UDWiki:Administration/Policy Discussion/Arbitration reform

Administration Services — Protection. This page has been protected against editing. See the archive of recent actions or the Protections log.

The original purpose of UDWiki:Administration/Arbitration was to settle edit disputes in a quick and civil manner. Examples of such happening abound, with disputed NPOV sections of groups, as well as disputes over page content (I refer you all to one of the more recent such events, where the Zerging page was subject to such an edit dispute that resulted in its protection).

Changes

This policy proposes that we restore Arbitration to such status effective immediately. As a result the following changes:

• Arbitration will no longer be a ground for settling personal disputes.
• Arbitration is solely for the purpose of deciding what material will go onto a page in the event of a conflict of opinions, or which page to use in the event of a conflict.
• The establishment of an Arbitration committee.

Arbitration Committee

The arbitration committee for each case will be composed of seven people. These will consist of:

• Three system operators of the wiki, preferably those with differing veiwpoints to allow for fuller discourse (Selected by the Bureaucrats. More on that later).
• The two involved parties, or a representative of those parties if there is more than one individual on either side.
• Each of the interested parties will be allowed to select one additional individual to participate. There are no limitations on who they may choose, so long as they are active.

The System Operators selected may not be bureaucrats themselves. This is simply for division of responsibility, and to remove the temptation for crats to just pick themselves at the expense of others. It is expected that the system operators selected have demonstrated some history in the creation and maintenance of articles on this wiki, beyond simple maintenance tasks that they do as sysops.

To become a part, a sysop must first be nominated on the arbitration talk page, where there should be a brief discussion of pros and cons, as well as proof of that individuals work in building up this wiki. For ease of transition, this process lasts three days, at the end of which the crats select them (Since we have two crats, if both are active, they select one each and the third is a joint decision).

Procedure

A complaint is logged in the standard manner in Arbitration as is present. The other party is notified and the page subject to the dispute is protected by one of the arbcom sysops, unless it is an administration page or other similiarly high traffic page (Suggestions, suburb pages), in which case a note is left there indicating that an issue is under arbitration and to avoid in interfering in the matter the arbitration is about.

After this, the two seconds are chosen by the representatives and the case begins, with each representative laying out a case, followed by a rebuttal stage. After this the committee can question and pick apart each position. Only the seven on that case's committee may participate.

This discussion lasts until either concensus is reached (Defined as 6 in favour of one conclusion to 1 against) or until a week has passed, at which time each participant states his preferred option and the decision is made on simple majority.

It is entirely possible that a third, originally unmentioned result could arise by concensus as a result of the discussion.

At the end of this, the page is unprotected and the changes decided upon are made. The matter is then considered closed.