User:Shemley1823/2016 Senegalese constitutional referendum/MaximilianP23 Peer Review

General info

 * Whose work are you reviewing?

Shemley1823


 * Link to draft you're reviewing
 * https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User:Shemley1823/2016_Senegalese_constitutional_referendum&veaction=edit&preload=Template%3ADashboard.wikiedu.org_draft_template&redirect=no


 * Link to the current version of the article (if it exists)
 * 2016 Senegalese constitutional referendum

Lead
The lead has a minor update to also include turnout, as well as to add a bit more precision to the margin of the result. The lead concisely and clearly describes the topic of the article, and it is certainly not overly detailed. The one major thing I would consider adding would be a summary of what the constitutional referendum was intended to do. As is, we don't see anything about the actual content of the amendments, just the results of the referendum on it. Technically, the article is about the referendum, but the new content you added in remainder of the article relates to the text of the amendment themselves, so a reflection of that in some way in the lead would be nice.

Content and organization
All the added content appears relevant and up-to-date. All content seems relevant, and this article expansion would be a valuable contribution to Wikipedia and to the filling of an equity gap. I have a few suggestions for content for specific sections, but my main recommendation overall is to explain each of the amendments in more detail, so readers have more context for what each amendment would actually do.

Background
The background section could probably benefit from some touching up. First of all, there's the simple matter of formatting: starting around amendment four, there are new line breaks added in at regular intervals in the middle of sentences. This is easy to fix — just delete the new line breaks — but it's still worth pointing out just in case. Also on the matter of punctuation and format, given this section is written as one single, long, continuous sentence, it may be a good idea to add semicolons at the end of each amendment explanation.

I also noticed French words made their way into this section, particularly for amendments one and three. I don't think the original French terms are very necessary. Perhaps you can keep the French translation of High Council of Local Authorities if you want, but a rogue démocratique just seems a bit random. I'd also check for other typos throughout, like "resources natural" in amendment four. Given the source you cited was in French, I imagine you simply translated it and accidentally preserved the original's noun-adjective word order, so it's worth just taking another glance at it for that.

I think there is unnecessarily complicated language in this section. I had to google what a quinquennium (amendment six) was, which is great for expanding vocabularies, but not for making topics more accessible to a broad audience. I would go back through this section and find synonyms for complicated words that might confuse readers and replace them with something that could be easier to read.

I think it would be a good idea to explain what some of these terms mean in more detail. What is an "organic law" (amendment ten)? What new powers did the National Assembly get to monitor government action (amendment nine)? How were the principles of decentralization and deconcentration constitutionalized (amendment fourteen)? How was the duty of the citizen consecrated (amendment five)? This section reads more like a top-line summary of amendments, published by the government or supporters of the slate of amendments, but it does not go into much detail about what the exact changes would do. If this section is simply a direct translation of the source you cited here, I would clearly mark it as a block quote (perhaps in a section labelled "Text of amendments" or "Summary" or something of the like), then add explanations for the summaries in a separate section.

If you do implement these ideas, you might even be able to shift the background section into the lead, particularly if you make the summaries even more concise and leave the details for your explanation sections.

Shortening of term and deputies abroad
"Shortening of term" is a valuable section, but it is only one sentence long. How long was the presidential term before this amendment went into effect? Amendment six says it would restore the quinquennium, so would it be valuable to include any details about how long the non-quinquennium term length has been in place or why it was changed from five years in the first place?

"Deputies abroad" is another very valuable section. I didn't quite understand how the constituencies were defined, but I talk about that in more detail in my images and media section. I'd also recommend adding more context about how the process actually works. If I'm a Senegalese citizen living in the United States, would I be eligible to vote for nine seats (one America seat and eight global constituencies)?

The reason why I grouped my feedback for these two sections together is because I feel like they could help accomplish what I mentioned I was hoping for at the end of the background subsection. Both of these sections address a specific amendment (six and eight, respectively) and do a great job of explaining the amendments themselves or the context behind them. If you're willing to make similar subsections for other amendments, I think most, if not all, could really benefit from the sort of additional information you wrote so well here.

Backlash
Similarly to the shortening of term and deputies abroad sections, I think this section could be folded into a more comprehensive set of explanations of each amendment. I also think it would be valuable to expand and contextualize this section more. Why did the PDS think the increase in seats was absurd? How did President Sall postpone the implementation of the shortened term amendment? (This part would also combine very well with your preexisting shortening of term section.) Why was the Senate so bad, and why do some people not want to see it come back? Can you give more specific concerns for why people think a secular government in a Muslim-majority country could be worrisome? What specific worries do folks have? (Also, this applies to the "organization" bit of "content and organization," but why is including the French translation of "secularity" necessary?) And you mentioned "other points of controversy" for other amendments, but you never explain what those points of controversy are. Could you do that?

Results
The results section of the original article was not included in your sandbox, but I assume this is just because you plan to keep it as is. If this is the case, good work. If not, of course, I'd recommend keeping it, since it shows raw vote count totals, which aren't included elsewhere in your revised article.

Tone and balance
One big question I have relates to the background section. Did you simply translate the source you had into English? If so, might the source be biased? I think that if you have a topline summary of all the changes, then explain each amendment in more detail, which would hopefully also include arguments in favor and against (i.e., backlash) for any controversial amendments, I think I'd feel more comfortable about this. As is, some language does seem quite positive but vague, without giving any real justification for why it's so positive. I'm looking at amendments like one, five, seven, and fifteen in particular here. You don't seem to attempt to persuade, although I would note you didn't say anything about how the president justified postponing the five-year-term amendment, despite mentioning it in two different sections. Even if it seems like a dubious explanation, I would recommend saying something like "President Sall justified this decision by saying X, while critics raised doubts because Y," to make sure you're covering all sides to a debate, even if you're not covering all sides as equal. Other than that, though, I thought your content had a good tone and good balance, particularly for the shortening of term, deputies abroad, and backlash sections.

Sources and references
I noticed source three was written entirely in French. It is an excellent source and should be included, but I believe sources in languages that are different from the language of the Wiki (in this case, English) should be marked as such. As an example, I pulled this example source from the English Wikipedia article on Oleśnica, Poland."Sula, Dorota (2010). 'Jeńcy włoscy na Dolnym Śląsku w czasie II wojny światowej'. Łambinowicki rocznik muzealny (in Polish). Opole. 33: 68."I noticed you did do this for source one, but since the French-language tag on that source was a holdover from the original article, so I wanted to flag your attention to this (fairly minor) issue for your new source.

I noticed you did not seem to have a bibliography page in your sandbox, but you did use a variety of good, reliable, detailed, and relevant sources, and your links seemed to work fine and to relate to the content you were citing the sources for.

Images and media
I know you didn't add any images or media, but for the deputies abroad section, I wonder if you could. Does "America" relate specifically to the United States, or to the entire Western Hemisphere? Do voters in Europe get to vote for two seats each, or do voters in, for example, Western Europe get to vote for different candidates than voters living in Central or Eastern Europe? If so, which areas get to vote for which seat? Similarly, do voters in Africa outside Senegal get to vote for four seats each, or, for example, do voters in North, South, East, and West Africa all have different slates of candidates to select from? Also, what countries are included in "Asia and the Middle East"? And do all voters abroad get to vote for all eight global constituencies, or are they broken up in a specific way? If there are any additional geographic boundaries for these constituencies beyond what you already mentioned, I think it might be a bit complicated to explain the exact borders of each constituency, but it could be valuable for readers to understand how the deputies abroad system works. In this way, if it is complicated, it might be valuable to include a map, with each constituency highlighted in its own color. If the map would simply be a map of continents, perhaps that would not be as valuable, but if there are specific sub-continental single-deputy constituencies, I think it could be valuable, if you're willing to take it on. (And from what I understand, I do think creating a custom world map is not nearly as intimidating as it might seem on Wikipedia, but I'm sure it'll be impressive if you decide to do it! If it does prove to be too much of a technical challenge, however, or if it wouldn't really add much at all, you're of course welcome to say no-thanks on this recommendation, just like all of the ones I've been making.)

Overall impressions
I'm sorry if my comments come across as a negative Nellie. Overall, I think this is a solid draft. There are certainly areas where I feel the draft could be improved, but overall, a lot of it is either simple stuff you could handle via proofreading or just a request to keep writing the sorts of explanations you've already started writing. I think you're on a good track, and I'm confident you'll have a great article by the time you're done.