[sudo-discuss] Fwd: Re: conflict resolution proposal

Forwarding message that failed to go through. ---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: "rachel lyra hospodar" <rachelyra(a)gmail.com> Date: Mar 9, 2013 12:03 PM Subject: Re: [sudo-discuss] conflict resolution proposal To: <di.franco(a)aya.yale.edu> Cc: "Eddan Katz" <eddan(a)eddan.com>om>, "Marina Kukso" <marina.kukso(a)gmail.com>om>, "sudo-discuss" <sudo-discuss(a)lists.sudoroom.org> Responses inline below mediumreality.com On Mar 9, 2013 11:25 AM, "Anthony Di Franco" <di.franco(a)gmail.com> wrote: as conceived better, I find the name change compelling because it is not a re-naming but an evolution, more reflective of my values and of those I would hope this organization espouses (ie, for those who exist as a priveleged class in a police state where entire other classes of people experience violence on the daily to be sensitive to what it might mean to invoke power, especially using a framing evocative of police power) You might think this is the same thing as what you have said above. I do not. according to a conceptual template associated with a name or an existing other role in another context, the name being mostly an afterthought, Our opinions on the power of language to expose bias, and reinforce it, differ. I disagree. You are missing my point. I believe the languaging of the documents we use to govern ourselves is not a distraction but in fact is their stuff of substance. buried deeper in the details. I disagree. from reframing and will read back over things myself with an eye toward them. I have given feedback on the languaging several times, essentially the same feedback. Hopefully the things I have said here to further explain will help. instead be Sudo Stewards of various kinds, perhaps with cheeky informal archaic titles as inside jokes of sorts, For our functionality, inside jokes & obfuscatory terms will serve the purpose of discouraging outsiders & newcomers from feeling like they belong. Our goal should be to decrease the learning curve for our governance structures. descriptively named. This would give more substance to the minor edits I made to the other roles and would be a good basis for splitting this change into two separate ones to consider. See below. light of the new framing, and see what else changes, rather than simply changing the title. see the preceding for my TL;DR Articles. wrote: around what else the role could be... for example, maybe someone from the community at large who wants to do, say, an unconference, could ask a sudo-ite to steward their event, ie, be a point of contact for the space? Or as our fundraising structure ramps up, projects could have a funding steward (also builds in accountability there!) that keeps an eye on the process and helps to clarify it. I know that's a ways down the road but honestly I have never seen a funding structure that was unconfusing, so I'll just go ahead and predict that ours might be, too. to make but is confused or intimidated by the process, a steward might be a good neutral ally who can help everything along before & during the meeting. ideas is part of the strength of that method?) wrote: where it remains is a bug. I would not mind it being summarily expunged from the draft wherever you find it. I generally went with "implementation" as a neutral term and made clear elsewhere that restorative remedies are strongly preferred. which seem to fit our situation well, from the very thorough wikipedia page about it. It is the best word I know of so far, but I too would like one that requires less up-front study of wikipedia to appreciate. wrote: marina! suggestion, with its problematic Enforcement language, into an Ombudspersonish solution, perhaps creating a sudo functionary role that is more flexible and applicable to a greater range of situations. streamline the articles, since overall to me they seem kind of opaque due to complexity & language. differences between unanimity, consensus, and voting, and which is used when. This could also include reaching clarity on how to get to the point where we are in consensus. about the denotations (ie, some of the stuff it actually says in the dictionary WRT the word) of 'constable' and 'enforcement' and am hoping we can come up with words less evocative of archaic and violent forms of social engineering. wrote: articles of association workshop sometime after this friday. we've tried these before and they were not super productive. i think that where we faltered before was in not having a very good list of "target areas" identified ahead of time. here's an example of a possible "target area": the sudo community] this?] will be held long? https://pad.riseup.net/p/sudoroom in-person feedback, and discuss. digital, in person, both, etc. also it seems like we're missing a step between receiving in person feedback, discussion etc,. and then having time to incorporate that feedback into a new text. in fact, maybe this was the source of the confusion yesterday?]" wrote: make: etc.) are clearly spelled out. it looks like what eddan is proposing below is the flowerings of an amendment to create a new thing to vote on - the creation of new roles. it would actually be accurate to instead say "consensus.") clearly laying out how we vote on things once we have something solid in place. from my perspective, we've been running into murky areas when trying to get to a solid decision that can be voted on (in the past, we've run into problems getting a single budget to vote on (this should be much resolved with our new budget sheet), getting a single conflict resolution decision to vote on (we're in the process of addressing this now), and getting a single amendment text to vote on). "reaching consensus" would be the catch-all way that we "get to a single decision to vote on" (i mean, what "consensus" really does is move away from the idea of having a single thing to vote up or down on), but i wonder if what we need is a little bit more defined structure on the process of reaching consensus, ie, working with others to draft amendments, etc.? we have some of that, but maybe we need more? maybe not even anything formal, but sort of "best practice"...what do others think? di.franco(a)gmail.com> wrote: conflict resolution should be considered separately from general decision procedures, and the old decision procedures should be moved out to a general decision-making scope, perhaps with sensible modifications, and the ones in my amendment specific to conflict resolution should apply within conflict resolution. an oversight in the original draft. wrote: relevant parts of the articles. approve the constable role by a 2/3 vote is based on (maybe this is a brand new suggestion?). new role. I laid out the questions below because I do think guidance on this falls in between the cracks somewhat and those questions are intended to get us to a conventionally understood agreement on it. the Articles together, but that we were convinced to remain silent on it in order to ensure that the number of official roles be kept to the minimum necessary. I also remembering that something about being silent on it didn't seem right at the time, but I hadn't been able to put my finger on it at the time. make amendments solely as guide, we must still figure out how to move forward when we hit a dead end or doesn't come out the way we had intended. There is some additional confusion caused by the the fact that this very section calls for a vote on the amendment, which is a different method than consensus. by vote? There are only 3 options - majority, super-majority (2/3), or unanimity. We intentionally did not include any voting requiring unanimity because of the problems introduced by single-person veto obstruction of what the group as a whole wants (while protecting minority opinion). think we should have any more additional roles - then the decision to never have any more roles fulfilling any functions is imposed on the group as a whole. This is a problem when a need for a particular role is identified and clearly agreed upon. But this is also a structural dynamic that would persist with any amendment on any issue introduced in the future. While the language-drafting process is more clear and offers practicable solutions, the approval of such an amendment is defaulting to being a unanimous vote for all future amendments. articles under the threshold of a compact, which is a minimum number (i.e., "coalition of the willing") rather than a percentage of the whole. Having watched some of the Republican house filibuster on C-SPAN last night, I shudder at the prospect of our entire initiative being held up at gun point by some zealot trying to manipulate the process for purposes other than solving the task at hand. constable role is a new suggestion. Having reached a dead end on approval (see above), I think that the kind of decision it is (dispute, fiscal solvency, membership, etc.) should guide the threshold by which the vote is decided. Reading the Amendment section in isolation without reference to any other part of the document leaves us highly vulnerable to being paralyzed (See current Republican-led Congress); and in my view can't really make sense. 2/3 is because this whole suggestion and the process we've embarked upon started with a pretty much universally shared distaste for how the conflict resolution process was turning out. The conversation focused around safe space initially and then was expanded some, but still closely connected to safe space. everyone feels free and encouraged to contribute, and where the system is set up specifically not to allow the loudest voices to drown out minority opinion and dissent. While the process moved us into the amendment drafting and approval section, I would argue that this situation and relevant considerations still most consistently falls under the notion of safe space, at least in my mind. different categories of issues are laid out can be interpreted to only be relevant to anything taking place in dispute resolution, I do not think that this interpretation allows us any guidance on how to make any other decision other than resolving disputes. In order to get something done, we would then be steering people to the dispute resolution process to work it out. All I can say to that is Oy Vey! language-drafting) should stay within the categories set out. At least that's what I thought we were doing when we forked it out that way. position be approved by a 2/3 vote and the language defining that role be drafted with a consensus process. plans for the creation of a new role and for making all other amendments to the articles. are you suggesting that this is how we do it this time around, or that this is something we should address in future amendments? decision about something in a more general sense for a vote, and working through the drafting process separately. I am not suggesting that though, because I think we'd be best served by making as narrow a decision as possible given that we haven't thought through other scenarios. involve officially adding functionary roles, but am not even advocating for that here. It seems to me like the best thing to do is recognize that it is definitely relevant for making a constable role, if not others as well. Our experience has shown that sometimes deliberative discussion veers off a productive process when there is no one assigned to pointing us to where we should go next. someone that makes sure we move forward in the process, I propose a 2/3 vote, under the Safe Space designated threshold. I still think we should call it an ombudsperson instead, but know that it is completely beside the point. body, dedicated as we are to a deliberative process, a point of contention arose around the process itself. The honest disagreement and confusion, as far as I understand it, is fundamentally about how we agree to approve the establishment of a position deputized to make sure the process is followed and make sure that conflicts move towards fair and efficient resolution. If the previous sentence makes some sense but also makes your head hurt, as it does mine, you won't be surprised to find out there was some confusion in this evening's meeting over what exactly we're supposed to do. announced last week, and it was agreed that Anthony has followed meticulous process as we have it laid out so far, giving everyone plentiful opportunity to discuss and object and to make available in-person and on-line opportunities to improve on the proposal. Discussion over the need for such a role has persistently come up that represented various points of view on several specific aspects of the proposal. Debate was halted at regular intervals to give the less aggressive and talkative folks (in addition to me) around an opportunity to interject; and everyone was reminded of the option for anonymous commenting on the etherpad and for direct editing on the wiki. This took place over a period of about 6 weeks and more, in as formal a method as we've made up along the way so far. is how to add a position to the Articles of Association by: (1) 2/3 vote; or must be done (2) by consensus. There are many other issues implied by this for sure, some of which have been brought up already and other conditionals still to be worked out. I also think re-hashing the play-by-play events of tonight would be unproductive and that considerations on the merits of the constable role be limited to high-level comments and would be best served without delving into too many details about the role. In other words, I'm suggesting we separate out the process by which we (a) find consensus on language amending the articles of association; and (b) decide on whether we need to add a Constable (or related functionary) role. some questions it seems to me need to be clarified in order to move forward: http://sudoroom.org/wiki/Articles_of_Association#Article_4._Amendments) say about the process by which we approve adding a functionary position? http://sudoroom.org/wiki/Articles_of_Association#Section_2.2_Sudo_Functiona…) say about how to amend the Articles to create another position? resolution process ( http://sudoroom.org/wiki/Articles_of_Association#Section_3.4_Enforcement) give us guidance on the process that should be followed in creating a new functionary role? http://sudoroom.org/wiki/Articles_of_Association#Sub-Section_3.40_Process) for approving the addition of a Constable (or equivalent) role be followed? http://sudoroom.org/wiki/Articles_of_Association#Sub-Section_3.0.1_Agenda) is the most appropriate category for adding a functionary role? http://sudoroom.org/wiki/Articles_of_Association#Values) in making these decisions? will say that I think consensus is not the right process by which the Constable role be approved. This being said, I do think that whatever language is drafted to amend the Articles to include this new role be done by consensus. Having a common understanding of how this ought to be done in detail is crucial, in my opinion, to avoid further misunderstandings and wide divergence of interpretation. I propose as I did at the meeting tonight that these two parts of the decision need to be disentangled for any progress to be made. Upon reflection, I would have presented that proposal differently and with more specific reference to the Articles. Suffice it to say that we're figuring out how to do this stuff in some ways we're not used to, and that we all have a lot to learn from each other. Constable (or equivalent) to the functionaries in the Articles, and that the vote require 2/3 approval, our highest threshold thus far. Since there are so many ancillary issues, I'd rather hear other Sudo folks' perspective before making too much of a case for this way of moving forward. Seems to me that the complications of getting to this vote make the greatest case for the need for such a role, to keep things moving in a productive direction. The constable (or ombudsperson as I had proposed), is not an ultimate judge of conflicts in my understanding. In fact, rotating ombudspeople and/or a jury of peers is more along the lines of what I've heard proposed. Rather, I think we need someone like a Constable to make sure we get unstuck when trying to resolve disputes and decide on things. di.franco(a)gmail.com> wrote: rigorous conflict resolution process and for the role of a Constable to facilitate the keeping of open and transparent records about conflicts and where their resolution stands. long and unsatisfactory non-process the group had just spent a lot of time in, and I presented a much briefer version of this proposal at last week's meeting. I intend to have it up for a vote at the next eligible meeting. the meeting and to think through a process that would capture the original intent of the sketchy previous language but flesh it out with comprehensive detail and precision, and I had firmly in mind the memories of the shortcomings of the old process in practice. While I was there mucking around in the articles I fixed a few other odd things that were lying around. (It also still seems to me that the numbering is off.) here: http://sudoroom.org/wiki/Articles_of_Association/Draft the Constable in particular: section 2.2: "Any member of sudoroom may perform any of the functions of any of the Functionaries, but the Functionaries are expected to perform their duties regularly and must perform them if no one else can or will." and section 3.4.1 below. according to the Articles, but not necessarily a moderator. conflicting parties and moderator. conflict resolution process. conflicting parties on a basis of mutual respect and growth towards better relationships and a stronger community. co-facilitates with Facilitator, and handles points of information about conflict resolution with reference to the documentation. is encouraged through informal process and the spirit of a collaborative environment. There is a process, however, by which issues that are not resolved informally and that arise within the scope of these articles of association: Constable in the matter, and works with this Constable to find a Mediator. consents to assist, and with whom all conflicting parties consent to work with towards a solution. maintains records of all meetings and relevant communications among the conflicting parties. to meet to work out a resolution to the conflict that all conflicting parties consent to. if at least one conflicting party is unavailable to meet in a reasonable time, all relevant circumstances considered, or if the Constable and Mediator agree after at least one meeting that further meetings would not be likely to lead to resolution, the issue is brought before the group in the following way: scheduled at least one week in the future, and all relevant documentation is gathered together by the Constable and made available to the group at least one week beforehand, preferably on the wiki, and notice is broadcast to the group, preferably on the mailing list, but information that would compromise anyone's privacy or dignity is not made public. In the description of the issue, the form of redress sought in by the plaintiff(s) is included. Both the Constable and Mediator must give their approval of the factual content of the documentation before it is posted. Both the Constable and Mediator must expressly affirm that the form of redress sought by the plaintiff(s) is consistent with sudo room's values. unresolved issues on the wiki are brought up for discussion followed by a vote. the issue. according to sudo room's values and the facts of the case. The category determines the voting threshold for sustaining a sanction against any party to the conflict. The categories are (in order of decreasing severity): redress is sought. each conflicting party and to the Mediator, and general discussion may be held about the issue if any member wishes. The Constable co-facilitates with the Facilitator in order to answer questions specific to the conflict and provides information about the history of the conflict by referring to the documentation. during which members are free to consider the issue or discuss it directly with others. conflict, which are added to a list of potential remedies if neither the Constable nor the Mediator objects. They may be overruled in their objections if a second member supports the proposal. and then alternative remedies are voted upon in the order they were proposed, but only if at least one member indicates that the one under consideration is still relevant. After all remedies have been considered in this way, the matter is considered resolved. an appeal on the agenda in the same way that conflicts are placed on the agenda, except that a majority of the group must vote to accept the appeal during a meeting, and the process begins anew. The appeal must propose an alternative remedy and refer to values that were not served by the original decision. passed during the current meeting in considering the conflict, any member may request that a majority vote be held on whether to table the conflict until the next meeting. Conflicts otherwise beyond reasonable doubt. consistently maintained. remedies. with, and recognizes speakers in a fair and inclusive way. decisions are made in the way described in these Articles of Association, by bearing them in mind and referring to them whenever needed. Association about how business is handled in meetings, but may be challenged in this by anyone who does not consent, which results in a majority vote on sustaining or overturning the Facilitator's judgment. include their notes in final meeting minutes. budget process below. group, using the group's accounts. to the group. according to the Articles, but not necessarily a moderator. conflicting parties and moderator. conflict resolution process. conflicting parties on a basis of mutual respect and growth towards better relationships and a stronger community. co-facilitates with Facilitator, and handles points of information about conflict resolution with reference to the documentation.