User talk:Elinruby/Archives/2022/August

Clarification
Just to clarify that on the Avisa Partners talk page, I'm giving summaries of what I know you can read yourself in French sans le moindre problème, because en.Wikipedians who are non-French speakers have to be given reasonable access to understanding what we're discussing. Of course, they'll need auto-translators (or human translators) to access most of the sources themselves. Boud (talk) 00:19, 2 August 2022 (UTC)


 * Yep. Preferring English language sources for that reason. Here’s one that does say dictator] btw Elinruby (talk) 00:36, 2 August 2022 (UTC)


 * uncertain of Reliability, don’t see About US — but does use the wording Elinruby (talk) 00:41, 2 August 2022 (UTC)


 * Looks reliable says dictator p. 87 Elinruby (talk) 00:46, 2 August 2022 (UTC)


 * don’t know source but looks reliable offhand, does say dictator Elinruby (talk) 00:50, 2 August 2022 (UTC)


 * older AP article, does say dictator Elinruby (talk) 00:54, 2 August 2022 (UTC)


 * Another that says dictator Elinruby (talk) 01:00, 2 August 2022 (UTC)


 * More: Elinruby (talk) 01:04, 2 August 2022 (UTC)

Well, the actual discussion of sources related to the article should probably go over there ... :), since it's not our "private" discussion. But since we're in User: space, I'll just say that personally, rather than decide if Nguesso is a dictator or not, I would find it more useful for encyclopedic purposes - and for the people who most need encyclopedic, RS'd information - to create missing pages like Law of the Republic of Congo that is missing at Template talk:Africa topic or Constitutional Court of the Republic of Congo. It's institutions that are the most significant in political and human rights changes, even if individuals attract more attention, and sometimes play key roles. Anyway, make an edit if you feel the sources are strong enough and we should probably return to discussing on the talk page over there... Boud (talk) 01:09, 2 August 2022 (UTC)


 * good suggestion. I will move these over in a while; I am still nibbling around the edges and multitasking, but this is one of the things I am multitasking on ;) this just jumped out at me because I did a deep dive on corrupt West African dictators at one point. It’s a side issue, but also conventional wisdom. What’s more interesting is why he was a client. Trying to bury stories about corruption, or get more aid? Elinruby (talk) 01:17, 2 August 2022 (UTC)

Sneak preview
Hi, Elinruby, as I think you know, I love finding gaps in our coverage and filling them, like we did with Liberation of France. Even though we have 6-point-whatever million articles, there are still significant topics that have not been directly addressed yet. It's almost hard to believe that the LoF article didn't exist before we created it. Another such was War guilt question, which I had a great time with, and really learned a lot while working on it. These "gap topics" don't come up very often, but I think I've found another one. Just as a teaser, it also relates to France during the period surrounding WW II, including just before and after. As was the case with Liberation of France, for this new topic I have in mind, it's not that the information is covered nowhere in Wikipedia; there are bits and pieces of it all over the place. It's very much like LoF in that respect, which contains portions copied from dozens of articles (reminder: see the collapsed attribution banner on the talk page). But, Lof is still a new topic, not handled in any of those other articles. It gets a few hundred pageviews a day, which is nice to see.

This new topic I have in mind is somewhat like that, in the sense that it's an important topic about French history of the 20th century, with bits and pieces all over, but no one article addresses the topic directly. I think it would be a helpful addition, and I would enjoy collaborating with you on it if you were interested. (I realize I'm being a bit mysterious, but it's in an inchoate state, and I need to organize my thoughts about it first.) I think the effort involved would be significant, perhaps half that of LoF, so a couple of months in Draft, probably (that's a wild guess). I'm in the early stages of coming up with a scope and design for the article and a possible section organization, and it might take me a a week before I have anything concrete to discuss. If in principle you might be interested, let me know. Mathglot (talk) 08:33, 30 July 2022 (UTC)


 * sure Elinruby (talk) 09:35, 30 July 2022 (UTC)
 * Great, I'll get back to you when I have something concrete. Stay tuned... Mathglot (talk) 16:53, 30 July 2022 (UTC)
 * On the way to getting to that topic, I translated a List article from fr-wiki; it's here: Draft:List of political systems in France. It will be a good "See also" for the new topic, and it contains a handy table that should help in a lot of French history and government related articles, including the one I have in mind. No references yet, because the original didn't have any, plus I haven't double-checked all the links, yet. But have a look, I find it really useful. Mathglot (talk) 09:14, 31 July 2022 (UTC)


 * systems? Not parties? Ok not to answer, I will look. Incidentally I translated one of the ILLs at Liberation of France recently - I forget the name, but one of the Vichy army units, although apparently the Germans didn’t like the idea of circumventing the Armistice Army that way and put a stop to it Elinruby (talk) 19:30, 31 July 2022 (UTC)
 * ooo. Yes, that’s quite interesting. Of course, I’n somebody who used the fall of the Third Republic to explain to somebody why Mike Pence wouldn’t leave the Capitol, so maybe I am a constitutional law nerd ;) Why are you disputing the neutrality of Free France, btw? Elinruby (talk) 19:40, 31 July 2022 (UTC)
 * Definitely systems and not parties. And not military, either. It's important to understand what the topic is, and what it isn't; and in particular, it is *not* a timeline of French kings and emperors and prime ministers and presidents; none of that would be on-topic there; even Clovis or Napoleon or De Gaulle's name should never be mentioned (unless directly related to a major invention or system of government change, which *could* happen in an explanatory note, but not in a table row). It's attempting to show changes in *systems* of government, and that's it. One for the US would be very short, which is why it doesn't exist, probably: U.S: 1492–1607 anarchy or local self-rule(?); 1607–1776 colonies under foreign rule, 1776–present: federal republic; end of table. France's situation is so much more complex, which makes it worthwhile (and interesting) to have an article about it. It's already helped me, to help organize my thinking about some other articles.
 * Where it falls down, is sourcing, and perhaps some arbitrariness in the top few rows. I'm (vaguely) familiar with Clovis, Merovingians, etc. but couldn't tell you the difference off the top of my head between Federal monarchy and Feudal monarchy, or why "Federal monarchy" has a hatnote telling you "not to be confused with Federated monarchy. (Sign me, "confused".) The first row in the French table lists 481-987 lists it as a "Monarchie fédérative" (which redirects to "fr:État fédéral"), so did I pick the wrong article in translating that as "Federal monarchy" and not "Federated monarchy"? Maybe so (could use your help, there, if you feel like disentangling those three similarly named monarchy-based systems).
 * As to the arbitrariness point: who picked the dates 481-987 for the first row anyway? I get that those two dates are individually important and why, and I don't need sources for them; what I don't see, is how do we know that the entire five-century period could all be described as "Monarchie fédérative" (however we end up translating that) and wasn't interrupted by some other system? Is their one source that discusses that whole period as corresponding to one system, or did the article's creator, maybe correctly based on their expert knowledge or something, just stuff that in there kind of arbitrarily? I think we need one reference in each cell of column one, just to cover the political system and the date range; there are sufficient hyperlinks in other cells to make them verifiable, imho.  Anyway, sourcing column one would be my top priority at this point, and we *have* to get at least three sources before we release it out of Draft, so that is my short term goal. If you can help with sourcing the column one cells, that would be ideal.
 * P.S. I'm thinking of using an unconventional sourcing style in order to avoid having to add citations inside the cells, and causing the cells or rows to get wider. Instead, I may put all the citations at the bottom, WP:LDR-style, but without even a bracketed number in the cell itself. I think we can retain full verifiability by adding all the citations at the bottom, clearly identified, e.g.: "Row 1: Federal monarchy 481-987: cite book, and so on. P.P.S., Love the Third Republic/Mike Pence example!
 * There's one other issue with the table, which relates to Vichy; I already opened a Talk section about it, but I consider that low priority, and it may never get solved. That's the one related to the neutrality tag you asked about. I don't dispute the Free France part of it at all, it's just that there's no good place to hang the tag; I can't hang it on the Vichy stuff in the last column, because no dispute there; the question is, why isn't there some sort of first-column presence for Vichy, even if it means a split cell? Again, see Talk for more about this question. So the tag is basically asking, "Why is the period 1940-44 handled in column one only by some cells representing the glory of France, and not the dark side (relegated to the dark cells on the right)?" Thanks, Mathglot (talk) 21:12, 31 July 2022 (UTC)


 * as it happens I clicked on federated monarchy and found the definition (of several tribes) rang true. But although I have been through that history a few times I would need to do a deep dive to really opine seriously. I hear you on the references.

Incidentally I just got pinged on something as a French speaker interested in disinformation; gonna ping you in turn as another. Planning to spend the rest of the day reading about this, that and the fighting in Kherson. Maybe correct verb tenses somewhere, but I am getting bored with that. Elinruby (talk) 21:28, 31 July 2022 (UTC)


 * Re Vichy, I think you have to have a split cell, (maybe collaborationism and resistance?) since it very much was in question who was the legitimate French state at the time. As for why somebody French would not want to write it that way, heh, I think you know. So if I am understanding, what you need is a source that says that in this time period this is what the system was?

Elinruby (talk) 01:27, 1 August 2022 (UTC)
 * You're so right, about knowing "why somebody French would not want to write it that way"; nothing could be clearer. (Hence the name of the top section on the article TP.)
 * Regarding Vichy and split cell, yes, I agree, we probably need a split cell in column one for that period. However, I don't think it's urgent, and we can come back to that.
 * More important, I think, is just general references, and coverage for the pre-revolutionary rows. References for 1789 to the present are easy to find. For the pre-revolutionary rows, my main question is whether WP:OR is involved or not; i.e., for row 1, are there reliable sources that refer to the period 481-987 as a unit and name it something (anything), or was that the article creator who decided on that date range? If the latter, that is OR and we have to break it up. But bottom line, we either need a source (or a few, preferably) that support the idea that "481-987 is a thing", or we need to find out how historians divide up that period and what they call the political system for Clovis and his descendants for a few centuries. In the end, it may be a historiographical question; these periods get named or chosen by historians, and sometimes they (the names) come and go; see the first paragraph of Late Antiquity for how that got "created" in 1971, and then generally adopted. So, who's responsible for "481-987"? That's my current top question about the [lack of] sourcing. Mathglot (talk) 09:38, 1 August 2022 (UTC)
 * Tried the split left cell approach (here), but had to use a very skinny "Vichy regime" to get it to sit next to "French Committee of National Liberation"; not sure this works. Mathglot (talk) 06:38, 4 August 2022 (UTC)


 * nod, ok. Elinruby (talk) 14:21, 1 August 2022 (UTC)
 * Got distracted from thinking about the gap article, because I found that Draft talk:List of political systems in France was not displaying any "find sources" links in the Talk header box at the top, and I wanted to know why. Turns out, there was a bug in Template:Talk header, but that is a highly visible template so I had to be really careful, work it out in the sandbox with new test cases, and everything; took me a while. At least now it's working, so Draft talk pages will now get their "find sources" links displayed, as long as there's a talk header at the top of the page.
 * Then I got to thinking, those aren't the greatest links for a French topic, there are better databases, such as Gallica, which I've used, and some others I've heard about. I checked over at fr-wiki, and sure enough, they have their own version of the "find sources" template, and they do use Gallica, but also Persée and Qwant. So, little light bulb comes on, and I whipped up a template to duplicate their links; it's available now. You can see the write-up about it at WT:FRANCE. Mathglot (talk) 10:30, 2 August 2022 (UTC)


 * Hurray Elinruby (talk) 00:22, 3 August 2022 (UTC)
 * So, I'm starting to use those links to source the Draft, and Qwant has some interesting stuff I haven't noticed before. Here's one that is really interesting, but not sure if it's a website of an individual, so maybe not RS, but an interesting page about the "9 major political systems everyone has to know"; it's here. It's a bit like an "Idiot's Guide to Political Systems", but given that I'm no expert, it's probably just about what I need right now. Plenty of other links on Qwant and Persee, and Gallica always has primary and secondary sources, but almost too many, so I hit them up last. Anyway, I need to find a few sources targeting France, and more obviously reliable, but that one was a good intro. Also, thought you'd like to see the new links in action: see Draft talk:List of political systems in France. Thanks, Mathglot (talk) 05:13, 3 August 2022 (UTC)


 * I have found Persée really useful in the past. Still clicking around the historiography of Clovis. There’s no question that he was a king ruling over an alliance (federation?) of petty kings. Even found a discussion of why they all adopted “Franks” as an identity. But so far no description as federal apart from fr.wiki. If you start from the terminology, the usual example is the Holy Roman Empire. Which is probably what you ran into. Don’t make any changes yet though; I am still at a fairly superficial level with this, and spent the day on driving a friend to the ER for an X-ray of an injured foot. I am not prepared yet to say it can’t be sourced. But I haven’t yet. Where did you see federated, btw? The fr.wiki article links to federal monarchy. Going to go look at Boud’s article for a quick break from this. Elinruby (talk) 05:26, 3 August 2022 (UTC)


 * The query terms  generates this query for Qwant, which has a good source at result #11 (here), which will source half the rows (1789 and afterward). Also, it's an impeccable governmental source, so no question of reliability.  Am also thinking of just adding a paragraph of intro at the top (not more, because it's a list article), and sticking all references there, instead of in the table, and if I can get three or four good ones spanning 481 – present, releasing it to mainspace. Even so, I'm new to all these French engines, and may take me a while to track down some good sources and do a writeup for the intro. Mathglot (talk) 08:31, 3 August 2022 (UTC)

Nod, will put some more time in on Clovis shortly. Elinruby (talk) 08:36, 3 August 2022 (UTC)

Clovis
I agree that this was a federated/federal monarchy after some reading, but you are looking for a source for the terminology, right? I haven’t gotten into the French Wikipedia on this yet but since the former redirects to the latter at en.wiki, I am assuming this is where you saw the hatnote. Might take some time; theory of political science is not a field I have spent much time in until now. Elinruby (talk) 21:44, 1 August 2022 (UTC)
 * Partly, yes; but also a source for the from-to dates; I know they can be sourced individually, but taking that period as one "thing" we need one source, not two, otherwise it's WP:SYNTH.
 * when you get a chance, give me the link to the page you are translating from. I just found a sourcthat dates the end of feudalism to the French Revolution, but that may be a superficial take. I haven’t gotten into any journals or books yet, just online encyclopedias and popular history sites that I wouldn’t want to use as sources. Maybe I will translate that redlink and see what that gets us. The class system was still rather feudal, but if there was a constitution I see the distinction the OP is making. I don’t recall this from high school French history, but see comments about the resistance Elinruby (talk) 22:18, 1 August 2022 (UTC)
 * French link is right on the draft page, in the left sidebar where you'd expect the language links to be. It's manually added while in Draft, but it will look the same once released and added to Wikidata. Mathglot (talk) 10:16, 2 August 2022 (UTC)

Mmm not on mobile interface but now that I know it’s there I will switch over to Desktop version and grab it Elinruby (talk) 00:19, 3 August 2022 (UTC)
 * Oh, I'm so sorry, I didn't realize it wasn't there on mobile; I should've just given it to you. It's here on fr-wiki: fr:Liste des régimes politiques de la France. Cheers, Mathglot (talk) 04:36, 3 August 2022 (UTC)

Thanks. I think I will deep-dive over there Elinruby (talk) 04:39, 3 August 2022 (UTC)
 * Check the "find France sources" links on the Talk page at . I'm also using a different query, and getting good results at Qwant. Have a brief "Intro" section on the Draft, now.  That's where I want to stick all the citations (can we do sfn, please, if you get there first), so we can keep the table cells uncluttered. Mathglot (talk) 09:24, 3 August 2022 (UTC)

I will wait for you to add a reference then follow that format. I just took a look at Persée and Qwant on Clovis and am getting an unbelievable amount of stuff about national myth, father of the French nation, did a dove appear when he was baptized, and the parallels between his reign and... various periods in French history. I do think the term is accurate but going to work on another part of this for a while Elinruby (talk) 09:30, 3 August 2022 (UTC)

However the to-from dates reflect the extent of his dynasty. Did see mention of feudalism following Elinruby (talk) 09:32, 3 August 2022 (UTC)


 * correction: merovingiens and carolingiens Elinruby (talk) 12:34, 3 August 2022 (UTC)


 * Yeah, I found those dates, too; would still like to see one source that mentions that they were both "federal" (or "federated"? "federative"?) monarchies, corresponding to the word in the top left cell, but doubt we'll find it. This corresponds to piped link Monarchie fédérative in the French original, probably piped because there is no fr:Monarchie fédérative article in fr-wiki (it's red over there), so maybe it's not even a legitimate term, and we'll have to change it to something that has support in English sources. Mathglot (talk) 03:34, 4 August 2022 (UTC)

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