Movement roles/Working group meeting 2011-3-27

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Transferred from http://etherpad.wikimedia.org/MR2012


[ See also http://etherpad.wikimedia.org/ChapCom-2012 ]

Schedule:

  • 10:30-11:15 - Introductions
  • 11:15-12:15 - Session w ChapCom - Request to expand scope
  • 13:30-14:30 - Session w ChapCom - future of ChapCom
  • 14:45-16:00 - MR discussion, theory and practice


Summary of discussion on affiliation models:
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_affiliation_models/Summary

Ziko's research into movement roles: http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Entities_in_an_international_movement.pdf

Non-mutual rights: create a single page to define them; review every quarter.
Rights for all: Right to be informed

Concerns and conflicts: create a page to collect them; review every quarter.
How many groups of each kind will be recognized?
 ---> expect a few at most in the first year. Will revisit next year.
 ---> thematic orgs, like chapters, should be encouraged to be large. with relatively broadly-defined themes
Neutrality: to what extent is this a requirement?
Bias and political split: to what degree is it necessary for groups to be inclusive? - perhaps better to merge multiple prespectives into one content-focused group

---> AffCom discussion
If a group is dedicated to a particular culture, they could eithe be constrained within a geography or could transcend it.

The normal idea would be for a chapter to do it, or for a group to operate in cooperate within a chapter. most gruops would not ened their own thematic org. If there is a need, or a global / cross-national group, then they could.

Is it ever necessary to have a thematic org operating within a single country?

Dam -
Akl - this cuold be a q of how you actually do the work.



Ziko: Look out that the entities of a lower level is not bending rules of the the upper level. We are inclined to have a lower level in order to repair the problems of the upper level.

  • Chapters are ok, but we don't want to have overlapping chapters. So we are looking for a solution for Amical or the Kurds. Accordingly we consider them to become thematic orgs, actually allowing the existence of surrogate chapters overlapping with real chapters.
  • And with regard to the thematic orgs, we are afraid that becoming a thematic org is too difficult and too much paperwork for many activists. So we invite them to become Groups with a 'lightweight process of recognition'. But - if we think that a heavyweight process of recognition and formalities and accountability and trustworthiness etc. is important with regard to thematic orgs, why do we suddenly think that that is no longer important with regard to Groups? Both (thematic orgs and Groups) are supposed to have access to grants and trademarks.

So, my recommendation: allow thematic org status only for organisations with a across nations scope, and make the Groups more formal or give them less access. E.g., a Group can use the trademarks only if a chapter or a thematic group gives them permission. That makes the chapter or thematic org responsible.

---> Future of Movement role and strategy discussions:
We need a strategy process

Ziko talks about types of movements or international entities in a movement.
- cult cnter. like te club of rome: small group that defines itself.
- national organisatinos, matching existing national structure
- international member orgs; not so many ppl in the world, people become directly members, often discussing in a single major global langauegl ike english
- federations. weak, where nat'l orgs are strong [like trade unions] are strong and decisions are made bilaterally b/t or among the members; or strong, where the union itself is strong and maeks decisions that bind all members. FIFA is an ex. where both nat. orgs and the federation are strong.
- joint committee. for all decision making you acn't leave to individuals. 'who can speak inthe name of the movement?' or 'who can coordinate all of our work?'
- individuals. direct action.
- others. say, single external partners could be very influential.

Ex with RC.
ICRC - the cult center.
IFRC - the federation.
170+ societies - Nat'l orgs
Joint Committee - " "

Ex with IOC.
Committee - the cult center.
Nat'l orgs - the 115 members

Ex with Esperanto.
World Esp. Org - Int'l members org.
National orgs.
Individuals.
...
in the 1950s, they added a Federation and a Joint Committee [funds from both nat'l orgs and WEO]
Word Esp Conference had leaders from JC, Federation, and IMO.
...
later, ingtegrated the Federation and IMO into one. There were many council members from the nat'l orgs as well as the individuals. Board members were individuals.

Today: they have
A board - individuals
A Council - 60% nat'l orgs, 7% individual members, 33% elected.
National orgs
Thematic orgs - must be neutral; not political or religious
   --> There are 6: medical, eo teachers. all international, but have national 'sections'.
   --> Ex: the german eo teachers are a section of both De national org and of the Eo teachers.
Individual (direct) members
Cooperating orgs: like 'Esperanto Vegetarians' or 'Catholic Esperanto speakers' (which can't become thematic orgs) - like our Groups.

Ex: WMF today
WMF - cult center (not a member org)
National orgs.
Projects
...
Considering:
Federation - an assoc.
Joint Committee - considering the FDC and strategy council.
...
Possible:
FDC
Strategy Council
WM Association (nat'l, thematic orgs, individuals)

====
Next steps
====

1. Make a connection between the communities and the structural ideas of recognition -- why organizations have anything to do with our work. How do we address issues related to individual editors, in a parallel way to this work we've done thinking about organizations?

"If after all of ourwork editosr ar angry with us and want to leave the projects, it would be better to disband and leave the editosr alone."

"What are our deliverables to editors?" -- process, results for editing community. how should this work directly empower editors and their work?

Tie current concerns of editors to related MR topics. Consider a functional analysis, tying what WMF currently does and what non-foundation groups should support.


2. List important topics and open questions that remain to be solved

  • A body
  • Roles of groups of editors and individual contributors (as in 1.)
  • Roles matrix
  • A global charter
  • Annual planning coordination
  • Committees that need creation (strategy, volunteer council, global requests committee)
  • Appoint a community Language Contact Person for each language, and a Project Contact Person for each wiki, improving on the old Embassy and translator models
  • A review process for new and old content projects
  • Define a pan-movement mediation process
  • A mechanism to more directly engage the developer community



3. Define how to do this work in the future - make a proposal over the coming weeks.

  • Split the whole into manageable pieces. Define clear roles for each part of the proecss -- a whip, a consolidator, a facilitator for events
  • Define how to engage community members to these discussions. have an ombudsman for this. have short summaries of work (one or two sentences) translated widely, every month.
  • Ask communities to select members to take part; either directly in a discussion, or as an observer for FDC or AffCom or other groups, to gain context before contributing
    • Who are stakeholders in these structural / organizational ideas?
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