Talk:Wikimedia Foundation Board of Trustees/Call for feedback: Community Board seats/Community-elected Selection Committee

.

In my opinion (s)elections for community- and affiliate seats of the Board of Trustees should be entirely organized, designed and run by the community, without involvement of the Board or staff of the WMF. The Wikimedia contributors are very well capable themselves to evaluate the candidates in an election. The Board appoints the candidates selected by the community. Half of the board seats are appointed by the Board, and that is more than enough. Ad Huikeshoven (talk) 10:50, 3 February 2021 (UTC)

Hi Ad Huikeshoven, This is similar to a clarifying question I asked of you on another page. I want to make sure I am understanding clearly. You are saying the previously used community practices are capable of evaluating candidates. Does this include a consideration for diversity or how it can encourage diversity? These ideas are presented for discussion as suggestions to "help us form a more diverse and better performing Board of Trustees!" I just want to make sure I'm not missing anything. Best, JKoerner (WMF) (talk) 22:41, 5 February 2021 (UTC)

Prefer to avoid

I would prefer to avoid this. There is a huge risk of getting an 'echo chamber' committee like AffCom: with the best intentions committees tend to select members like them. If we believe a community is capable of electing a qualified and a diverse committee (which will likely reproduce the similar profile for the seats they select), we should also believe the same community is capable of electing a qualified and a diverse set of Board candidates — NickK (talk) 11:43, 6 February 2021 (UTC)

Geht es bei dieser sog. AffCom um eine Besonderheit allein der enWP? Wenn dem so ist, könntest Du dann dem großen Rest des Wikiversums ein wenig erklären, was da passiert und wo das Problem sein soll, denn für 95% des Wikiversums sind internen Konflikte eines einzelnen Projekts eher weniger interessant? One question: Is this AffCom something, that is solely in the enWP? If so, can you explain it to the rest of the Wikiverse, how it is working and what are the problems, as 95% of the Wikiverse doesn't care about some inner conflicts in any single project. Grüße vom Sänger ♫^(Reden) 12:07, 6 February 2021 (UTC)

@Sänger: I believe what NickK is referring to is the Affiliations Committee? dwf² ✉ 12:54, 6 February 2021 (UTC)

OK, and where's the concrete problem with that committee? I mean, it's just for affiliates, not the real communities, and there is a huge distinction between, say, deWP and WMDE. The affs have no say about the projects, they are just some kind of meta organisation of people for various reasons, be it collecting donations with a proper receipt, or just to provide social gatherings and communications. They are by far not that central to the universe as the real communities. Grüße vom Sänger ♫^(Reden) 13:03, 6 February 2021 (UTC)

@Sänger: Weil du kannst auch Englisch sprechen und mein Deutsch ist nicht so gut, ich werde lieber auf Englisch antworten. Yes, I am talking about the Affiliations Committee. This is pretty much the only example of a committee selecting future members in our movement. It is not the most important committee but it is a committee supposed to have an oversight over all affiliates, in theory it might, for instance, derecognise WMDE. But my point is that it is a remarkable example of how a committee selecting members resulted in selection of members with diverse backgrounds (different countries, different ages, different professional profiles) but similar views. From psychological point of view (and multiple studies prove it) it is natural for a group of people to select candidates with views similar to theirs. If you know any other example of a committee selecting members in the movement, I would be glad to hear about it, but I could not find any except AffCom and the Board — NickK (talk) 17:56, 6 February 2021 (UTC)

I agree with NickK. AffCom is a very good example of how selection committees tend to not only to create dynamics of selfperpetuation, but also tend to immensely reduce richness and diversity of opinions inside the group, even if at the surface it looks very diverse and equilibrated. I strongly disagree with the idea of a selection committee.--- Darwin ^Ahoy! 18:07, 6 February 2021 (UTC)

@NickK: @DarwIn:, I'm reading this and I think perhaps I am misunderstanding. I am reading that NickK suggests AffCom as a good example and I see Darwin suggests AffCom as a poor example of diversity (like tokenism). Could you help clarify this for me? Thanks for this. Best, JKoerner (WMF) (talk) 23:48, 9 February 2021 (UTC)

@JKoerner (WMF): A good example of what? That depends on what you are looking for. Do you want a diversity of backgrounds or a diversity of views? AffCom is a good example of the former and at the same time a poor example of the latter — NickK (talk) 00:40, 10 February 2021 (UTC)

NickK, That helps. Thanks for clarifying that for me. I didn't want to misunderstand what you were saying. Best, JKoerner (WMF) (talk) 12:28, 10 February 2021 (UTC)

@JKoerner (WMF): Hello, that's exactly what NickK said.--- Darwin ^Ahoy! 17:36, 12 February 2021 (UTC)

Thanks, @DarwIn: I always prefer to act cautiously and ask for clarification over misrepresenting someone. Best, JKoerner (WMF) (talk) 22:07, 12 February 2021 (UTC)

Oppose, no selction committee

Any "Selection Committee" would be, at best, disruptive pure bureaucracy. However it appears to be far worse than that, if it is intended to prohibit free election of legally-qualified candidates.

Any committee just creates a bureaucratic two-layer process which only multiples the opportunity for breakage or dysfunction or abuse. There is no possible process for creating a committee that would magically be better than the process for electing the candidates themselves. (Note: This is a deliberate duplicate of my response to Board-delegated_Selection_Committee, as the two topics are near duplicates.) Alsee (talk) 06:44, 13 February 2021 (UTC)

Collected feedback on "Community-elected Selection Committee" from the first weekly report

Here follows the collected feedback on the idea, "Community-elected Selection Committee" from the first weekly report covering the call for feedback during February 1-7:

• If a community can select a diverse committee why can a community not also elect diverse and qualified Board members?
• Affiliations Committee as an example of a committee selecting members with diverse backgrounds, but creating false diversity.
• It was suggested to look at psychological research about groups of people selecting people like themselves.
• Half of the attendees at a Wikimedia Nigeria User Group conversation said local affiliates should have much influence in selecting who represents them on the Board.

Please reach out if you have any questions or comments. KCVelaga (WMF) (talk) 18:40, 18 February 2021 (UTC)

Collected feedback on "Community-elected Selection Committee" from the second weekly report

Here follows the collected feedback on the idea, "Community-elected Selection Committee" from the second weekly report covering the call for feedback during February 8-14:

• Two people from Wikimedia Indonesia do not recommend this. One recommended this as long as it met the Board’s criteria.
• Two people about AffCom representing a good diversity of backgrounds but not a good diversity of views.
• One person reiterates there is no process that would be better than elections.
• One person from Benin and another from Morocco are in favor of this as this gives power to the community. One person at a French Sub-Saharan community conversation agreed.
• Three people from Open Foundation West Africa group were in support of the community selection committee.
• People from the North Africa Wikimedia community said at a meeting the community should lead and manage the process.
• People from Punjabi Wikimedians User Group said a selection committee will be able to negotiate with the Board better for skills and diversity.
• People from Punjabi Wikimedians User Group said if the committee and Board aren’t together, candidates can be lost. Conflict of interest was also mentioned.
• A person from the Telugu community recommended quotas for the selection committee to ensure representation from across the movement. It can include quotas for participants across the movement since the size of the committee is not set.
• In a French Sub-Saharan community conversation people said voting for a committee could make the process longer.

Please reach out if you have any questions or comments. KCVelaga (WMF) (talk) 18:43, 18 February 2021 (UTC)

Collected feedback on "Community-elected Selection Committee" from the third weekly report

Here follows the collected feedback on the idea, "Community-elected Selection Committee", from the third weekly report covering the call for feedback during February 15-21:

• A volunteer from the Urdu community worried that there are a lot of unanswered questions regarding selection committees as of now, and for that reason they would prefer voting. A volunteer from the Kannada community felt the same.
• Volunteers from Goa felt that it is almost impossible for every voter to read lengthy profiles and make the most rational choice. For that reason, a selection committee sounds better, and also a selection committee can also eliminate popularity bias that influences voting in an election process.
• Volunteers from Goa said that the trustee evaluation forms become quite important, to make sure that committee’s decisions are objective, rather than subjective.
• Jon Harald Soby of Wikimedia Norge said a community selected committee seems a bit too complicated. It might make the selection process harder for people to engage in.
• Camelia Boban of WikiDonne states that this only increases bureaucracy. What is the point in electing a committee instead of voting for a Board candidate directly.
• At the German LGBT+ conversation a volunteer reminded, to be aware that a community vote is only as diverse as the community itself. At the German Wiki Women conversation attendees said this too.

Please reach out if you have any questions or comments. KCVelaga (WMF) (talk) 11:27, 25 February 2021 (UTC)

Collected feedback on "Community-elected Selection Committee" from the fourth weekly report

Here follows the collected feedback on the idea, "Community-elected Selection Committee", from the fourth weekly report covering the call for feedback during February 22-28:

Meta-wiki Talk page conversation statistics:

6 users from 5 different home wikis have participated in the conversation on this idea's talk page so far.

• During a meeting with the Georgian community the participants saw it as falling into communism when you choose someone and someone else decides.
• Volunteers from the Odia community shared their experience of casting votes with superficial understanding in many cases, and felt a community-elected selection committee will be able to make an informed decision.
• A volunteer from the Gujarati community said that such a committee would be fine if it is entirely community-elected. The opinions of a serving board member will heavily influence other committee members.
• With reference to the two tier indirect election in the US, former trustee Bishakha opposed having any system where the community doesn’t have the final say.

Please reach out if you have any questions or comments. DBarthel (WMF) (talk) 16:32, 4 March 2021 (UTC)

Wugapodes

I think this could be a good idea if the community-elected committee appointed all board seats, regardless of sourcing. It would come close to eliminating fears that the board would usurp community control, while meeting the Foundation's needs of vetting, etc. If this were to apply only to community-sourced seats, it is far inferior to direct election. Wugapodes (talk) 23:32, 5 March 2021 (UTC)

Collected feedback on "Community-elected Selection Committee" from the fifth weekly report

Here follows the collected feedback on the idea, "Community-elected Selection Committee", from the fifth weekly report covering the call for feedback during March 1-7:

• One member of the Election Committee argued that if you have a diversity problem in the selection committee, that might affect the outcome of an election.
• A Wikitech volunteer said that the committee should be large and final decisions regarding candidates should be made through voting among the committee members.
• Some Wikitech volunteers suggested having an ombudsman and a redressal mechanism, if the community is not okay with any of the committee’s decisions.
• One person on the idea Meta talk page said this could be a good idea if all seats are appointed by the committee.

Please reach out if you have any questions or comments. KCVelaga (WMF) (talk) 19:21, 12 March 2021 (UTC)

Collected feedback on "Community-elected Selection Committee" from the sixth weekly report

Here follows the collected feedback on the idea, "Community-elected Selection Committee", from the sixth weekly report covering the call for feedback during March 8 - 14.: Meta-wiki Talk page conversation statistics: 7 users from 5 different home wikis have participated in the conversation on this idea's talk page.

• A Karavalli Wikimedian suggested having a conflict of interest policy if a selection committee is formed, and the situation in which a committee member is also interested in being a board candidate should be addressed.
• A volunteer shared their concern that, in one of the previous elections, an election committee member resigned from their position after the process had started, ran for a board seat, and eventually won. They said that the time of being an election committee member had given an undue advantage to the candidate, and that a clear Conflict of Interest policy should have prevented this situation. It was suggested to have policies to avoid such patterns repeating again.
• Volunteers from Urdu community suggested having regional subcommittees, working in coordination with the main committee, to increase the involvement of grassroot communities in the process.
• A Maithili volunteer suggested distributing all the positions on the committee uniformly across various regions and genders.
• A CIS-A2K staff member felt that when a person is elected through community voting system, they will be accountable to all volunteers, but if it is through a selection committee, their accountability may be limited to the committee itself.
• A CIS-A2K staff member suggested having a monitoring committee that will keep a check on the process, behaviour, abuse of voting processes, too much canvassing etc. In real-world, an election commission keeps a check on corruption, bribing, code of conduct violations etc.

Please reach out if you have any questions or comments. DBarthel (WMF) (talk) 20:43, 17 March 2021 (UTC)