Universal Code of Conduct/2021 consultations/Enforcement/Santali community

Universal Code of Conduct (UCoC) Facilitation Summary - Santali Wikipedia Community

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The Santali Wikipedia is the Santali-language edition of the free online encyclopedia. The project was launched on 2018 August 2. As of March 13, 2021 the project has 5,849 articles with 3,480 registered users. The Wikipedia project is the 185th largest Wikipedia project in terms of articles. There are 17 active editors and the project has 2 administrators. There are no sister projects of Santali Wikipedia.

Wikimedians of Santali Language User Group has been set up since 25th September 2019 to promote and conduct online activities on Santali Wikipedia. The group consists of volunteer members from the Santali community and is responsible for organizing offline activities in India, Bangladesh and Nepal.

Status/Summary of behavioral policies

The Santali Wikipedia community doesn’t have any conduct policies to deal with behavioural issues.

There are little or no cases of discrimination, abuse, and problematic behaviour in this community. The local sysops are responsible to manage and conclude the community discussions, whether it is about policymaking or general discussion of the community.

Facilitation process

The onwiki consultation was started on Santali Wikipedia from 29 January 2021 and lasted until 4 March 2021. To engage all group of members (active and inactive) of the community, the following mediums of communication were used::

Community leader: We have contacted the community leaders to initiate the discussion. Many of them had also participated in the phase 1 discussions.
Personal Meeting: We have organized a meeting with the help of a focal person of the community before launching the survey form

During the onwiki consultation, the community had conducted an internal meeting with the group members post which they proposed their ideas and recommendations for the enforcement of UCoC at the Village pump.

The community unanimously supported the proposed idea at Village pump. The number of total participants who participated at the village pump discussion was 18.

Ahead of the launch of the survey form, we organized a meeting with the Santali Community for more clarity regarding the Universal Code of Conduct. We launched the survey form from March 2 to March 4, 2021. With the help of one of the community leaders. We have translated the questionnaire of the survey form.

Throughout the survey duration, we have managed to record 26 responses among which 18 were male and 8 were female participants. The survey response looks very decent because most of the active users from the community (including all sysops and trusted users) recorded their responses.

Community’s feedback

Santali Wikipedia community contributors shared their thoughts on the UCoC discussion. The community is clear about the importance and needs to have UCoC to tackle behaviour related issues so that one can freely contribute to the Wikimedia projects.

After the internal meeting with the members of the Santali Wikipedia community, the local sysop of the project proposed their ideas and suggestions for the enforcement mechanism plan at the Village pump discussion.

Important note from the Surveys

Total number of participants: 26
Male : 18 (69.2%)
Female : 8 (31.8%)
21 participants reported that they have over 1-5 years of experience in the Wikimedia movement.
50% of participants indicated that they have never participated in the local community policy-making process.
90% of editors expressed that they need a behavioural policy in the local Wikipedia community.
93% (24 participants) users indicated that they have not faced any unacceptable behaviour so far but 7% of users indicated that they have faced unethical behaviour within the community.
Only 4% of users indicated that at some point of time they have considered taking a break from editing or leaving the project altogether due to harassment and abuse of power
30% of participants are not aware of UCoC
62.5% are in favour of adopting the UCoC as it is and 22% of users think that it should be adopted as a guiding principle to establish a unique local policy.

Enforcement body mechanism

Santali Wikipedia contributors think that the Wikimedia Foundation (with 38.5% favour response) should play a key role in enforcing the UCoC in Wikimedia projects. With 26.9% response, local community sysops stand at second place and a global community stands at third place with 23% response.
69.2% of users were neutral on whether members of the UCoC enforcement body should receive a form of financial compensation/remuneration for their service.
61.5% of users are of the opinion that Wikimedia Foundation and its Affiliates are able to handle the cases of UCoC violations.
69.2% are in favour of a standard procedure to protect the rights and obligations of complaining parties, complainants, and enforcers in an UCoC violation case.
76.9% of users were recorded that there should be an appellate review mechanism handled by a global body in cases of an UCoC violation that could not be resolved by the community.
73% of participants cast their response for the need of the global body to enforce UCoC in Wikimedia projects where there is no local capacity of enforcement.
88.5% are in favour of a periodic review of UCoC text.
34.6% of users were expressed that UCoC mechanisms should be available publicly, which includes reporting, arbitration, sanction enforcement, etc.

Enforcement pathways and escalation channels

46.2% of users indicated that they are not aware of the steps to report harassment, abuse of power, and/or vandalism on Wikipedia.

Support for the targets of harassment

We have got the following responses from the community members about how can the Foundation or the communities provide better support to people who have suffered abuse or harassment:

Give them an assurance that their matter is taken seriously. Review the matter by providing them with an authentic report on the matter from Officials (Enforcement body) by Email.
— Santali Wikipedian, UCoC Survey 2021

The foundation or the communities should provide better support to people who have suffered abuse or harassment.
— Santali Wikipedian, UCoC Survey 2021

Only through the implementation of strict policies and action against the unethical and uncivilised behaviour.
— Santali Wikipedian, UCoC Survey 2021

Interesting stories/ideas/observations (anonymized)

In order to start a conversation with the local community, the Santali community leader set up a call with the active editors of the community and decided to propose their common thoughts on the enforcement pathways of the Universal Code of Conduct into Santali Wikipedia community.

They came up with the behavioural guideline and monitoring plan on their respective Wikipedia project Village pump on 2021 February 25 (16:28 UTC). They suggested that there must be a well organised team at different levels of the hierarchy of the foundation to monitor the behaviour of the contributor, user and every executive. They have categorized the behaviour in 4 different levels, which includes General behaviour, Critical behaviour, Behaviour with female, Behaviour for skill development and leadership.

Once the proposal popped on their village pump, they started endorsing the ideas. The idea looks pretty decent and they seem very much concerned about female contributors. Any case of harassment should be dealt with by an independent Wikimedia Foundation team, which consists of at least a female member and one regional member.

Conclusion

The Santali Wikipedia community engaged enthusiastically in this important policy discussion. The members of this community come from different countries. Yet, the way they welcomed the proposal of the Universal Code of Conduct is a sign that this emerging community is very positive about its future growth and is preparing for it. The community members are learning and gaining experience in the Wikimedia movement every day as it’s still a considerably new community.

The Santali Wikipedia community accepted the importance of the Universal Code of Conduct. The Santali community strongly preferred that Wikimedia Foundation should play an important role to enforce UCoC within the Wikimedia projects and movement.

The diverse and inter-country Santali community has not faced many problems of unethical behaviour within the community. This is the reason why this community has not worked on developing its local behavioural policies yet. But there is a fair consensus on the need and adaptation of Universal Code of Conduct to handle the future problems and challenges.