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Strategy/Wikimedia movement/2018-20/Transition/Discuss/Ensure Equity in Decision-making

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Discussion of priorities: Increase the Sustainability of our Movement • Improve User Experience • Provide for Safety and Inclusion • Ensure Equity in Decision-making • Coordinate Across Stakeholders • Invest in Skills and Leadership Development • Manage Internal Knowledge • Identify Topics for Impact • Innovate in Free Knowledge • Evaluate, Iterate, and Adapt

This is an open discussion space dedicated to defining potential priorities for implementation from the Ensure Equity in Decision-Making recommendation.

Movement Charter

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Create a Movement Charter to:

  • Lay the values, principles and policy basis for Movement structures, including the roles and responsibilities of the Global Council, regional and thematic hubs, as well as other existing and new entities and decision-making bodies,
  • Set requirements and criteria for decisions and processes that are Movement-wide to be legitimate and trusted by all stakeholders, e.g. for
  • Maintaining safe collaborative environments,
  • Ensuring Movement-wide revenue generation and distribution,
  • Giving a common direction on how resources should be allocated with appropriate accountability mechanisms.
  • Defining how communities work together and are accountable to each other.
  • Setting expectations for participation and the rights of participants.

Interim Global Council

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Establish a temporary committee, consisting of participants representative of the diversity of the global Movement, who will work openly, transparently, and in close collaboration with the broader movement and communities in order to:

  • Serve as an Interim Global Council and play a leadership role in supporting the implementation of the Movement Strategy. This temporary committee will dissolve after the Movement Charter is finalized and the Global Council is established according to it,
  • Oversee the development of the Movement Charter in consultation with communities, organizations and subject matter experts,
  • Engage with the Board of Trustees of the Wikimedia Foundation to identify areas of its current responsibilities that must be transferred to achieve the goals of the recommendations, and;
  • Design an independent and transparent process, along with an independent legal assessment, to transfer those responsibilities and authorities to the appropriate Movement-led bodies. In those cases in which the legal limitations of the organizational structure cannot be overcome, establish a social contract to allow those bodies to make legally non-binding but socially binding decisions. This ensures that the authorities and responsibilities of the Global Council and of the other Movement-led bodies are respected and they lead within the Movement.

We have summarized information from this recommendation to provide an overview and clearly define the tasks ahead for the Interim Global Council, please see link.

The Global Council

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Main article: Global Council
  • Overseeing the implementation of Movement Strategy, with community input wherever possible, and its alignment across established structures of the Movement;
  • Overseeing further development and endorsement of the Movement Charter;
  • Enforcing accountability of all Movement organizations around:
  • Use of Movement funds;
  • Alignment with the Wikimedia mission, vision, and Strategic Direction;
  • Compliance with the Movement Charter;
  • Appropriate use of movement branding and marks;
  • Setting frameworks on resource allocation and revenue generation for the Movement.
  • Any responsibility that the Interim Global Council has identified as needing to be delegated by the Board.

Regional & thematic hubs

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Main article: Hubs
  • Actively facilitate and support the creation of regional and thematic hubs as structures designed both on identified needs and patterns of success, including networks developing organically.
  • Assess which thematic (e.g. advocacy, capacity building, partnerships, research, etc.) or geographic areas of the Movement need structures that support coordination across stakeholders.
  • Hubs are either an enhancement of existing entities, collaborations between affiliates, or new structures formed for a specific purpose. They are expected to emerge according to identified needs and organic initiatives.
  • Hubs are independent in their daily work and operations, though coordinating with other stakeholders and sharing results of their work with the rest of the Movement.
  • These structures will work toward high standards of diversity, inclusion, accountability, and equity in decision-making as per the Movement Charter.
  • The concrete scope and functionality of these structures will be decided by communities and organizations based on their contexts and needs. These systems will follow the subsidiarity principle while making the following functions available:
  • Allocation of resources;
  • Providing legal support to community members and organizations, and evaluating safety and security guidelines and procedures adapted to local contexts;
  • Coordinating capacity building;
  • Supporting organizational growth through tailored advice and peer support (evaluation, funding, networking, mentorship, etc.);
  • Developing appropriate technologies to better serve communities.

Flexible resource allocation framework

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  • In the immediate future, the Wikimedia Foundation should increase overall financial and other resources directed to the Movement for the purpose of implementing Movement strategy.
  • These additional resources should support new regional and thematic hubs and other Movement organizations in addition to existing Movement organizations and affiliates.
  • In the near future, the Movement should play a guiding role in resource allocation. The processes for allocation should be designed through consultation and described in the Movement Charter. This transition to Movement-led guidance should occur in a timely fashion.
  • The Global Council should oversee the implementation of the guidance given by the Movement as described in the Movement Charter, including recommendations for funds allocation to regional and thematic hubs and other Movement organizations while recognizing the involved organizations’ legal and fiduciary obligations.
  • Based on frameworks set by the Global Council, regional and thematic hubs will facilitate resource allocation through approaches that are reliable, contextualized, flexible, and resilient to secure and sustain communities and organizations with multi-year plans.
  • Funding systems will need to be flexible in terms of length, merging strategic goals of the Movement with local needs and directives, specifying mutual accountabilities, and opening pathways to local funding initiatives.
  • ..

Guidelines for board functions and governance

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  • Establish good practice guidelines for how boards function, such as term limits, election and selection processes, and approaches to other governance questions where applicable and relevant for a community. These guidelines will need to be adapted and contextualized by each stakeholder. Boards would be held accountable for following good practices by the Global Council. For those that do not, the Global Council will create mechanisms to review and provide support.
  • Collectively define good practice guidelines for how to both empower/inspire and enable/support new volunteers to run for different types of elected roles. These efforts will be particularly focused on underrepresented groups.
  • Ensure leadership positions and ways of accessing them are documented, transparent, and accessible.
  • ..
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