Sudo room/Governance Structure

Final Proposal

Summary: Based on the Organizational Purpose below, under the following Organizational Structure, with a mode for individual participation through Qualificiations for Membership below, this proposal is to draft by-laws (or equivalently articles of association, etc) to be ratified through a Compact with at least 23 members (as membership is defined below) which is to be drafted by Monday July 23rd 2012, and approved, if possible, by Tuesday July 31st, 2012.

Organizational purpose

• Sudo Room is an association of individuals established to open and collectively support a hacker space under the definition here and with values articulated here, i.e.:
  • Sudo Room is an open, non-hierarchical, collaborative community of humans, including tech developers, citizen scientists, activists, artists--and all combinations in between and beyond!--who are interested in and working towards social change. Our goal is to create the first inclusive, dedicated hackerspace in downtown Oakland, to share ideas and projects in citizen science, digital citizenship and literacy, environmental sustainability, community engagement, and self-government.
  • Sudo Room is committed to access, empowerment, transparency, and public/social good. Sudoers have a great diversity of interests and we emphasize respect and solidarity among ourselves and with others.
  • Sudo Room has the flexible agility to never wholly exclude possibilities, but instead, to give clear visions of some values over other values:
    1. Value open, public discourses over closed, proprietary processes.
    2. Value access and transparency over exclusivity.
    3. Value present concerns over hypotheticals, but respect visions of the future.
    4. Value community and interconnectivity over seclusion and territoriality.
    5. Value do-ocracy over bureaucracy

Organizational Structure

• Sudo Room is a collective, meaning there is horizontal democratic control and management of the organization, which is composed of all individual members. However, the group actively strives to substantially incorporate interested community participants and beneficiaries who are non-members.

Qualifications for Membership

• Membership is defined by fulfilling the following requirements:
  1. Contributing monthly dues (sliding-scale with respect to operating costs) or equivalent.
     • It is an express purpose of the group to keep membership rates low, and therefore accessible, as well as offer, when possible, alternatives to monetary contribution to suffice for monthly dues.
  2. A status of good standing with the organization.
     • Non-good standing includes any unresolved debts or substantial lapses in respecting the values of the organization and its members, up to the discretion of the collective.

Procedure

• Members must form draft By-Laws by Monday, July 23rd, 2012 in an effort to have them be ratified by at least 23 members by Tuesday, July 31st, 2012.

To-Be-Determined

This proposal suggests that any By-Laws should have analogs of the pieces above, plus resolution on:

• Any necessary or explicit roles.
• More generalized decision-making procedures, domains, formats, and frequencies.
• Membership disqualification conditions.
• Tax status.
• Means of dissolution.

Below this are DRAFTs that required major INPUT to form final version above

Resources

Research, background investigations, early ideas can go (and come from) here:

• Sudo_room/research
• Sudo_room/decisions
• Sudo_room

Draft

• Premise: A decision needs to be made. Why? Either a concern is raised, a goal is suggested, or a proposal is made.
• Step 1: Discuss at large in the group (with a time limit, and/or feedback can be gathered online instead of taking in-person meeting time).
• Step 2: A Senate takes this "raw material" and generates a proposal.
• Step 3: The Senate puts the proposal to the group for amendments & voting. We can do majority vote or total consensus. If the vote is a "no", the Senate goes back and drafts another proposal.
• End Result: A decision is made

The "Senate" Could be comprised of elected representatives (or volunteers, or super-volunteers). TBD.

Who makes up this Senate? And why them and not others? Are those not participating doing so because of disinterest and/or exclusion? Does this group of people constitute a representation of the whole body, however that is determined?

It is worth considering whether or not there should be checks and balances between the Senate and the whole body in terms of decision-making. Perhaps the people on the Senate developing an idea or proposal should be separated to some extent from the decision process, in order to avoid undue influence?

Could this be another form of sudo group? Would we convene different councils for different issues or is it always the same people, rotating out every month or year? It's important to have a way for people to organically form the groups that bring proposals at least some of the time. This allows new users with good ideas to bubble up.

Blocking

I'm seeing that the tool of "blocking" can be used in consensus voting, but some groups think of it more as a nuclear option (hence the opportunity to offer amendments and give feedback). This is something else for us to figure out.

in different existing models, a blocker is variously:

• required to help the proposers rework the proposal
• required to have a fundamental moral issue with the proposal or otherwise defend their block in debate or gain supporters for their position
• required to have membership or other status
• perhaps here, required to block in correct stage of detail?

Brief Alternate Ideas for Making Decisions

Questions that can be answered by draft governance structures

Who is a voting member?

Who can bring a proposal/how do proposals get brought?

How do proposals get debated/edited/discussed?

Who votes on proposals (related: synchronous or asynchronous voting)?

What amount of agreement is necessary for a proposal to pass (unanimity, majority, etc.) (related: different amounts of agreement necessary for different kinds of proposals)?

Alternate Draft 1

Who is a voting member? Anyone who considers themselves a member can vote.

Who can bring a proposal/how do proposals get brought? Anyone can bring a proposal.

How do proposals get debated/edited/discussed? Proposals are brought up on a given week and discussed. Additional discussions and edits take place on the wiki during the week. Following week's meeting includes discussions and final edits to the proposal (maybe cap discussions and editing per proposal at X # minutes?).

Who votes on proposals (related: synchronous or asynchronous voting)? Voting is open online for a week and at the following week's meeting online numbers are added to in-person numbers.

What amount of agreement is necessary for a proposal to pass (unanimity, majority, etc.) (related: different amounts of agreement necessary for different kinds of proposals)? This can work with unanimity, majority, etc.

Alternate Draft 2

Who is a voting member? Anyone who shows up at meetings is a voting member.

Who can bring a proposal/how do proposals get brought? Anyone who shows up at a meeting.

How do proposals get debated/edited/discussed? Proposals are brought up on a given week and discussed. Additional discussions and edits take place on the wiki during the week with a final proposal presented at the following week's meeting.

Who votes on proposals (related: synchronous or asynchronous voting)? Only in-person votes that week count.

What amount of agreement is necessary for a proposal to pass (unanimity, majority, etc.) (related: different amounts of agreement necessary for different kinds of proposals)? This can work with unanimity, majority, etc.

Alternate Draft 3

Who is a voting member? Anyone who pays monthly membership.

Who can bring a proposal/how do proposals get brought? Anyone can bring proposals.

How do proposals get debated/edited/discussed? This can work with the two week proposal introduction/voting system.

Who votes on proposals (related: synchronous or asynchronous voting)? Members can vote on proposals

What amount of agreement is necessary for a proposal to pass (unanimity, majority, etc.) (related: different amounts of agreement necessary for different kinds of proposals)? This can work with unanimity, majority, etc.

Alternate Draft 4

Who is a voting member? Anyone who pays monthly membership.

Who can bring a proposal/how do proposals get brought? Only members can bring proposals.

How do proposals get debated/edited/discussed? This can work with the two week proposal introduction/voting system.

Who votes on proposals (related: synchronous or asynchronous voting)? Only members can vote on proposals.

What amount of agreement is necessary for a proposal to pass (unanimity, majority, etc.) (related: different amounts of agreement necessary for different kinds of proposals)? This can work with unanimity, majority, etc.

Alternate Draft 5

Who is a voting member?

Who can bring a proposal/how do proposals get brought?

How do proposals get debated/edited/discussed?

Who votes on proposals (related: synchronous or asynchronous voting)?

What amount of agreement is necessary for a proposal to pass (unanimity, majority, etc.) (related: different amounts of agreement necessary for different kinds of proposals)?