Wikipedia - Governance

See our general article about the Wikipedia; and our entry on the Wikimedia Foundation which has a subsection on the Transparency of the Foundation's governance.

Principles

As described by Eric Olin Wright:

"Wikipedia’s fundamental principles of organization are not simply non-capitalist; they are thoroughly anti-capitalist:

1. Nonmarket relations:

Voluntary, unpaid contributions and free access. No one is paid to write entries in Wikipedia and even much technical work on the software infrastructure of Wikipedia is done on a volunteer basis. No one is charged to gain access to its millions of entries: it is free to anyone in the world who can get access to an internet connection. There are no advertisements on the pages of Wikipedia. No one makes a profit directly from its activities. The financial resources needed to underwrite the hardware of the system and pay the limited staff needed for some technical functions is provided by the Wikimedia Foundation which is largely funded by contributions from the wiki community.

2. Full, Open, Egalitarian Participation.

Wikipedia gives full editing rights to anyone who wishes to join in the production and transformation of content. Anyone can be an editor and no editors have special privileges over others in the production of content. A PhD and a well-read high school student are on formally equal footing. The editorial process thus functions in a dramatically different way from conventional editorial processes that rely heavily on experts with credentials. While it is impossible from the available Wikipedia statistics to know how many different people have contributed to the editing process, in December 2008 there were 157, 360 “active accounts”, meaning accounts which had done at least one edit in the previous month.

3. Direct and Deliberative interactions among contributors.

Wikipedia contributions and decision-making are generally done directly by editors in a deliberative process with other editors without mediation by any body that has editorial or managerial control. Wikipedia articles tend to display a certain life-cycle, beginning as a “stub” (the wiki-term for a minimalist entry that has not yet “matured” into the normal structure of a Wikipedia article), then growing to a proper article with an increasing rate of edits which eventually converges on some equilibrium in which the article either remains largely static and “complete” or undergoes only minor editing. This process is often accompanied by considerable back and forth discussion among editors, which is recorded in a discussion page linked to a given entry.

It is thus possible to review the entire history of the writing and discussion in the editing process of Wikipedia entries. The mass collaborative effort of article authorship is a slow process of consensus formation. On average, entries in the English Wikipedia have nearly 90 saved revisions per article.

4. Democratic governance and adjudication.

At its inception, all Wikipedians were essentially editorial administrators (called “sysops”) but as vandalism and other mischief intensified with the growing notoriety of the encyclopedia, a kind of quasi-administrative structure was instituted which enable users to acquire different levels of organizational responsibility and roles in adjudicating conflicts. This is one of the most interesting aspects of the development of Wikipedia as a real utopian institutional design: the emergence and evolution of mechanisms of social control and adjudication suitable for such a freewheeling network structure.

There are currently four basic administrative levels of users: editors, administrators, bureaucrats, and stewards. As of mid-2008 there were about 1600 administrators, 31 bureaucrats and 36 stewards. The administrative privileges associated with these designations, however, remain focused on facilitating “cleaning” the encyclopedia; they do not confer privileges in the production of Wikipedia content. Here is how Wikipedia describes administrators, the basic level of this administrative structure above ordinary editors: “Administrators, commonly known as admins and also called sysops (system operators), are Wikipedia editors who have access to technical features that help with maintenance.” As described in the Wikipedia website that discusses administrative procedures, “English Wikipedia practice is to grant administrator status to anyone who has been an active and regular Wikipedia contributor for at least a few months, is familiar with and respects Wikipedia policy, and who has gained the trust of the community, as demonstrated through the Requests for adminship process.11 Among other technical abilities, administrators can protect and delete pages, block other editors, and undo these actions as well. These privileges are granted indefinitely, and are only removed upon request or under circumstances involving high-level intervention (see administrator abuse below). Administrators undertake additional responsibilities on a voluntary basis, and are not employees of the Wikimedia Foundation.”

Access to these administrative roles is gained through democratic means. The process, as described on the page in Wikipedia discussing “Requests for Adminship”, stresses the open, consensus-seeking character of the process:

- Any user may nominate another user with an account. Self-nominations are permitted. If you are unsure about nominating yourself for adminship, you may wish to consult admin coaching first, so as to get an idea of what the community might think of your request. Also, you might explore adoption by a more experienced user to gain experience. Nominations remain posted for seven days from the time the nomination is posted on this page, during which time users give their opinions, ask questions, and make comments. This discussion process is not a vote (it is sometimes referred to as a !vote using the computer science negation symbol). At the end of that period, a bureaucrat will review the discussion to see whether there is a consensus for promotion. This is sometimes difficult to ascertain, and is not a numerical measurement, but as a general descriptive rule of thumb most of those above ~80% approval pass, most of those below ~70% fail, and the area between is subject to bureaucratic discretion….. Any Wikipedian with an account is welcome to comment in the Support, Oppose, and Neutral sections. The candidate may respond to the comments of others. Certain comments may be discounted if there are suspicions of fraud; these may be the contributions of very new editors, sockpuppets, and meatpuppets13. Please explain your opinion by including a short explanation of your reasoning. Your input will carry more weight if it is accompanied by supporting evidence.

Selection procedures to other levels of the hierarchy have somewhat different rules, but they all involve open democratic processes.

One of the key roles for these different levels of administrators is resolving conflicts.

There are, of course, topics in which there is considerable disagreement among editors over content. Sometimes this makes it difficult for an entry to converge on a consensus text. There are also instances of malicious vandalism of Wikipedia entries. Wikipedia urges the resolution of disagreement between editors on the basis of open communication and users have written numerous guides and essays offering instruction and advice to this end.16 Most evidence indicates that warring between editors is rare relative to the total number of editors and vast amount of content over which disagreement may arise. Yet, disputes do arise and when the editors fail to resolve the issues themselves, a neutral administrator may be called in to manage the conflict through negotiation, mediation, and arbitration – all processes that emphasize the empowerment of aggrieved parties, consensus, and mutually beneficial outcomes. If disputes remain unresolved, then a series of escalating interventions become available. A dispute may be referred to formal mediation and finally to arbitration. The Arbitration Committee, which was formed in early 2004, is the mechanism of last resort for dispute resolution and is the only body that can impose a decision, including sanctions, against users. The members of the Arbitration Committee are appointed by Jimmy Wales on the basis of advisory elections by the broader Wikipedia community. At this ultimate level of control, the Wikipedia process contains a residual, if nevertheless important, element of undemocratic power.

Taken together these four characteristics of Wikipedia – nonmarket relations, egalitarian participation, deliberative interactions among contributors, democratic governance and adjudication – conform closely to the normative ideals of radical democratic egalitarianism. What is remarkable is that these principles have underwritten the collaboration of tens of thousands of people across the world in the production of a massive global resource." (http://www.ssc.wisc.edu/~wright/ERU_files/ERU-CHAPTER-7-final.pdf)

Conflict Arbitration

Interview of Jonathan Hochman by Tisch Shute:

"One of the things I did was to try and clear people out who were being disruptive. We actually had to go to arbitration over that article. It is like the supreme court of Wikipedia. There is a panel of 15 arbitrators. They hear the case. There is evidence, arguments and decisions. It is really like a simulated law suit. You get all the experience of a simulated law suit with the real threat that you could be banned. If they don’t like what you are doing they can actually ban you or restrict you from topics.

So it is really fascinating how this social space Wikipedia becomes a very real platform though it is in a virtual world for real world disputes. Most disputes are over the definition of things. If you have a you suit most disputes are about how things are defined. And Wikipedia has become the defacto definition of things in the real world. People want to know what are “The Troubles.” If you go to Wikipedia you find out The Troubles are a dispute over Northern Ireland. What the article says has a profound impact on public opinion.

Tish: So who is on the court of Wikipedia?

Jonathan: They are volunteers. these people work two or three hours a day to run this court. There are all kinds of projects. There is a WikiProject Spam which has people who can write computer programs to statistically analyze Wikipedia projects - not only Wikipedia. But all of them are looking at the links and reporting them and banning those people who are abusing or gaming the system.

Tish: You were on the Stopping Virtual Blight Panel at Web 2.0 Summit - what are the most important things to think about on this topic?

Jonathan: Yes we were talking about how to defend the web against virtual blight. The thing I find interesting about Wikipedia is that because it is the eighth largest web site and possibly the second largest web site comprised of user generated content after YouTube. The problems that exist in Wikipedia are larger and more detailed than any other site. For whatever problem someone has for their social media site or their Web 2.0 site these problems already exist in Wikipedia and the solutions are there and they are transparent. You can actually see the history of what’s been done.

If there is, for example, a problem on Digg - some problem with sock puppetry or vote stacking - it happens, it goes away. You don’t get full disclosure. With Wikipedia you can actually go in and look at a dispute and watch it unfold. You can watch the arbitration cases that are filed, the arguments, the decisions, the logic, the rationale. You can see the successes and the failures and the different things people have tried to control blight. For example, we tried to resolve this dispute one way but it was a disaster, so we have tried something else and that worked." (http://www.ugotrade.com/2008/12/29/hacking-the-world-in-2009-google-street-view-smart-stuff-and-wikiculture/)

User typology as related to governance

Forte and Bruckman (2008, pp. 3-4) identify three main identities that a user may have:

Unregistered users can exert little individual influence in shaping policy and establishing norms, but en masse they represent an important part of the context in which day-to-day operations take place. In most cases, unregistered users have the ability to edit the encyclopedia freely but…their ability to influence content is weaker than registered users.

Registered Users includes everybody else on the site…Registered users may also hold various technical powers…[they] often self-select into formal and informal subgroups along ideological, functional, and content-related lines… Ideological groups are much like political parties whose affiliates hold a set of common beliefs about the way the community should function and what its goals should be. Examples of stable ideological groups include deletionists, who are committed to very strict guidelines on what constitutes encyclopedic topics, and inclusionists, who are committed to the idea that an online encyclopedia need not and must not exclude information.

The Arbitration Committee wields considerable influence in the community. The Arbitration Committee (Arb Com)…appears to often serve as a more general decision-making body for the English language site. Arb Com was initially charged with interpreting policy and making binding resolutions in the case of interpersonal disputes…Committee members are selected through a hybrid process of election by the community and appointment by Jimmy Wales…Committee action can play a role in influencing both policy and content."

Source: Forte, A., and Bruckman, A. (2008) “Scaling Consensus: Increasing Decentralization in Wikipedia Governance”, Proceedings of the 41st International Conference on System Sciences, Hawai: HICSS, 157.

Research

On the governance structure of Wikipedia, see

1. Fernanda B. Viégas, Martin Wattenberg, and Matthew M. McKeon, “The Hidden Order of Wikipedia,” Visual Communication Lab, IBM Research, <http://www.research.ibm.com/visual/papers/hidden_order_wikipedia.pdf>, and
2. Andrea Forte and Amy Bruckman, “Scaling Consensus: Increasing Decentralization in Wikipedia Governance,” Proceedings of the 41st Hawaii International Conference on System Sciences, 2008, <http://csdl.computer.org/plugins/dl/pdf/proceedings/hicss/2008/3075/00/30750157.pdf?template=1&loginState=1&userData=anonymous-IP1223136700127>.
3. Bauwens, M. (2008b) “Is Something Fundamentally Wrong with Wikipedia Governance Processes?”, P2P Foundation blog at http://blog.p2pfoundation.net/is-something-fundamentally-wrong-withwikipedia-governance-processes/2008/01/07 (retrieved 14 October 2008).
4. Butler, B., Joyce, E., and Pike, J. (2008) “Don’t Look Now, But We’ve Created a Bureaucracy: The Nature and Roles of Policies and Rules in Wikipedia”, CHI Proceedings, 2008, Florence: CHI.
5. Economist, The (2008) “The Battle for Wikipedia’s Soul”,at http://www.economist.com/printedition/displaystory.cfm?story_id=10789354&logout=Y (retrieved 24 January 2009).
6. Helm, B. (2005) “Wikipedia: A Work in Progress”, Business Week at http://www.businessweek.com/technology/content/dec2005/tc20051214_441708.htm?chan=db (retrieved 20 January 2009).
7. Loubser, M., and den Besten, M. (2008) “Wikipedia Admins and Templates: The Organizational Capabilities of a Peer Production Effort“, Creating Value through Digital Commons, European Academy of Management, Ljubljana and Bled, 14-17 May.
8. Riehle, D. (2006) “How and Why Wikipedia Works: An Interview with Angela Beesley, Elisabeth Bauer, and Kizu Naoko”, International Symposium on Wikis (WikiSym '06).
9. Rosenzweig, R. (2006) “Can History be Open Source? Wikipedia and the Future of the Past’’, The Journal of American History, 93(1).
10. Spek, S., Postma, E., and van den Herik, H.J. (2006) “Wikipedia: Organisation from a bottum-up approach“, International Symposium on Wikis (WikiSym '06).
11. Viegas, F., Wattenberg, M., and McKeon, M. (2007) “The Hidden Order of Wikipedia“, Proceedings of HCII International, Beijing: HCI.

Internal Wikipedia articles:

1. Wikipedia (2009) “Criticism of Wikipedia” at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Criticism_of_Wikipedia (retrieved 23 January 2009)
2. Wikipedia (2009) “Deletionism and Inclusionism in Wikipedia”, at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deletionism_and_inclusionism_in_Wikipedia (retrieved 25 January 2009)
3. Wikipedia (2009) “Essjay Controversy” at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Essjay_controversy (retrieved 23 January 2009)
4. Wikipedia (2009) “Talk: Deletionism and Inclusionism in Wikipedia”, at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Deletionism_and_inclusionism_in_Wikipedia#COI.2FSYN (retrieved 25 January 2009)
5. Wikipedia, “Wikipedia:Protection policy”, at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Protection_policy (retrieved 25 October 2008)
6. Wikipedia (2009) “Wikitruth” at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikitruth retrieved 24 January 2009)

Wikipedia-critical sites:

1. Wikipedia Review, The (2008) ”Criticisms of Wikipedia: A Compendium” at http://wikipediareview.com/blog/20080104/criticisms-of-wikipedia/ (retrieved 30 October 2008)
2. Wikipedia Review, The (2008) “Discussion” at http://wikipediareview.com/index.php?showtopic=14292 (retrieved 11 November 2008)
3. Wikimedia (2008) “Power Structure” at http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Power_structure (retrieved 25 October 2008)