Wikimedia Foundation Affiliates Strategy/Implementation/Affiliate health criteria/Reports/2024/Wikimedia Deutschland
| Affiliate basic information | ||
|---|---|---|
| What is the affiliate name? | Wikimedia Deutschland e. V. | |
| Please list the languages supported by this affiliate | Wikipedia: German, German dialect, or a recognized minority language in Germany.
Wikidata and other Wikimedia projects: cross-language For more information see: https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikimedia_Deutschland/F%C3%B6rderrichtlinien | |
| Please list countries where this affiliate operates | We operate mostly in Germany. However, we also support programs in other countries and other languages (mainly Wikidata, Wikibase, Commons) | |
| Reporting timeline (e.g. January-December) | January-December | |
| Reporting year (e.g. 2024 or 2024-2025) | 2024 | |
| Primary contact (user name) | Franziska Heine (WMDE) | |
| Secondary contact (user name) | Nicole Ebber (WMDE) | |
| Goal delivery | ||
| What is the affiliate mission? | Wikimedia Deutschland's mission is set out in its statutes: “The purpose of the association is the selfless promotion of the creation, collection, and dissemination of free knowledge to promote equal opportunities in access to knowledge and education.” | |
| What are the affiliate goals? Link to the strategic plan, if there is one. | Here are our 9 strategic goals:
You can find more information about our strategic plan and goals on this meta page: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_Deutschland/Plan_2025/en | |
| Organizational development | ||
| How does the affiliate make decisions? How are decisions communicated? | Wikimedia Deutschland is a membership organization. From the very beginning, the association's members have played a key role in its decision-making processes. In 2025, more than 110,000 people supported our association through their membership. They meet at least once a year at a general assembly, which is the association's highest decision-making body.
Every two years, the members elect a voluntary Supervisory Board consisting of at least seven members from among their ranks. This Board appoints and dismisses the Executive Director(s) and supervises their work. The minutes of the general assemblies are made available to all members. All decisions made by the Supervisory Board can be viewed on the association's website. | |
| What is the current state of the affiliate finances? Link to the latest financial report, if there is one. | https://www.wikimedia.de/2024/en/finances/ | |
Affiliate health and resilience
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| How many people participate in the decision-making process in the affiliate? | All 113,000+ members (as of March 31, 2025) can get involved in the association's decision-making processes by joining the general assemblies, actively taking part in the conversations and submitting motions. Around 3000 of them are active members, which gives them voting rights and enables them to run for elected positions. | |
| Has there been any significant changes in the level of the affiliate membership body (e.g. increase/decrease of number of dues-paying members)? | Since its foundation, Wikimedia Deutschland has seen its membership grow significantly every year. Between March 2024 and March 2025 the number of members rose from 111,254 to 113,340. | |
| Are there any affiliate activities in the past year that were led by affiliate members? Please share the highlights. | The way this question is formulated doesn’t reflect the reality of Wikimedia Deutschland’s work and membership structure. A majority of WMDE’s activities are co-organized or co-led by affiliate staff and community members, independent from their membership status. | |
| Leadership and inclusion | ||
Diverse, skilled, and accountable leadership
| ||
| What kind of skills does the affiliate leadership possess? | Supervisory Board Elections: Leadership at WMDE includes the honorary Supervisory Board as well as the professional management team (C-team) including the ED(s), and also the leadership circle consisting of all staff team leads.
Executive Board Transitions:Leadership positions at WMDE are held by experienced professional staff members, in an organizational context that supports ongoing professional development. Additionally, the Supervisory Board is supported by a team of professional staff members. | |
| Is there any kind of succession plan for the affiliate leadership? | Supervisory Board Elections: It is the responsibility of the Supervisory Board to ensure that there is always a good pool of suitable and diverse candidates for the board elections and that new candidates are well integrated into the board. Responsibility for this lies with the Board Governance Committee. The Board Governance Committee consists of at least two members of the Supervisory Board and is elected at the beginning of the term of office.
Executive Board Transitions:It is the task of the Executive Board Committee of the Supervisory Board to prepare for the timely search for successors when members of the Executive Board leave by preparing suitable concepts for resolution by the Supervisory Board as well as preparing and conducting contract extension discussions with members of the Executive Board in good time before the end of their contracts and drafting the corresponding resolution proposal for the Supervisory Board. | |
| Are there any trainings that affiliate leadership undergo before they assume their leadership position? | Supervisory Board: The members of the Supervisory Board are elected every two years by the general assembly. After the election, the Supervisory Board may co-opt up to two additional association members into the committee in order to improve diversity and bring in the necessary expertise or experience. The detailed provisions for this are set out in § 4a of the election regulations.
Executive Board:Wikimedia Deutschland supports the professional development of all its staff members, including its Executive Director(s). | |
| Are there any requirements for affiliate leadership to disclose their conflict(s) of interests? | Compliance structures and processes were developed in cooperation between the Supervisory Board and the Executive Board. Supervision was transferred to the Board Governance Committee.
There are separate bylaws for conflicts of interest: https://www.wikimedia.de/ueber-uns/der-verein/geschaeftsordnung/ Accordingly, members of the Supervisory Board and the Executive Board must disclose any conflicts of interest. A conflict of interest exists when the personal interests of a member of the Supervisory Boards or Executive Board diverge from the interests of the association. The further procedure is governed by the rules of procedure on conflicts of interest. | |
Diversity balance (especially gender)
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| What is the diversity level of the affiliate leadership and membership body? | Supervisory Board: Currently, five of the eight members of the 9th Supervisory Board are female.
Staff Leadership: Among the association's full-time employees, the proportion of non-male persons with leadership responsibilities is over 60%. Affiliate members:A representative sample survey of members in 2021 indicated that 80% of WMDE members are male. | |
| How is the affiliate leadership encouraging gender diversity in the decision-making process(es) of the affiliate? | Supervisory Board: In May 2019, the 6th Supervisory Board of Wikimedia Germany established a Diversity Working Group with the aim of increasing the number of women on the Supervisory Board. You will find an overview of the working group's findings and recommendations, which the Supervisory Board decided to implement on December 7, 2019, on this page: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_Deutschland/Pr%C3%A4sidium/Diversit%C3%A4t_im_Pr%C3%A4sidium
Staff Leadership:An internal working group “Diversity, Equity, Inclusion and Belonging” made of staff members is currently in charge of analysing and mapping how diverse and inclusive WMDE currently is, as a first step to eventually take additional actions if needed. | |
Universal Code of Conduct compliance
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| How does the affiliate leadership ensure, enforce, and evaluate compliance with the Universal Code of Conduct obligations? | The Universal Code of Conduct applies to all events organized by Wikimedia Deutschland. It is communicated to all participants and its compliance is ensured by a trained team on-site.
Additionally, a concept for respectful interaction has been developed for events sponsored or conducted by WMDE onsite, which is currently under review. For WMDE-sponsored online events, the rules for video conferences apply. This page gives an overview of the rules, guidelines, and behavioral instructions that are relevant for WMDE-sponsored or WMDE-organized on- and offline-events: https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikimedia_Deutschland/Community-Portal/%C3%9Cber_WMDE/Selbstverst%C3%A4ndnis_Communityzusammenarbeit | |
| Engagement and Collaboration | ||
| Please share the publicly available records of regular meetings, activities, events, or conference in the past year where the affiliate has participated. | See our annual report: https://www.wikimedia.de/2024/en/annual-report-2024/ | |
| Community connection | ||
| How many affiliate members are active contributors to the Wikimedia projects? | The way this question is formulated doesn’t reflect the reality of Wikimedia Deutschland’s work and membership structure. Also, we don't match real names of our members against their user names in the projects and can’t accurately answer this question. | |
| How many affiliate members are not active contributors to the Wikimedia projects? | The way this question is formulated doesn’t reflect the reality of Wikimedia Deutschland’s work and membership structure. Also, we don't match real names of our members against their user names in the projects and can’t accurately answer this question. | |
| How many affiliate members are active organizers (of projects, events, conferences, initiatives, etc) within the Wikimedia movement? | The way this question is formulated doesn’t reflect the reality of Wikimedia Deutschland’s work and membership structure. Also, we don't match real names of our members against their user names in the projects, we can’t accurately answer this question. | |
| How many people have participated in affiliate projects, events, conferences, and/or initiatives in the past year? | Please note that the following numbers reflect only the work of our Community & Engagement department and do not represent the full scope of WMDE’s projects and initiatives.
In 2024, Wikimedia Deutschland’s C&E department supported 997 community-led initiatives, including 257 projects who benefited to more than 2000 participants. You can find more information about our programmes in our annual reporthttps://www.wikimedia.de/2024/en/annual-report-2024/: https://www.wikimedia.de/2024/en/annual-report-2024/ | |
| Partnerships and collaboration | ||
| Please list all activities/initiatives that the affiliate has organized or co-organized in past 12 months. | An overview of the activities and initiatives that the organization has organized or co-organized over the past year can be found in our 2024 Annual Report: https://www.wikimedia.de/2024/en/annual-report-2024/ | |
| What would affiliate leadership list as the top 3 (three) capacities of the affiliate? (e.g. evaluation, community governance, programs and events, organizational governance and resource policies, conflict management, partnerships, fundraising, communication and media relations, contributor development, on-wiki technical skills, policy advocacy, etc) | Our focus capacities in 2024 were our three focus areas (see our annual report): 1. Volunteer support | |
| 2. Parameters for Free Knowledge | ||
| 3. Technology | ||
| What are the 3 (three) capacities that the affiliate would like to strengthen in the next 12 months? | Wikimedia Deutschland’s Supervisory Board, Executive Board, and staff, with the support of our members, have committed to achieving five strategic priorities until 2030, which are defined in our Strategic Direction 2030: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_Deutschland/Strategic_Direction_2030/en
Our five priorities are:
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| Strategic goals were set for each of these priorities between September 2023 and October 2024: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_Deutschland/Plan_2025/en | ||
| The strategic goals form the basis for our planning for 2025: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_Deutschland/Plan_2025/en | ||
| What are the organizations, community projects, or groups that the affiliate had been working or seeking to work with to develop and support the 3 capacities? | To implement our strategic priorities, Wikimedia Deutschland closely works together with community members and organizations from the Wikimedia Movement, as well as partner organizations from the larger ecosystem of free knowledge, including GLAM institutions.
You can find further information about specific partnerships in our annual report: https://www.wikimedia.de/2024/en/annual-report-2024/ | |