User:Esquivalience/Clerking

Clerking in general
There are three Wikipedia processes that are maintained by a certain group of editors called clerks:


 * the Arbitration Committee (/Clerks)
 * Sockpuppet investigations (/SPI/Clerks)
 * Contributor copyright investigations (/Instructions)

Most processes can be solely overseen by the community and admins (e.g. Articles for deletion) or editors with a certain user right (e.g. the edit filter). But there are a few complex processes that become anarchic when community-managed.

Background
The Arbitration Committee ("ArbCom"), sockpuppet investigations (SPI), and contributor copyright violations (CCI) have one thing in common: they are among the most complicated or serious processes on Wikipedia.
 * ArbCom regularly deals with disputes that the community cannot resolve. It is the last resort venue for behavioral dispute resolution. It is also prone to trolling and filibustering by editors, involved or uninvolved.
 * Sockpuppetry is hard to deal with. Any sockmaster can evade a block and conceal their sockpuppets with ease. Some have even spent years or decades playing cat-and-mouse with Wikipedia.
 * Using copyrighted material without prior permission exposes contributors to Wikimedia sites to legal liability. If copyright violations are incorrectly dealt with, it could even expose the Wikimedia Foundation to lawsuits.

Basically, there are some processes that ...
 * need oversight by editors experienced in the most sensitive aspects of Wikipedia (such as dispute resolution)
 * are prone to disruption, trolling, or otherwise inappropriate participation from editors, new or experienced; and need editors to deal with such participation

The role of clerks
Clerks either oversee or assist in the oversight of a process. They are editors in good-standing who are experienced with Wikipedia and the process.

This fulfills or contributes towards the above needs. Clerks ...
 * are experienced with the area they are clerking, so the general community, most inexperienced with the area, is relieved of the burden to manage complex processes. In some cases, the lack of a system or sub-process of oversight with community consensus has adversely affected complex processes.
 * are allowed by the community to revert disruption or trolling. In community-managed processes, even admin intervention in seemingly-uncontroversial cases of disruption may result in objection and feuds at forums of grievance.

Note that in the three mentioned processes, clerks only play a supporting role.

Requests for adminship
It is been generally accepted for more than a decade that RfA subjects its candidates and participants to a hostile environment. We have promoted about 20 admins in 2015. This may seem like a lot to the casual editor, but at RfA's peak in 2007, we promoted 407 admins – nearly $1⁄3$ of our current admin count – and there were an average of 3 RfAs per day. Nowadays, having more than three candidates per month at RfA would require a miracle or solution.

Causes, forms, and consequences of hostility in RfAs
Many blame the process.

However, it is not the process that causes hostility. Processes cannot attack participants or candidates, but it is a minority of the participants that attack and stress the candidate and other participants. The types of disruption in RfAs include, but are not limited to:
 * Trolling – abusing RfA for emotional benefit
 * Vituperation – attacking or harassing candidates or voters
 * Vandalism – usually committed by IPs and SPAs
 * Malice – voting maliciously

Hostility seems like it can easily be dealt with at RfAs. After all, there are more than 400 active admins willing to revert and block. However, admin intervention at RfAs has led to objection and feuds. Usually, it is the same disruptive minority who make disruption at RfA a pain to deal with. Indeed, there is no definite community consensus regarding dealing with disruptive participants. This results in wasted time and declining participant morale.

Note that this is in no way targeting good-faith editors with higher standards at RfA. This targets those who think that the usual standards of decorum and order do not apply in RfAs.

Clerking
Back to the first section on clerking. Most processes can be managed by the community or admins. However, RfA is a serious process that is prone to disruption by even experienced editors. Admins have a hard time their tools to combat disruption at RfA; they'll be accused of violating consensus by the disruptive minority and even hauled to AN/ANI. Since there is no consensus on dealing with disruptive participants, editors in general can only easily tackle the most obvious disruption. Also because of this lack of consensus, uninvolved editors and admins willing to deal with disruption are unable to boldly deal with disruption in RfAs; when the disruptive minority challenge these editors, they are unable to cite anything except WP:IAR, which leads to more interrogation.

By allowing a group of editors to clerk RfAs, the disruptive minority can be dealt with easily. All clerk actions are "act first, ask questions later" instead of "wrestle first, act later", so participants and the candidate would not be stressed by disruption.

Clerks would also assist in the running of RfAs, moving long debates to the talk page and keeping RfAs well-oiled and orderly.

Proposal

 * This page is not the page to discuss the finer details, a new subpage will be created if this proposal is accepted by the community in principle. To avoid overwhelming participants, the second RfC should be advertised two weeks after the closing of this RfC, if successful.

I propose a system of clerking in RfA discussions. Clerks should attempt to maintain a peaceful environment in RfAs, countering disruption and maintaining disruptions. Basically, clerks should lessen the stress on RfA candidates and good-faith participants.

Clerks should act in behalf of the general good-faith community, maintaining RfA pages and dealing with disruptive participants. "Clerks" do not have to be an elite or static group of editors; there can be a consensus allowing any editor to clerk RfAs or even to perform the occasional clerking task.

Clerk tasks
In principle, clerks should improve the environment at RfA. Thus, all their actions will be geared towards maintaining RfA and combating disruption.

This is not the page to argue over the specific responsibilities of clerks. Possible clerk tasks include (from least to most contentious):
 * informing voters about events that may potentially change their vote
 * maintaining RfA pages, moving long discussions to the talk page
 * close heated threads that are diverging from the RfA
 * reverting trolls and disruptive editors
 * removing incivil votes and comments or asking the editors who make these comments to redact their incivility
 * removing blatantly inappropriate votes

Clerk accountability
Clerks must be accountable to the community. The following basic provisions will be present in the clerking guideline:


 * Clerks must be uninvolved with the candidate. If a clerk was involved in any past conflicts with the candidate, or otherwise is involved with the candidate, then they must not clerk their RfA. This also applies to clerk actions that affect participants that a clerk is involved with. Clerks may not vote in RfAs they are clerking.
 * It will only require a small consensus to revert clerk actions. In general, about three reasoned good-faith arguments against a clerk action should result in the reversal of that action.
 * The final clerking guideline will set strict limits on the clerk's powers.

Q: Will editors who have higher standards at RfA be affected?
 * A: Those who have higher standards than other voters and oppose in good faith and constructively definitely will not be affected. However, editors who have exceedingly high standards in bad faith may have their votes struck if the community authorizes clerks in the second RfC to remove votes with the most frivolous rationales. For example, voters requiring 10 or even 20 thousand edits will not be affected; but voters who expect 100 thousand edits in bad faith may be affected if it passes.

Q: I oppose on RfAs more often than others; will clerking cause more "badgering" of my oppose votes?
 * Good-faith participants: No. Provided that you express your opinion of candidates in good-faith and with civility, clerks will not touch your vote. Although editors are free to request that to rethink one of your premises, if any of them personally attack you, clerks will strike that comment if the community is in favor of countering incivility in the second RfC.
 * Bad-faith participants: Your vote may be struck if the community authorizes striking of votes.

Q: Will this add any bureaucracy to the process?
 * A: It is up to editors to make an informed judgement about that, but it will add some degree of bureaucracy to the process. However, clerking will be kept as lightweight as possible.