight (talk) (projects) 01:39, 21 January 2007 (UTC)


 * My take on the matter was that we would in fact have an arbitration process now, even if it is totally different from the current one going on. We would define the procedural rules on this page. This process is the last of four steps, and quite a bit of work must go into the previous three before arbitration is needed. Those who try to jump steps will be denied. To discuss the need for arbitration, I suggest we discuss that at the arbitration page. -within focus 02:56, 21 January 2007 (UTC)


 * There is a need for a clear procedure, at least in terms of who should be involved.


 * Do you feel that editorial and behaviour disputes should be handled in a different fashion?


 * - If someone continually reverts text or violates no personal attacks then there is a behavioural dispute - disciplinary procedure should be used.


 * - If two editors vehemently disagree about content the solution might be to offer some sort of ad hoc editorial board to resolve the issue or, if this is refused, enforce a discussion period mediated by an admin and, if this doesnt work, include both views in the book. Both views would only be included in a final, published edition of the book if permitted by the editorial board that reviews that edition.


 * -If two editors vehemently disagree about presentation an ad hoc editorial board should give binding arbitration (you cant really have 2 presentations). RobinH 16:54, 25 January 2007 (UTC)


 * My only point with my above comment was that wikibooks never has had an arbitration "step" in the dispute resolution process (to be fair, it hasn't had a "dispute resolution process" for very long either). Adding such a thing is more important then asking how to do it, but we need to as ourselves if we need to have it. I'm not going to advocate either option (at least not here), i just want people to consider that it's new territory for us. --Whiteknight (talk) (projects) 18:04, 25 January 2007 (UTC)

Arbitration suggestion
Anyone want to help me draft a suggestion?? --82.42.237.84 18:11, 25 January 2007 (UTC)
 * Let's do this at Wikibooks talk:Arbitration. -within focus 02:08, 26 January 2007 (UTC)

Move to enforce
This policy, or some kind of rules concerning the handling of disputes is a necessary feature at wikibooks. Given some of the recent events, I think it is all the more pertinent for us to try and put something on the books that can help to govern such disputes. I am recommending that this proposal, in whole or in part, be moved to policy as soon as can reasonably happen.

One caveat, of course, is that the final section of this policy refers to both the Arbitration Committee and the Editorial board, neither of which are policy yet. If we can confirm the first 3 steps of the proposal now, we can confirm the fourth section later, if we want. As an alternative, we could enforce the entire document now, with a note perhaps that the specific workings of the editorial board and the arbitration committee are not set in stone yet. --Whiteknight (talk) (projects) 14:23, 1 February 2007 (UTC)


 * I disagree that this should be made an enforced policy. I don't like the idea of an arbitration committee. Reading other comments on this page, I like the idea of differentiating between editorial problems and behavioral problems.
 * I think editorial problems should almost always being handled using the decision making process by those working on the book or wishing to be involved in the book. Much in the same spirit that deleting a single page of a book is encouraged to be discussed by those involved in the book rather then voted on in VfD and if agreed to speedily deleted instead. Meditation should only come into play if requested for this type of issue.
 * I think behavioral problems should be addressed by the Wikibooks community, discussed and voted on in a similar format as VfD is done and with similar rules. Quality over quanity, no sockpuppets, etc. The decision should be to either uphold a previous decision or provide an alternative solution and should be binding. If the decision is to uphold a previous decision, the person who made the original decision should not be punished and should be free make similar decisions in the future on similar cases.
 * In both cases I think perhaps that once a decision has been made that unless either new quality reasons or quality information is presented or there is a clear presents of the community that no longer agrees with the decision, the issue should not be allowed to be reopened. Similar to how books that have been previous voted on for deletion should not be brought up again for deletion if the decision was to keep, unless new reasons are provided. --dark [[Image:Yin yang.svg|12px]] lama 15:39, 1 February 2007 (UTC)


 * I agree... something less formal like what's been started at WB:RFC would be better. -- SB_Johnny | talk 16:02, 1 February 2007 (UTC)


 * See also a less formalized version of this policy... needs cleanup but it's more reasonable I think, since it allows for quick and simple resolutions rather than the drama of formal arbitration.


 * 2 months ago I would have agreed with you, and said that this proposal was completely unnecessary and that we didnt need any kind of formalized arbitration method. My opinions on this matter have been changed by recent events, and I strongly believe that the community needs something definative in dealing with behavioral problems. How do we handle cases where discussion and progress have broken down completely? We need to have an arbitration committee, and i will cite the following reasons:
 * We need a last resort for disputes that are out of hand and cannot be solved in the usual methods.
 * We need a standard so that nobody tries to throw together a home-brewed arbitration in the future.
 * We need something formal and final so that people don't take appeals to meta or the stewards or the WMF when arguments here get out of hand.
 * Not all disputes are book-content related. There are behavioral problems, there are policy violations, and there are abuses. A policy that only talks about content disputes is short-sighted and incomplete.
 * The recent events have heavily shaped my thinking on this matter, and I'm not really receptive at this point to something that's "less formal". --Whiteknight (talk) (projects) 18:27, 1 February 2007 (UTC)


 * I consider behavioral problems, policy violations and abuses to be one sort of dispute and content dispute to be another. Content disputes should be encouraged to be resolved through discussion and consensus as is already done, so no change there. I have no issue with having a standard method for resolving the other form of disputes. I'm not saying this policy is unnecessary, I'm saying I don't agree that arbitration should be that standard method and I don't think we need to have a committee to handle it. I'm saying that part of the policy should be changed. --dark [[Image:Yin yang.svg|12px]] lama 21:59, 1 February 2007 (UTC)


 * I really like the two separate areas of dispute resolution and think formal committees are the ideal solution. We have to stay away from wishy-washy policy and need straightforward rules on how to handle this now that's it's jumped on us. RFC can surely be an intermediate step, but we need formal, ending solutions for disputes so that they don't linger forever. It would be great if someone could take the initiative and draw a map of the processes and where each page here lies, because it's becoming a bit of a blur (for one, is Arbitration dead now in favor of Arbitration Committee?). -within focus 22:39, 1 February 2007 (UTC)


 * Blur aside, I agree that we do need a solid policy to stand on. When somebody misbehaves, or when all sorts of other nonsense starts happening, we need the authority and the confidence to drop the freaking hammer. All sorts of non-confrontational "don't do bad stuff or action might be taken against you at the judgement of an admin" just wont cut it, and I think that we've seen that recently. An editorial board may not be the correct method for handling content disputes (although I can see plenty of other great uses for such a board), but I do think that formal, standard arbitration is the best last resort for behavior problems. --Whiteknight (talk) (projects) 02:50, 2 February 2007 (UTC)

tab reset

To clarify I believe the problems with the arbitration process as has been generally acknowledged that was tried out and disagreed with by the community, is a very good reason to frown on encouraging further movement in that direction. I am not suggesting we have a blur or vage policy to decide what to do for a final decision rather I am suggesting an alternative to an arbitration committee and arbitration. My suggestion is that the community discusses and decides through consensus how best to handle the situation and that decision be made final and binding in this proposed policy and enforced through whatever actions may need to be taken by admins. For example that part of the policy should define the rules that are used by the community in carrying out such a discussion and what sort of decisions can be made and the fact the decision is final.

However I believe recent events have demonstrated that abuse, behavioral problems and policy violations aren't as obvious as seems to be suggested. I believe before we should even attempt to have any form of process like this, we as a community need to clarify better what is considered abuse, a behavioral problem and a policy violation, so we're not working in the dark, have a means for admins to judge the quality of any arguments rather then the quantity of the arguments and other issues. What exactly was abusive, a behavioral problem or a policy violation with regard to Panic should make for good starting place to clarify these issues. For example by clarifying WB:CIVIL.

I hope this clarifies any misunderstandings about my objections. --dark lama  03:23, 3 February 2007 (UTC)

Need to protect "ordinary Wikibooks users"
I could speak volumes about some abuses to the arbitration situation that happened with Panic, but I do want to address a basic principle here to this process.

Regardless of what is happening, we need to keep foremost the idea that ordinary Wikibooks users can be "bullied" by admins and bureaucrats. Particularly because admin options like performing a user block and locking (protecting) pages from editing can be abused, even if it is unintentional or even a mistake on the part of the admin.

One of the things I was trying to also work up to in the situation with Panic was to get an arbitration "board" put together that would avoid putting the arbitrators into the mud fest. As I tried to mention as for the justification for the process I created here (but didn't get completed in the manner that I had hoped), it seemed as though every admin that tried to get involved simply became covered in the issue and became a party to the dispute rather than a neutral observer who tried to get everybody to calm down. I had hoped that I would be able to get ahold of a couple more admins that would be neutral on the issue to help join with me in a common resolution.

It is very critical in situations like this that we remember that the whole process is supposed to be one of telling everybody, including passionate admins and others, to back off and cool down. Change directions and try to do something else positive instead of trying to pump up your egos to explosive sizes.

Under no cirsumstance should the opinions or attitudes of an admin be weighted more than those of any other user or editor. Even "Jimbo says" should be taken with a grain of salt (or at least Jimbo has suggested as much in the past). And there needs to be some sort of aveune for ordinary Wikibooks users to be able to fight against "the establishment" if they are feeling picked upon.

I also must say that the whole process of arbitration must be open, and a matter of "public record" or the equivalent. One of the problems I saw with the whole Panic arbitration issue was that much of the disuccsion was happening on IRC, with the "trial" or "arbitration" happening in abstentia and a bunch of people deciding upon the ultimate outcome. Or talk on various user pages. This is not a reasonable way to carry on these discussion. Perhaps an arbitration committee wants to discuss some of the issues "in chamber" or privately among themselves in e-mails. Outside parties trying to capture the process and force a conclusion is merely going to derail the whole process.

I also need to be very blunt about arbitrations here and the arbitrators. One of the things I am most disappointed about was the pressing need to get the situation resolved quickly. OK, I admit that it needed to be resolved, but it already had taken some time. This is something that had been going on for months. Could waiting a week or two for some resolution be really a huge problem? If there is a problem where a user is going amok and causing huge problems (such as spamming, moving pages, or cause other vandalism), there are already existing policies in place to deal with that. When instead there are editorial disputes (and I still fail to see how the situation with Panic was anything more than that), it is more of trying to find what is going on and how to resolve this issue.

This also takes something that is nebulous called "leadership". This is not somebody who has been been given infinite abitrary "power" to do all kinds of god-like things, but rather somebody who has been able to persuade people to act in a responsible manner that will help the community. That often these "leaders" are also given prominence of "titles" or "authority", but that is a by-product to what they have accomplished. Instead, this is the ability to come to a solution that is acceptable to nearly everybody. That this isn't easy is demonstrated by the fact that few people are recognized as a community leader independent of titles.

Finally, one of the objections of the final "solution" to the situation with Panic was the very arbitrary user block that happened. I don't think it was necessary at all, nor especially for six months. Leaving the discussion aside in this particular case, I believe that you can find a resolution to situations like this that would avoid having to perform a user block, particularly for somebody who has been generally supportive of this project. A user block is really to stop a vandal or somebody who is causing immediate harm to the project and won't stop. Instead, by blocking a user you have created an enemy, which ultimately could prove far more disasterous. Unnoticed by just about everybody critical to my actions with Panic, I was trying hard to keep Panic to make positive contributions to this project and to be able to use his help to further all of our common goals.

One other huge thing that was missing from all of this is that we are unpaid volunteers in a strictly unpaid volunteer organization. The way that you work with volunteers in this situation is very different than you would in a typical corporate environment. Most of all, you absolutely must treasure and value each person who makes any sort of positive contribution. That discliplinary actions may have to take place from time to time, the overall goal should be one of reformation rather than removal. In a corporate environment, you may have the luxury of being able to "fire" somebody who is "difficult" to work with. In a volunteer environment like we have on Wikibooks, that is not a luxury we can enjoy. --Rob Horning 00:46, 3 February 2007 (UTC)


 * This page should not contain a discussion of Panic's arbitration. Surely we need to establish some dispute resolution process which we are doing right now, not creating a process on the fly and trying to use it well before it's ready and has gained community approval. I don't think admin abuse is a big issue here at all since we have a tight community and watch what each other are doing. I don't want recent events to be some excuse to go after admins that were trying to defend the true goals and spirit of the community here. -within focus 02:55, 3 February 2007 (UTC)

New Suggested Arbitration Procedures
I think the proposed procedure is overly legalistic and I don't like it. It is too cumbersome and will take too long to work through. I suggest something more like the following:


 * [Initiation Stage] An arbitration page will be created. This page will include the scope of the arbitration, involved parties, questions to be decided, agreements to arbitration and expected time frames for completion. Individual dispute pages will be created for each party.
 * [Personal Statements Stage] All interested parties will state their position on their individual dispute pages. Their stance on the dispute, additional points of contention, accusations of wrongdoing, and supporting evidence should all be included. Direct responses to accusations from other parties should be saved for later.
 * [Rebuttal and Remedies Phase] All parties are given a chance to respond to all accusations and offer a rebuttal on their individual pages. Specific potential remedies should also be suggested. During this phase, arbiters will also ask direct questions of parties on their dispute pages for the purpose of clarification.
 * [Decision Phase] The arbitrators will offer their opinions on the questions to be decided and any additional accusations of wrongdoing. The arbitration committee will deliver a final verdict and action.


 * Each party will have their own individual dispute page and only they and arbiters will make content edits on that page. The arbitration committee has the right to suspend proceedings or issue a final decision summarily at any time should they decide it necessary. All decisions by the committee will be considered final. --xixtas 15:27, 3 February 2007 (UTC)


 * I disagree with an arbitration committee. My suggestion is more simplistic:
 * [Initiation Stage] A page thats defined by this policy is created for resolving disputes. A new section heading is created for a new dispute with a summary by the initiator(s) who have a problem that couldn't be resolved using decision making and mediation.
 * [Discussion/Suggested Solution Stage] Anyone who has something to say, for or against the problem can make comments perhaps marked with either Comment or Agree/Disagree. Suggestions for possible solutions marked with Suggestion, with people who agree with the solution marked their response with Support and those people who disagree mark their response with Opposed. This phase being similar to how things are done with VfD.
 * [Decision Stage] Once a few days have passed without any further comments, the dispute is brought to a close and an admin using their best judgment and any rules defined in this policy, balanced with what the general community consensus is, carries out the final decision. This being similar to how a vote for deletion is brought to a close. Additionally if someone makes an initial dispute and nobody responds to it in a few days, I think it should be brought to a close as failed.
 * This would all happen on one page, the section name being similar to how sections for VfD are named perhaps. Such as named after the book or user the dispute is over. --<span style="font: bold 10pt 'courier new', comic, sans, ms;"><font color="midnightblue">dark [[Image:Yin yang.svg|12px]] lama 16:23, 3 February 2007 (UTC)


 * I do not think such a process would have worked well in the case of Panic v SB Johnny, but I concede that it would have been a lot better than what finally ended up happening. There is a real danger here that a particular clique will stomp on an individual user regardless of the correctness of their position. That is why I feel that mob rule is unacceptable in a situation that has progressed to this stage. Remember, this is a process of last resort, after mediation (presumably involving an administrator) has already failed.


 * I believe that the procedure needs to spell out steps in an orderly fashion, set a timeline and allow users to state their opinions outside of the context of a point-counterpoint argument, respecting the rights of all parties to be heard. The process also desperately needs to focus the discussion on those points that are actually cogent and significant within the context of the dispute.


 * I do not think that turning such a situation into a popularity contest by opening the matter up to a 'vote' by the entire community is right or fair or in any way in the long-term best interests of wikibooks. This simply serves to drag users who have neither the time or inclination to fully research the situation into the fray. --xixtas 17:22, 3 February 2007 (UTC)


 * I don't think it matters how correct someone feels their position is if the community disagrees with them. The community makes the policies that decides what is and isn't allowed. Any arbitration simply won't hold if the community disagrees with its progress and its outcome. This has already been demonstrated. I don't think it makes sense to force a decision to be made in a fixed amount of time. I believe so long as people are making progress twards a solution that hasn't stagnated into repeating the same arguments/info over and over again, it should be allowed to continue. As soon as there is no new points or new comments that address the points brought up and a few days have passed it should come to an end. The few days delay is to give people who may be busy a chance to respond.
 * I don't believe anyone should have to fully research the situation. Anyone who brings up points should be required to provides links as references in order establish their points or risk having them ignored. We're all volunteers after all, who choose to contribute to this project when we have free time. I also don't believe it drags users into having to discuss it. Only people who have a reason to get involved will do so, regardless of what method is used.
 * I don't see how community consensus suddenly turns into mob rule with this particular situation. It almost seems as if some people have lost faith in the community to do the right thing and wish to prevent the community from having any say. Wikibooks has a mission and the community decides how best the work to achieve that mission. I don't want to see decisions being limited to a select few, especially when the decision is suppose to be final without any appeal. What the community wants has always been the final word when it comes to policy here, so I feel it makes sense for the final word on what to do about problems that fail to be resolved through discussion to be up to the community. --<span style="font: bold 10pt 'courier new', comic, sans, ms;"><font color="midnightblue">dark [[Image:Yin yang.svg|12px]] lama 18:51, 3 February 2007 (UTC)
 * Yes, the action in the Panic case has caused me to loose faith in the admin clique that governs Wikibooks (what you call 'the community'). No question about that. To my mind the 'community' clearly did not do the right or fair thing in that case. --xixtas 20:05, 3 February 2007 (UTC)


 * No I do not call admins the community. The community consists of every registered and participating user who comes here with the desire to create collaborative textbooks as is the mission of Wikibooks. As it stands this proposed policy wants to make an arbitration committee that can only consist of admins. I disagree with arbitration committee and believe it makes no sense. I disagree that the decision should be left up to only a select few, be that admins, some committee of admins or a committee of any sort. The discussion and decision should be open to every user who wishes to participate in the discussion and decision making process to resolve the dispute. The admins interaction in the process should be only to state their own views and to carry out the decision if it requires admin action to do so. --<span style="font: bold 10pt 'courier new', comic, sans, ms;"><font color="midnightblue">dark [[Image:Yin yang.svg|12px]] lama 21:53, 3 February 2007 (UTC)


 * Well it's going to be hard to get consensus on this I can see. I am completely opposed to making the arbitration process similar to the VfD process. Consensus based processes are good at maintaining the status quo. Something that maintains the status quo most of the time is not what we are going for here. --xixtas 00:10, 4 February 2007 (UTC)

<--- reset tabs Here is a modified arbitration proposal that includes a forum for community input.
 * [Initiation Stage] An arbitration page will be created. This page will include the scope of the arbitration, involved parties, named arbiters, questions to be decided, agreements to arbitration and expected time frames for completion. Individual dispute pages will be created for each party.
 * [Personal Statements Stage] All involved parties will state their position on their individual personal statements pages. Their stance on the dispute, additional points of contention, accusations of wrongdoing, and supporting evidence should all be included. Direct responses to accusations from other parties should be saved for later.
 * [Rebuttal and Remedies Phase] All parties are given a chance to respond to all accusations and offer a rebuttal on their individual pages. Specific potential remedies should also be suggested. During this phase, arbiters will also ask direct questions of parties on their dispute pages for the purpose of clarification. Additionally, during this phase a community page will be created where the community can voice its opinion. Anyone who has something to say related to the dispute can make comments. Comments would be marked with comment. Suggestions for possible solutions would be marked with Suggestion. People who agree with the solution mark their response with Support and those people who disagree mark their response with Opposed. Parties to the dispute would specifically be precluded from posting on this page.
 * [Decision Phase] The arbitrators will offer their opinions on the questions to be decided and any additional accusations of wrongdoing (findings of fact). The arbiters will take into account all of the information presented including the opinions of the community. The arbiters will deliver a final verdict and action.


 * Each party will have their own individual dispute page and only they and arbiters will make content edits on that page. Efforts should be made to resolve disputes quickly, however time extensions may be granted depending on circumstances. The arbitration committee has the right to suspend proceedings or issue a final decision summarily at any time should they decide it necessary. All decisions by the committee will be considered final. --xixtas 16:43, 4 February 2007 (UTC)


 * I believe the entire process needs to be on one page to make it easier to keep track of. I don't believe we need a fixed order in which discussion takes place. I believe we should only be concerned with minimizing the need for the parties to repeat themselves. Ideally discussions are well organized from the beginning so that nobody needs to repeat themselves for mediation and for this stage if it becomes necessary. Because requiring the entire thing to be gone over and discussed again from the beginning will more than likely increase the tension of the situation rather than defusing it. I rather by the time a mediator is requested, the mediator can simply look at the discussion and be able to understand everyone's position with the minimal of questions and be able to offer suggestions. By the time this stage is necessary there really should be no more need for discussion by the parties involved accept for clarifying any questions that may need to be asked. Otherwise I see any use of this process ending badly with most people unsatisfied and unhappy, and everyone losing. I'm starting to believe whichever module the discussion took place is where the meditation and this stage of the process should happen to minimize the repeating of discussion and turning it into a mess thats across many different pages and that the RFC should be used to request and keep track of current disputes that need resolving along with where the discussion is taking place. Maybe even for a time what the decision for a resolved dispute. --<span style="font: bold 10pt 'courier new', comic, sans, ms;"><font color="midnightblue">dark [[Image:Yin yang.svg|12px]] lama 17:25, 4 February 2007 (UTC)


 * Are you talking about mediation or arbitration? to my mind I see them as two different steps, the first informal, the second very formal. In an actual real-world arbitration, the parties are frequently forbidden from talking to each other at all. There's a very good reason for this. In my experience, point-counterpoint arguments harden disagreements, and encourage them to continue. Not everyone feels comfortable in an argument free-for-all like you and I do. Wikibooks is not paper. There is no need to conserve bits by limiting the number of pages. I do agree that the individual summary statements should be kept short and concise. In a formal debate each side is given a particular time to state their position and then specific time is given for responses. This is a time-tested formula for dealing with disagreement fairly, if we do not include some mechanism for individuals to make their case without being subjected to continual interruption and counterpoint, the process cannot be fair. I am very worried about the tyranny of the majority here at Wikibooks, there is much groupthink here and little room for iconoclasts. --xixtas 20:21, 4 February 2007 (UTC)


 * I'm mostly talking about some other process (we'll call it RFC) other then arbitration and briefly how mediation fits into the process just before it. You've misunderstood me it seems, from your reference to Wikibooks not being paper. This has nothing to do with size and how much space it takes up. Before the mediation stage even has begun the parties involved have already made their cases, and shouldn't need to repeat them. The more time a person needs to spend trying to find links in the history and spend writing up their positions and points again the more time people have to get angrier over it. As happened with Robert's attempt which did not defused the situation, but made it more heated and intense. Not everyone feels comfortable having to repeat what a disagreement is over again and thinking about everything that lead to the situation or pressured to respond within a fixed time frame and rather just leave the project than get involved in that. The discussion I had in mind was between the rest of the community at the point of the RFC rather than the involved parties. I think by the time of the RFC, the parties know each other's positions and just need others to resolve it and so should not be involved in the process except where there positions may need to be clarified for anyone who wasn't involved who may have misunderstood or when asked a question. --<span style="font: bold 10pt 'courier new', comic, sans, ms;"><font color="midnightblue">dark [[Image:Yin yang.svg|12px]] lama 00:08, 5 February 2007 (UTC)


 * I agree with most of that. I would support that the mediation/rfc process be fairly informal and done in whatever way makes sense at the time. My proposal was always intended to be a court of last resort thing to be used only in extreme circumstances of intractable disagreement --xixtas 01:24, 5 February 2007 (UTC)


 * RFC is meant as an alternative to the arbitration process rather then as part of the meditation process. First discussion, then mediation and finally RFC. RFC is just to give it a name and is probably not the same as SB_Johnny is proposing. My intension is for the arbitration process to be replaced with RFC as a last resort. Consisting of discussion by the community and a decision made without the parties being involved except in the two cases I mentioned, because by the time RFC is needed it should be clear that one or more parties has refused to find common ground and work together. I also feel its been made clear that any decision won't stick without the decision being made by the community, since otherwise it will only cause the community to become divided and create distrust as seems to have already happened, which I believe to not be good for the community. What did you not like about the arbitration that Robert tried to setup or how it was done? --<span style="font: bold 10pt 'courier new', comic, sans, ms;"><font color="midnightblue">dark [[Image:Yin yang.svg|12px]] lama 02:03, 5 February 2007 (UTC)


 * In fact, I was one of the few people who objected to specific aspects of the process early on. I still object to those three things. I don't think anyone wants me to list all the ways in which I believe that process was unfair and abusive from beginning to end. The list would be thirty or forty points long. However, instead of raining fire and brimstone and raising hell on meta, I've decided to work here systematically to prevent a repeat in the future. By comparing my proposal to Rob's system you can see the myriad and fundamental ways in which I found his process lacking. Four key ones being that his process defined no scope, was not time-bound, used a single arbiter, and provided no opportunity for community input. -- xixtas 04:46, 5 February 2007 (UTC)


 * I have worked up a couple of templates to go with the arbitration process I describe above. Hopefully this will help others visualize what I have in mind. Some of the features I think this idea has going for it are: a set timeline, a prescribed place for community input, and a specific scope of questions to be resolved. --23:36, 4 February 2007 (UTC)

Let's not begin with arbitration...
I seem to be a bit slow on the uptake here :P.

First a quick note on step 2: I'm not sure how realistic that is, because in my experience most Wikibookians come to Wikibooks to write something in particular, not just because they feel like writing books and any topic will do. We should assume that people who come here are driven by an urge to create something worthwhile, and if they're having a hard time getting along with someone (or a group of someones), they should get support if they ask for it (IOW: I don't think it would be a great thing if someone asked for help and recieved the blunt reply of "you didn't follow step two, come back later"). If someone ran straight to RfC without first trying to talk to the other contributor(s), we should by all means suggest that they do so, but telling them to sit on their hands and cool off isn't likely to be productive.

I think the step 3 ("mediation") should be the important one, since that's worked very well for our sister project, Wikipedia. The WB:RFC process some of us are interested in developing here is modeled after theirs, and while the wikipedia version is quite formalized, we perhaps don't need to go there yet. The RfC is also designed in the hopes of using it for just getting some constructive criticism even without dispute, or at least getting outside support and opinions before things get heated. If possible we should try to get some way of keeping the dialog as friendly as possible: not "he's wrong, I'm right", but more along the lines of "we're having a hard time agreeing on a path forward, and need some advice."

The "local projects" stuff I mentioned on the Staff lounge is the other side of this that can in some ways be used as a way for authors to communicate what the creative approach has been over the history of the book, and why they think that approach is appropriate. That way if a new contributor comes along and wants to change things, they'll be less likely to re-make mistakes that previous contributors might already have made (and I speak as one who's made some mistakes, and spent as much time fixing them as making them).

I guess what I'm saying with all this is that the arbitration sort of approach should really be a last resort, and that we should focus this policy towards trying to resolve things well before that happens. Step one is really just a statement of the obvious (which is appropriate because sometimes the obvious needs to be stated). Step two, as I said above, is a good idea in some cases and for some people, but should definitely not be required by policy... we should not be in the business of assigning arbitrary wikibreaks. Step three needs to be approached with care, in a definitively constructive manner.

As for step four, hopefully we won't find ourselves there very often. If and when we do, and however it's structured, the decision should be quick and sure. By the time the other options have been exhausted, those involved in the disputes are likely to be at wit's end: only angry words are going to come out of it, and the longer it goes on the more the wounds will fester. -- SB_Johnny | talk 01:33, 4 February 2007 (UTC)


 * I've made some changes to step one and step two based on your comments and my own thoughts on the subject. In both cases I'm trying to higlight and focus on the positive. -xixtas 16:26, 4 February 2007 (UTC)


 * Thanks, but I decided to try being bold and made some more radical changes by just getting rid of the second step altogether, since like the first one this was more good advice than policy.
 * Just a compositional note: the arbitration section stands alone as having subsections. Perhaps more for aesthetic reasons than anything rational, I wonder if the Arbitration policy should just be a separate page altogether, so that this page can just mention it briefly with the implication that we don't want to go there? -- SB_Johnny | talk 20:24, 4 February 2007 (UTC)

Change/Remove step 4
Judging from some early results in a straw poll from the staff lounge, and some other comments that were made around the project (and unfortunately many of these comments are highly distributed), I would like to suggest the following changes to this proposal: I think that step 4 should be removed for the following reasons: Given the sheer amount of indecision on this matter, I think it would be a bad idea for us to specify that arbitration is the "last step", when we don't have an arbitration process to employ for these situations. I recommend therefore that we remove the entire fourth section of the proposal, until such time as we have an acceptable arbitration process. --Whiteknight (talk) (projects) 15:22, 7 February 2007 (UTC)
 * Removal of step 4 entirely, for reasons I will enumerate below
 * Making "mediation" the final step in the process
 * Higher emphasis on community involvement and the use of concensus to make decisions.
 * Disputes over content are already covered by the text of Decision making, and there is no need to have an editorial board to step in on such situations. However, I don't rule out the possibility that such an entity could act as a mediator if desired. I have addressed some of these points in the current text of Editorial board.
 * Out of 5 votes cast currently, 4 have been in favor of the use of some brand of arbitration. However, the specifics of how the arbitration should be handled is a matter with far less agreement.
 * 3 out of 5 votes claim that arbitration is not an acceptable way to end disputes concerning book content (hence a revitalized focus on Decision making).
 * 3 out of 5 votes (with one neutral vote) are against the establishment of a standing arbitration committee. Concerns cited are the consolidation and abuse of administrative power, the inability to maintain neutrality on a small project, and the community's lack of experience with this type of dispute.
 * 2 out of 4 votes (with one neutral vote) are against the use of ad hoc or informal arbitration.


 * You mean the third section :). I wouldn't want to rule out the possibility of creating an arbitration system at a later date, but what I'm leaning more towards now is a more "wiki-ish" system of a binding contract for one or both parties to agree to, with community support and input.
 * In any case, making an arbitration panel, especially a standing panel is not a good idea at this point. The ARBCOM at wikipedia is a standing cabal, and I think one of the things that's been made quite clear by the community now is that there should be no formalised cabals. -- SB_Johnny | talk 18:43, 7 February 2007 (UTC)


 * My problem here is that we don't have an arbitration "situation", and we dont know even how we want to go about making one. Making this policy dependant on arbitration seems short-sighted to me, because we may never have a standardized form of arbitration to use! I think that it's important that we have a dispute resolution policy on the books soon so that we don't run into any further problems by not having one, and I also think that we can update it later when/if we decide to implement arbitration. I don't see any reason to put all our eggs in one basket, and say "we can solve all our problems using arbitration", and "we don't have arbitration, some of us dont really want it, and nobody can agree how to do it". The result of those two conflicting statements is "we can't solve our own problems". --Whiteknight (talk) (projects) 18:58, 7 February 2007 (UTC)


 * Right... I guess I was saying that we don't want to say there will never be such a thing, but for this and other reasons, an arbitration policy should be a separate one anyway, linked to from this policy if it ever came about. For now, I agree... just remove those sections. -- SB_Johnny | talk 19:11, 7 February 2007 (UTC)


 * The real danger is in doing nothing. Any arbitration policy would be better than what we have now. --xixtas 22:03, 7 February 2007 (UTC)