Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Pro-War Greens Debate


 * The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review).  No further edits should be made to this page.  

The result was merge to Green Party. Done. Neıl ☎  14:14, 14 December 2007 (UTC)

Pro-War Greens Debate

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"Pro-War Greens Debate" seems to be a made up term. Article seems to be entirely based on one person's published opinion piece. WP:NPOV Barrylb (talk) 10:10, 28 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Politics-related deletions.   —Barrylb (talk) 11:39, 28 November 2007 (UTC)

Hi, I am the article author, and I recommend keeping the article for the following reasons:

1. Debate. The OED defines “debate” as being an argument or contention. Clearly in this case there is a genuine argument and/or contention concerning how we ought to interpret the commitment of Green political parties to peace and nonviolence. The title of the Wikipedia article is therefore, I believe, appropriate. The NPOV issue is whether the entry gives equal space to the Greens and the critique of the Greens position. I think it does.

2. Opinion piece. I think that the editor confuses an article which states an opinion and an opinion piece. An opinion piece is generally defined as a piece of writing which gives an opinion or view, without providing evidence. If a piece of writing does provide referenced evidence for an opinion or view, then this is known as scholarly research. If one goes to the on-line version of the source article in question , then it is apparent that the source article is not an opinion piece as such, given a) it is an article in one of Australia’s reputable political science journals b) it does cite evidence, with some 26 references to both primary and secondary documentary sources, c) the source article does conform to the OECD definition of research, in that it does employ the apparatus and conventions of scholarly research.

3. Even if the article is to be understood as an opinion piece, it is difficult to see why, under the Wikipedia criteria, that this means that the article ought to be deleted. Similarly, I am not aware of anything under the Wikipedia policies which indicates that one needs more than one source. Moreover, the one source suggestion is misleading, as the source article itself has 26 endnote references to numerous primary and secondary historical sources. Why not include these references in the Wikipedia article? My thinking was that this would simply make the Wikipedia article too long, and in any case a curious reader would be readily able to access these further references on-line.

4. Verifiability. The Wikipedia Verifiability Policy indicates that “articles should rely on reliable, third-party published sources with a reputation for fact-checking and accuracy”. The source article is published in the political science journal AQ:Australian Quarterly, published for the past 75 years by the respected and independent Australian Institute for Policy and Science . The journal AQ is in fact included as a core journal in the Worldwide Political Science Abstracts database , available on-line with most university libraries (please look under the previous name of AQ: Journal of Contemporary Analysis). Moreover, as stated above, the source article itself contains 26 references to primary and secondary historical sources, including quotations from scholarly works and from Hansard. As stated above, the article does conform to the OECD definition of research.

5. Neutrality. It is difficult to see how there could be any argument about the neutrality of the Wikipedia article. The structure of the article involves a) a statement that there are divergent viewpoints on the commitment of the Greens to peace and nonviolence and the significance of this issue, b) the Greens official position, and c) the critique of the Greens position. Approximately equal space is given to the Greens official position and to the critique, and moreover the article at all times merely describes positions – it does not itself make any denunciations. If one looks at the References for the Wikipedia article, there are scholarly sources both in support of the Greens (3) and critical of the Greens (1).  The article gives equal weight to both positions and it seems difficult how one might claim that this is biased in any way.

I understand that any deletion decision is made strictly on the basis of Wikipedia policies. On the basis of these policies, I believe this Wikipedia article clearly ought to stay. I am the primary author of the Wikipedia article.

User:JDakins —Preceding comment was added at 09:31, 30 November 2007 (UTC)


 * Comments: (1) On neutrality, the article's title is not neutral - it basically takes a POV position that the "Greens are Pro-war" and says "here is the debate". (2) Your involvement in this article is a serious conflict of interest. Please see Conflict of Interest. -- Barrylb (talk) 12:22, 30 November 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for the comments. Please see my response (as author of the article) as below:

1. Procedural fairness. I do have some problems of procedural fairness about adding additional objections to an article more than mid-way through the consideration process. The objections to the title and to COI were not mentioned at the outset. If an editor has bona fide objections to a particular article, then he/she ought to state these from the outset. As a matter of fairness, you cannot try one line of objection to an article, and then try another when it seems that the initial one does not carry weight.

2. Another problem of adding additional grounds of deletion is that one does not know whether the editor is still challening on the additional grounds cited. For instance, the editor has previously claimed that the source article is only an "opinion piece". Does the editor still believe this?

3. However, having said the above, I will respond to the complaints regarding the title and supposed conflict of interest.

4. Title. The editor alleges that the title says “The Greens are Pro-War” and then “Here is the debate”, and that this is therefore a POV. Well, actually the title does not say this at all. The title is one phrase, “The Pro-War Greens Debate”. The word “debate” is clearly indicative that there is opinion pro and con on this issue, which is exactly what the situation is and which reflects NPOV. Moreover the article then proceeds to give equal weight to divergent positions, as required under NPOV.

5. Alleged conflict of interest. I don’t think it is sufficient merely to allege this without substantiation. It is necessary to indicate in exactly what ways there is an alleged COI and the objective evidence for this.

6. I believe that deletion decisions ought to be made strictly on the Wikipedia principles and then only with evidence. Anything other than this is not editing but censorship. I do not believe that it has been demonstrated that the article contravenes Wikipedia principles and therefore I urge that the article remain.

Regards, User:JDakins —Preceding comment was added at 11:19, 2 December 2007 (UTC)


 * 1. I withdraw my comments about a conflict of interest. As I read your comments I thought you meant you were the author of the article published in the journal but you only meant you are the author of the wiki article: sorry.


 * 2. My comments regarding the title was to respond to your claim that "It is difficult to see how there could be any argument about the neutrality of the Wikipedia article". This relates to my initial complaint (NPOV) and wasn't intended to introduce an entirely new line of complaint.


 * 3. I would like to propose we rename the article to "Greens Position on War" - it doesn't label the Greens as "Pro War" or presuppose the Greens' position. Instead it opens the way to state the aspects of the Greens position on war. Barrylb 15:05, 2 December 2007 (UTC)

Response. I think that what you are suggesting is not as direct or communicative as "Pro-War Greens Debate". However, having said that, and seeking to reach some consensus, might I suggest, as a minor variation on your suggestion, the title "Debate on the Greens and War". My reason for suggesting this rather than "The Greens Position on War" is that the article is actually giving more than the Greens position on war - it is giving an insight into an area of controversy in political science. The opening sentence of the article would also need to be re-written, deleting "The Pro-War Greens debate refers to divergent interpretations of the ..." and replacing this with the simpler "There is a significant area of debate over the ...". The writer in me says that one ought always to use the active rather than passive voice where possible. I also don't really think that Pro-War Greens Debate does violate NPOV. However, in the interests of us both getting some sleep, I can live with another title. User:JDakins —Preceding comment was added at 10:49, 3 December 2007 (UTC)


 * I would like to be convinced that there is actually a "significant area of debate" to justify making an article based on the debate itself, rather than the underlying issues. To establish significance I would like to know if there are more published works (in popular media and scholarly journals) on the topic. Is the cited journal article the only work on the topic? Barrylb 03:41, 4 December 2007 (UTC)


 * Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion so that consensus may be reached. Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, Mailer Diablo 12:50, 4 December 2007 (UTC)


 * Merge into Green Party. This article focuses on one particular critique of the party. I think this information would be best served in a controversy section in the main article, rather than being separate. As of now, it's not covered there at all. -- Cyrus      Andiron   14:53, 4 December 2007 (UTC)
 * Merge as a paragraph into the article on the party--I cannot see how every topic discussed by them warrants a separate article. DGG (talk) 07:09, 5 December 2007 (UTC)

Well, I am sympathetic to the idea of merging, although this does raise the some difficulties, given that the source article deals in particular with the German Greens, the Australian Greens and Bob Brown. Ought a section or paragraph be inserted into each of these? I think that the better option might be the separate article. Perhaps the strongest argument in favour of a separate article is that it is the best mechanism to give clear expression to NPOV, in other words, to give equal space to the argument of the Green Parties and to the critique of this. And I know from discussion thus far that NPOV, understandably, is a very sensitive issue with political articles.In addition, I think that in the discussion hithertoo (above) with Barry, we were not too far from reaching a consensus regarding a separate article. However before I continue this discussion I thought I might invite some more comment on where to go from here. Is it OK if I continue discussion regarding consensus on a separate article? User:JDakins. —Preceding comment was added at 06:28, 7 December 2007 (UTC)


 * Delete if it's only 1 person writing 1 article per WP:NPOV's "may not include tiny-minority views at all.". Merge into Green party and the specific parties involved if more reliable third party sources are included. JDAKINS, be careful not to blank sections like you did to the references at Green party. -- Jeandré, 2007-12-10t18:37z

Hi Jeandré. Thanks for that input and for the "tiny minority" reminder. There are other references to instances of Greens being in support of war, in addition to the source article, and I will see if I can locate these. I think this should satisfy concerns regarding the tiny minority viewpoint. Regarding the blanked references, these were in fact originally posted by me. I then blanked these, as I thought it might be premature to post these references whilst the debate over this article was still continuing. The other reason for blanking these references is that at the present time the references aren't actually cited in the article, which I understand they need to be. Hope this explains. If it doesn't, I am more than willing to re-post the references. Thanks again for your suggestion. User:JDakins. —Preceding comment was added at 08:32, 11 December 2007 (UTC)


 * Merge per Cyrus Andiron. The debate is good information, but doesn't warrant a separate article.  PKT (talk) 13:07, 14 December 2007 (UTC)


 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.