User:Skomorokh/ACEX

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The Arbitration Committee is a collective of volunteer editors responsible for conducting the arbitration process, for managing advanced permissions, and for handling sensitive project issues unfit for public discussion. Since July 2004, its members have been selected by community vote in annual elections taking place around December.[1] The elections, by practice on Wikimedia projects, are organised independently by the English Wikipedia community.

Organisation[edit]

Legacy structure

Three groups of editors are involved in the organisation of the elections:

  • Election coordinators— self-selected editors organising the on-wiki aspects of the election.
  • Election administrators— Wikimedia Foundation-identified editors who are responsible for liaising with scrutineers and system administrators to ensure the smooth functioning of the technical and private aspects of the election.
  • Scrutineers— volunteers drawn from the ranks of stewards whose contributions have primarily been on projects other than the English Wikipedia, who are tasked with verifying the integrity of the vote and tallying the outcome. The instructions for scrutineers are outlined here.
A Wikimedia system administrator may be required to assist with configuration if the voting is conducted using a software interface.[2]

The task of organisation rests with the Election Commission, a body of experienced and trusted English Wikipedia editors convened prior to each election. The Commission is responsible for:

  • Recruiting and liaising with any personnel necessary for conducting the election, such as independent scrutineers, system administrators, checkusers, and the volunteer co-ordinators who maintain the election pages.
  • Ensuring that the necessary election infrastructure, such as on-wiki pages and software extensions, are properly established, and that the parameters of the elections, including the voting mechanism, schedule, and conduct guidelines, are clearly documented.
  • Assessing whether candidate and voter eligibility criteria are satisfied and allocating ballot and voting access accordingly.
  • Determining resolutions in the event of discrepancies, issues not addressed fully here, and any other procedural matters arising in the course of the elections.

Editors who have volunteered to organise the elections, including commissioners, scrutineers, checkusers and co-ordinators are expected to remain impartial, and refrain from publicly expressing opinions on the merits of the candidates.

Schedule[edit]

Elections consist of four consecutive stages, as follows:

  1. Nomination period → during which interested eligible editors are invited to submit a candidate statement.
  2. Fallow period → set aside to ensure voters have enough time to discuss, assess and question the candidates to aid their deliberations.
  3. Voting period → during which eligible voters can vote on the candidates.
  4. Scrutineering period → during which votes are inspected (e.g. for duplicate, missing, and ineligible votes), and a tally of the results is compiled. Once the results are certified, the successful candidates are deemed elected to the Committee.

Vacancies and appointments[edit]

The annual elections are intended to replenish the membership of the Arbitration Committee such that all its seats are filled at the start of the following year, less any resignations or removals from the Committee of members between the opening of nominations and that time.[3]

The seats filled are those of arbitrators coming to the end of their term (i.e. those whose existing terms would not extend into the next year) as well as those of arbitrators with more than a year left on their terms whose resignation or removal from the Committee is publicly announced before the opening of nominations.

Vacant seats are filled by successful candidates in order of their level of support.[4] A candidate is deemed successful if they receive at least as many support votes as oppose votes (i.e. their support percentage is greater than or equal to 50%), and if the number of candidates with higher support levels than theirs does not equal or exceed the number of vacant seats.

The seats of outgoing arbitrators are filled first, with full two-year terms for those appointed. In the case of seats vacated by the resignation or removal from the Committee of an arbitrator with more than a year left on their terms, appointees receive one-year terms. If there are insufficient successful candidates to fill all vacant seats, the remaining seats are left empty. The terms of incoming arbitrators begin on the first day of the year following their election.

Eligibility[edit]

An editor is eligible to stand as a candidate who

(i) has a registered account which met the threshold for edits[5] before the opening of nominations,
(ii) is in good standing and not subject to active blocks or site-bans,
(iii) credibly asserts that they meet the Wikimedia Foundation's criteria for access to non-public data and that they are willing to identify to the Foundation if elected,
(iv) has included in their nomination statement a full and unequivocal disclosure of all accounts they have edited the English Wikipedia from.[6]

An editor is eligible to vote who

(i) has a registered account which met the threshold for edits[5] before the opening of nominations,
(ii) is not blocked from – or evading a block or sanction on – the English Wikipedia while casting their vote, and
(iii) does not attempt to vote with more than one account.

Votes cast by editors who are found to be ineligible to vote before the end of the scrutineering period will be struck. Editors who are found to be ineligible to stand as candidates, at any time during the elections or before the elected arbitrators have assumed their seats, will have their candidacies suspended. In exceptional cases, editors whose eligibility is in question, for instance those who meet the spirit of the criteria but not the letter, can appeal to the Election Commission.[7]

Pre-election considerations[edit]

Efforts at reaching consensus to alter or establish novel procedures for an election should be concluded 30 days before nominations open.

Footnotes[edit]

  1. ^ Arbitrators were initially appointed by Jimbo Wales before the institution of community elections. As enumerated by Wikipedia:Arbitration Committee/History, there have been nine such elections since: July 2004, December 2004, January 2006, December 2006, December 2007, December 2008, December 2009, December 2010, December 2011.
  2. ^ Since the 2009 election, voting has been conducted privately using the SecurePoll extension.
  3. ^ A 2011 Request for Comment established that the Arbitration Committee is to be composed of 15 members, reduced from the previous figure of 18.
  4. ^ Support percentages are calculated using the metric (Support / (Support + Oppose)); "No vote" preferences have no effect whatsoever.
  5. ^ a b In the 2011 election, prospective voters and candidates were required to have made 150 mainspace edits before November 1, 2011.
  6. ^ The sole exception is in the case of a legitimate former or alternate account which the Arbitration Committee has publicly confirmed that the candidate has justified privacy concerns to warrant non-disclosure of.
  7. ^ Such cases could include variants on the following:
    • In the 2008 election, it was unsuccessfully argued that an editor who could only meet the voter eligibility criteria if the contributions of two of their accounts were counted should be deemed eligible.
    • In the 2011 elections, a candidate who could not disclose all accounts they had edited from was nevertheless allowed to stand.
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