User:DutchTreat/sandbox

WMF Board Candidate

Q1

The creation and implementation of a Universal Code of Conduct has been a Board priority since 2020. The original timeline for the implementation of the UCoC was wildly unrealistic, the UCoC was implemented by the Board without community ratification, and the first Universal Code of Conduct Coordinating Committee was recently elected without a sufficient number of members to form a quorum. What lessons should the Board take from the UCoC process, especially about how the Board interacts with volunteers?

Bobby Shabangu (Bobbyshabangu)

I think the first thing we all need to acknowledge is that as the movement grows, communication becomes increasingly complex and challenging. This means that more time must be invested in community consultations, and we need to use a variety of communication channels. Most importantly, the board needs to engage with people where they are. For example, we cannot only rely on Meta and Wikimedia-l to reach out to the community, board should have put together a Communications team dedicated to this project and put in place a full Communication strategy that equally utilised other social media platforms like YouTube to create video messages about the UCoC and share them on sites like Facebook, Telegram, and WhatsApp on top of speaking to community leaders. We are masters in our own Wikimedia domain , but these platforms are highly effective at reaching people, and many Wikimedians use them.

Christel Steigenberger (Kritzolina)

I think I understand the perspective this question is coming from. It is a good and important question. And I want to suggest to look at the whole process from a different angle: To see the creation of the UCoC and its enforcement guidelines as a combined success of the community and the Wikimedia Foundation. The Board had strategic oversight over this process, but little actual influence. The Wikimedia Communities put the creation of the UCoC as a very high priority in the 2030 strategy - and the board supported this. It asked the Wikimedia Foundation to create a participatory process that would bring results as quickly as possible. And so the Wikimedia Foundation tried and mostly succeeded - only "as quickly as possible" took quite a bit longer than expected.

Of course the results of this process can and should be improved upon, but I still see it as a success that we have a valid and widely accepted UCoC. And we have more, we have guidelines for implementation that made a first trial run for a U4C possible and that many communities already apply to their needs. Yes, it took longer than we thought when we started. Not all problems are solved yet. And yes, the way community at large was called to vote on the Code certainly can and should be improved. But still - we as a movement moved several important steps toward the goals of the 2030 strategy. Now it is time to evaluate, iterate and adapt.

Deon Steyn (Oesjaar)

The Afrikaans Wikipedia is in the 79th percentile of the ranking list (69th out 331 Wikipedia's). From this stat we should be seen as big but in reality are deemed to be small. The bigger Wikipedia'a can be divide into two blocks, America and Europe and they dominate Wikipedia. This is not a negative remark but a realistic one. We get very little news re events, incidents from anybody. Sometimes a WMF user would dumped something about something on our version of Village Pump and we would jokingly refer to it as another solution looking for a problem!

The first time I got involved with the UCoC was when I was asked to assist with translating it into Afrikaans which I end up doing. Thereafter no formal communication re the UCoC reached my ears. The problem that I have though with the UCoC is as follows: In South Africa there is a chapter called WikimediaZA which Afrikaans is part off. It is registered as a Non-profit Company in South Africa meaning that it must comply with the Companies Act and most importantly - South African Labour Laws. In South Africa WikimediaZA is thus seen as a legal person, it can sue and can be sued. Wikipedia Users in South Africa will thus be seen as members of WikimediaZA and any labour actions re grievance, disciplinary hearings must comply with South Africa Labour laws. Where does this leaves the UCoC? I am curious to know, I have been involved with labour issues in my corpoarte life. This matter need to be resolved. What is the situation in other countries?

Erik Hanberg (Erikemery)

No response yet.

Farah Jack Mustaklem (Fjmustak)

Response removed by Elections Committee due to late submission.

Lane Rasberry (Bluerasberry)

To improve this and many other interactions between the Wikimedia Foundation and user community, the WMF must practice budget transparency. A major source of conflict is that the WMF hires staff who advocate in one direction, while volunteers without money want different things. Investment is a Wikimedia Foundation signal that a something is important. When the Foundation assigns its own staff to a project without sufficient support for community engagement, then that signals the value of staff development and the optional nature of community input. The result of such projects is an outcome that is more attractive to staff than community, and that is designed for the people who fund it rather than the people who use it.

I organize LGBT+ programs. Because LGBT+ people get extra harassment and have few options for support, I hear harassment reports from around the world. With others, I have been advocating for Wikimedia victim support services since 2014, and still the LGBT+ community in Wikimedia projects has never had appropriate protection. I appreciate the Universal Code of Conduct, but it is the latest of many investments which prioritize the protection of the WMF as a corporation rather than the Wikimedia community. Of course I want both WMF and the user community to have protection, but the Wikimedia community must have freedom to speak for itself and financial independence to design its own community safety services.

The idea of the UCoC is immensely popular in the Wikimedia Community, especially among vulnerable demographics. The community did ratify the code, and is aware that it is supposed to be community-led. I am very grateful to the volunteers who drafted its text and developed its different parts, because their contributions are essential even while we still need a few more community pieces. The ratification and community input to this point demonstrate enthusiastic consent for many parts of the UCoC. The failures around implementation and lack of quorum are indications that the stakeholder activists who demanded this for years do not overall see themselves leading this program right now. If all of this design were community-led rather than foundation-led, then there would be much greater enthusiasm.

Lorenzo Losa (Laurentius)

The creation and implementation of a Universal Code of Conduct stems from one of the 2020 Movement Strategy recommendations, Provide for Safety and Inclusion, and was picked up by the board.

While, as mentioned in the question, there was not a community ratification vote for the UCoC itself, we had one for the UCoC Enforcement Guidelines and another for the Universal Code of Conduct Coordinating Committee (U4C). I'm not sure what motivated that choice, but which decisions should go through community ratification, and which ones shouldn't, is an important question to reflect on. Ideally, we want to select the ones that are the most fundamental and impactful; and limiting to a few votes per year, to avoid creating a burden on the community (which would result in fewer and fewer people casting informed votes). Whether or not there is a community-wide vote, in any case, a community-wide consultation should always take place.

The results of the Universal Code of Conduct Coordinating Committee election in May are interesting, with most candidates having a high level of opposition, so much that almost half of the seats were not filled. Understanding the reason is important: is it because most voters believe the candidates are not good enough? If so, how can we push more people to nominate, and how can we support volunteers to grow in these roles? Is it because the candidates were not well known to the global community? If so, how can we help them be more visible? Have some voters voted against most or all candidates to oppose in principle the implementation of the UCoC?

I also believe we have a pattern of underestimating the timelines of such processes. If we look at the whole 2030 movement strategy, the process started in 2016, and it's still on - resulting in volunteer fatigue, and many people disengaging from the process. We should be more realistic when estimating how much time is needed for movement-wide processes; while at the same time designing iterative processes with shorter cycles, and striving for greater community engagement in movement governance.

Maciej Artur Nadzikiewicz (Nadzik)

I worked on the Universal Code of Conduct as a part-time contractor for a few months in 2021; I was responsible for consulting the Polish community about it – these were the most extensive consultations with the Polish community. They started with the community rejecting the idea of anything being moderated and controlled "globally", as it is not how the Wikimedia Movement was planned to function. The community rightly demanded the distributed model of control.

It took many days of work to ensure every community grievance was heard. Explaining what the Wikimedia Foundation wanted to do also took a lot of effort. With historical hindsight, it now strikes me that the Legal team could have done a much better job explaining that the UCoC was not only one of the Movement Strategy Initiatives, but also a requirement put on us by regulators and lawmakers (for example the European Unione with the Digital Services Act). While some communication regarding that was put out there, it was hidden in places where regular community members rarely look ([1]) or done much after the fact (2).

I think the UCoC was one of the best-consulted projects in our Movement, but it still fell far short of what we needed. Only a handful of communities got individual attention, others were just spammed with MassMessage. The way it is done is not always the fault of the staff, as you can only do so much in 10/20/40 hours a week; it is the fault of the entire model and management understanding. The community must be talked to in local languages by people who know the communities, not just in English and by someone who came to work at the WMF without a clue of what our community is and what we do. They must be consulted during their volunteer time, not at 10:00 AM on a Wednesday when most volunteers are at work or in school.

There are people in the community who would like to engage in projects like the UCoC and its development. There are people that need to be convinced and then would become the project's allies (look at the en.wiki ArbCom implementing the UCoC to their ruling ([2]).). But it is the job of the Wikimedia Foundation to find these people and meaningfully engage them, not the other way around.

The Board should prioritize the community by stressing the importance of contacting the people locally, at their designated spaces (some communities meet on Telegram, some on Discords, some on Facebook; it is not universal!), and IN THEIR OWN LANGUAGES. It may take more resources, but why do we have money if not for supporting the volunteers?

Mohammed Awal Alhassan (Alhassan Mohammed Awal)

Well, it is an undeniable fact that volunteers play a crucial role in Wikimedia projects, and there should be adequate support for their efforts. In order to be empowered to contribute effectively, they should be given a significant level of recognition, and provided with training and resources. The Board should consider establishing support systems that address the diverse needs of the volunteer community. The Board should as well adopt a collaborative approach in interacting with volunteers rather than a top-down approach. Engaging in dialogue, listening to concerns, and co-creating solutions with the community can build stronger relationships and trust. This collaborative spirit should be embedded in all Board activities. For instance, it is apparent that the initial timeline for implementing the UCoC was ambitious and failed to recognize the complexities involved. Future projects should therefore involve more realistic planning phases, with enough time for community feedback and iterative development. The Board should ensure that volunteer perspectives are integrated early and throughout the process to build a more inclusive and representative outcome. Also, it appears that there was a significant gap in engagement with the community which resulted in the implementation of the UCoC without any community ratification. For any policy or guideline to be effective and respected, it must be perceived as legitimate by the community it intends to govern. The Board should therefore prioritize mechanisms for community approval, such as referendums or comprehensive consultation periods, to ensure buy-in and adherence. To bridge the engagement gap, the Board should deliberately set consistent and clear communication channels to provide regular updates, explain decisions transparently, and spell out how community feedback is incorporated in the process. That way, there will be trust, and is equally a demonstration of respect for volunteer contributions. Electing the Universal Code of Conduct Coordinating Committee without members forming a quorum means there is the need for careful planning in governance structures. To avoid such situations, the Board should ensure that committees are properly constituted and have enough members to function effectively. This might include setting clear criteria for elections and having contingency plans for filling vacancies. The implementation of a universal policy like the UCoC should not just be a one-time event but rather as an ongoing process. The Board can learn to adopt an iterative approach, where feedback is continuously gathered and used to refine the policy and as well be made flexible in responding to emerging community needs and challenges. The Board should adopt a collaborative approach in interacting with volunteers rather than a top-down approach. Engaging in dialogue, listening to concerns, and co-creating solutions with the community can build stronger relationships and trust. This collaborative spirit should be embedded in all Board activities.

Rosie Stephenson-Goodknight (Rosiestep)

In 2018-20, I volunteered to serve on the Movement Strategy 2030 Community Health Working Group (WG). Our WG included WMF staff, WMF board, affiliate representatives, and community members. We met weekly for more than a year, and developed the 12 Movement Strategy 2030 Recommendations/Initiatives related to community health, including “Number 1: A joint set of rules we all agree to live by (a.k.a. Code of Conduct)”.

The Board should take this lesson: our WG worked so well together, as equals, with no one person having a greater voice than another. No cabal. No back-channeling. This is a lesson and a great gift, as I believe a cooperative effort that assumes good faith is the cornerstone of the Wiki way. I don’t see my thinking as utopian. I believe it is how we are at our best. So I live it… as a first-term WMF Trustee, a founding/participating member of multiple affiliates, and a day-to-day Wikipedia editor.

Tesleemah Abdulkareem (Tesleemah)

I have always know the Universal code of conduct as way back as 2021 when I joined the movement as a kind of guideline that protect individuals from getting mistreated within the community, it is that important that it got read before the commencement of any wiki event. I feel that volunteers need to get involved in these guidelines aside editing as a volunteer, as I can see from here that an election actually took place passing through the first and 2nd ratification even, with 1746 votes across 107 'home wiki'. I understand that some volunteers feel there is lack of representation underrepresented communities within the movement who are either not fully involved or whose votes are not really reflected due to their small population. My suggestion is that volunteers can engage more through the English, German and French Wikis as they are the official languages of most Countries. These three languages has more votes and indeed, will reflect our voices. For instance, my home wiki is Yoruba however, I engage more on the English Wiki and I have been carrying out more of my volunteer work through that. Also, the board can hold more engaging sessions with community to hear their concerns and suggestions. I believe all these will go a long way in having a unified community, satisfied volunteers and a functioning Board.

Victoria Doronina (Victoria)

The statement about the absence of the UCoC ratification is incorrect. After a consultation on Meta, which included open calls, the UCoC was ratified by around 2000 people from from 107 “home” wikis representing 74 of Wikimedia’s project languages voting and 74.87% of voters supporting the UCoC. Despite the UCoC passing with a healthy majority, the Board had noticed that the Enforcement guidlines were causing the majority of the negative comments accompanying the vote, so they were returned for the corrections.

A small number of engagements between the majority of volunteers and strategic discussions is an ongoing problem. The same people turn up for the call for volunteers for global structures such as the Affiliation Committee or Sister Projects Taskforce, mainly from the Global North. On the other hand, there are also candidates from the Global South who are very enthusiastic but have insufficient experience and often don’t understand the fundamenta wikimedial policies, such as copyright. We have a generational and geogrational gap, which is reflected in the difficulties of the Movement governance.

The absence of the quorum for the Universal Code of Conduct Coordinating Committee also raises the question about the feasibility of the current proposed structure of the Global Council, which starts as a 25 person body and potentially can be expanded to 100 members. In my opinion, we simply don’t have 100 diverse volunteers who are prepared to work on this level additionally to their other projects.

As for the lessons, WMF is implementing variuos training opportunities for the people to be prepared for work at high level, for example training academy WALDO, which the candidates will take part in. In this election we have 12 candidates and only 4 of us will be elected. I invite everybody who will not be appointed to the board to apply taking part in the other global governance structures.

Q2

There has been some trend towards devolving or sharing the governance of the Wikimedia movement, including having a separate board for the Wikimedia Endowment and the proposed Global Council in the Movement Charter. What do you see as the positives and negatives of these trends, and what is your overall assessment of the work so far?

Bobby Shabangu (Bobbyshabangu)

I think the positive side of creating a separate board for the Wikimedia Endowment allows for more focused and efficient oversight of funds, and I also think it will allow for better resource management. However, the down side can also lead to the Board of Trustees working in silo from the board for the Wikimedia Endowment and making it harder to keep strategies aligned across different governing bodies. Same applies to the proposed Global Council in the Movement Charter.

I am not opposed to sharing the governance of the Wikimedia movement. I believe it can be most effective if done by creating sub-committees under the Board of Trustees, with equal representation from Affiliates. This approach would help prevent the two challenges I've highlighted - working in silos and misaligned strategies.

Christel Steigenberger (Kritzolina)

Generally I am a big fan of sharing responsibilities and sharing power. And in the end this is what shared governance means. Basically the idea of Wikipedia is based on this sharing of responsibilities. All editors do their part and rely on others to do their part as well. So I think it is only appropriate that the governance structures of the movement should mirror this.

There are of course also drawbacks to this sharing of responsiblities. Shared power means a higher need for communication and more risk of mistakes and confusion. Communication doesn’t always go well. With a global community of the size of our movement, this risk of confusion is especially high.

I think at the moment we are at the hight of confusion in regards to the Global Council and the Movement Charter. And yet I am confident we will find a way forward that will lead to more shared power through different governance bodies. This will benefit the movement as a whole.

Deon Steyn (Oesjaar)

Managing Wikimedia is quite a challenge as it literally covers the globe with different languages, cultures and statuary requirements. Then to complicate matters, not all Wikipedia's are the same size in terms of users and mother tongue speakers and English skew this whole picture further. There are responsibilities that will always be controlled at Organizational level e.g. strategy and finances. The Board cannot prescribing/advising/managing at Community level for various reasons such as the differences already indicated. But still the communities need to be involved so devolving or sharing within the Wikimedia Movement is the answer. Creating separate boards for the Wikimedia Endowment and proposed Global Council in the Movement Charter will improve efficiency, representation and accountability. It will also make the Communities feel that they belong, not being left alone and improve communications.

These changes may lead to complexity, coordination challenges, can be resource intensive and can possibly lead to conflicts.

I support devolving some duties and responsibilities Global Council.

Erik Hanberg (Erikemery)

I think it’s important to begin by noting that the wiki community are already the leaders of the movement, whether or not there’s a Global Council to represent it. And the WMF board is built to have majority representation from the community.

But I am, in general, wary of devolving or sharing legal governance.

I agree with many of the tenets and values of the proposed Movement Charter, and I admire the work that went into it. I think it captures a shared vision quite well. That said, I believe opening up a separate body like the Global Charter is likely to make reaching that vision harder, increase bureaucracy, and make internal disagreements within the community more acute.

Part of my thinking is structural. The WMF board has a legal and financial responsibility for Wikimedia and all its platforms. That’s part of the law governing all nonprofits like WMF. It’s not a responsibility a board member should take lightly. A separate governance organization that doesn’t have that same legal and financial obligation, such as the global council, would always put it on a different footing than the WMF board, and I think it would result in more friction, not less. I worry it would create a poor dynamic with confusing relationships that would not be productive.

Finally, I do call on the WMF board to think about ways to address the concerns of the movement that resulted in calls for this shared governance model.

Farah Jack Mustaklem (Fjmustak)

Response removed by Elections Committee due to late submission.

Lane Rasberry (Bluerasberry)

In the past the Wikimedia Foundation and Wikimedia community have disagreed on ethics, values, and the interpretation of the Wikimedia mission. I support the establishment of the Global Council because such an organization would empower the Wikimedia community to speak for itself and improve collaboration. Wikimedia is special because it is the only user-generated content platform where the users themselves govern the project. The Global Council is our best-developed plan to support community self-expression. The Wikimedia Foundation, Wikimedia Endowment, and Global Council can coexist with different goals while avoiding competition over the same power and resources.

Even though it is nice to imagine successful crowdsourced governance by anonymous online Internet people, there are many problems with power sharing. The processes that work for collaboratively organizing volunteers to build an encyclopedia are different from those for sharing the next billion dollars that we will spend. I am happy with the development of the Movement Strategy, I endorse ratification of the Movement Charter, and I wish to join the board to establish the Global Council with attractive powers for the community. Overall, I am satisfied with the Wikimedia community's demand to speak freely and independently, and of the Wikimedia Foundation's intention to support significant power transfer.

Lorenzo Losa (Laurentius)

Having multiple entities or bodies with different roles is nothing new: affiliates have been there for 20 years, and the first community-wide committees, like the Affiliations Committee or the Language Committee, were established shortly after that. As time passes, more and more structures are created to support the mission. This is generally a sign, and a result of, maturity in the movement; but at the same time, we need to think carefully when structures are useful and when they are ineffective and make us slower.

The two examples mentioned - the Endowment and the Global Council - are different in nature. While the proposed Global Council would be a governance body, the Wikimedia Endowment is a specialized organization, with a very specific purpose: to support Wikimedia projects in perpetuity. It has more an operational role than a governance role. It is a fully independent legal entity mainly for legal reasons: to make sure that claims made against the Wikimedia Foundation could not undermine the Endowment, and vice versa.

In terms of sharing the governance, I think we still have a long way to go. While a lot of work has already been done, it generally focuses on having wider participation in the governance of individual organizations: often on the Wikimedia Foundation, as the largest one, but also in affiliates. What we really lack are structures for taking decisions together. For instance, not to assign grants, or tell the Wikimedia Foundation, or tell Wikimedia affiliates, what to do - but to align in the decisions that each organization, and different parts of the community, make. We can design participatory processes to assign Wikimedia Foundation grants. We can design participatory processes to give input into the annual plans of the Wikimedia Foundation or affiliates. We already have some of that, and there are proposals on the table to improve them. But often times, this sounds like someone telling someone else what to do. What would really make a difference would be to have all these entities, and the community, work together on what each of them is doing.

Maciej Artur Nadzikiewicz (Nadzik)

Over the past few years we have seen several developments in the Movement governance structure. The Board of Trustees now has half of its members elected by the community (by changing the affiliate seats and the affiliates' role in the process). We have a separate board for the Wikimedia Endowment, although some, myself included, wish that the community had some say in this process.

When it comes to actually sharing governance with the Movement, the Foundation has yet to do so. We still have self-selective committees (e.g., the Affiliations Committee), ones with complicated structures that lead to the lack of quorum (e.g. U4C committee). Even when successfully selected, the committees are under-resourced and understaffed, and the volunteers are over-stretched (sometimes doing the job that the support staff should be doing), leading to bizarre situations in which those important bodies have no capacity to act, leading to frustration on all sides. We have regional grant committees that are tasked to share money in their respective regions, but it is still a few people at the Wikimedia Foundation that decide which regions get how much; there is no real Movement governance over the Movement's funds.

There are signals coming from the Board Wikimedia Foundation Board noticeboard/Board liaisons reflections on final Movement charter draft that the BoT may vote against the proposed text of the Movement Charter (which would lead to it being veto-ed). While the Charter is not perfect and offers less than many may have wanted, it is our first real attempt at sharing the governance of the Wikimedia movement. I've organised a global meeting to talk about this development, let's see where we are with this in a few weeks.

Overall, as a Movement, we are developing a governance model. In some parts, we are achieving great success; our ongoing hub projects are the best examples of that. In other parts, we are still stuck in time because of the decisions made many years ago. Meanwhile, the world keeps turning, and no one will wait for us.

Mohammed Awal Alhassan (Alhassan Mohammed Awal)

The trend towards devolving or sharing governance within the Wikimedia movement has several positives and negatives. Below are my opinion about some of the positives and negatives:

Positives;

Having separate boards like the Wikimedia Endowment and the proposed Global Council will ensure a more specialized governance systems. These boards can focus specifically on their mandates, which can facilitate a more informed and effective decision-making. Considering the proposed Global Council in the Movement Charter and its activities so far, it seems to represent the true diverse global community more effectively which is the ultimate goal of the Charter. This inclusivity can ensure that different regions and linguistic groups have a voice in the movement’s governance, and ensure a more democratic and equitable structure. Having a smaller, and or specialized boards or councils ensures a shared workload and guides them through their areas of focus and specific responsibilities. This can lead to faster implementation of initiatives and more targeted support for various community needs. Sharing governance responsibilities can alleviate the burden on the central Board of Trustees, allowing it to focus on broader strategic issues while other bodies handle more specific tasks. It also ensures checks and balances among the bodies. Checks and balances are more effective when there are multiple governance bodies. This ensures accountability and transparency across the movement.

Now, let's consider Negatives;

In as much as it is necessary to ensure that all bodies are aligned with the overall mission and vision of the Wikimedia movement, devolving governance may sometimes lead to a lack of cohesion and unified direction amongst the different bodies. This can lead to complex or bureaucratic decision-making processes. Unless there is a clear communication and coordination mechanism put in place to mitigate this risk, there will be less results achieved within a longer period. Establishing and maintaining multiple governance structures requires resources. Another possible negative impact of the multiple governance structures is the additional resources required in their establishment and maintenance process. There is a risk that this could divert resources away from core activities if not managed efficiently. In terms of human resource, with the establishment of multiple governance bodies and to ensure that all of them have the necessary expertise and experience, it is necessary to have a robust selection and training processes to ensure effective governance across all levels.

My Overall Assessment of the case is that;

The establishment of separate boards and the proposed Global Council are steps in the right direction towards a more inclusive and effective governance. However, there has to be a carefully designed plan and a continuous evaluation process to ensure these bodies function efficiently. In the planning processes, the mandate of each body should be clearly defined and there should be regular communication and evaluation of their activities to ensure they align with the objectives and goals of the Wikimedia Movement. To gain the trust and buy-in from the Community, there should be continued engagements and transparent processes to clearly convey the benefits of these governance structures to them. During these engagements, there should be willingness to adapt based on feedback from the Community and changing circumstances to ensure success of these governance structures. Flexibility and responsiveness to the community’s needs should remain a priority.

Rosie Stephenson-Goodknight (Rosiestep)

I have taught Organizational Behavior at a university in California, so my opinion is not solely based on the Wikimedia movement. The key to successful governance is being flexible. An organization (such as the Wiki movement) should have appropriate structures for the work that must be done at a given time. For example, in the last few days, on Wikimedia-l, there’s been discussion regarding the WMF’s “old days”: “...WMF was originally incorporated as a membership organization…” We know that the model has evolved since then.

The Wikimedia Endowment is appropriate for supporting a U.S.-based non-profit organization focusing on “knowledge”/education. Its positive side is that it will ensure that Wikipedia lasts perpetually. The negative side is that endowments are not universal; people from some parts of the world are baffled by them. Maybe we need to better explain what it is, what it does, and why it does it. (Ditto for Wikimedia Enterprise.)

The proposed Global Council is a noble idea; developing it from scratch is tough. That's because questions such as what should it be, what should it do, and why should it do it are central to its development as well as the changes that will cascade after its establishment. The positive side (premise) is that it will assume roles best suited for such a structure. The negative side is “the unknown”, e.g., we don’t know how successful it will or won’t be.

My overall assessment of our governance work so far is that we have functioned better in some years than others.

Tesleemah Abdulkareem (Tesleemah)

Establishing a supreme board for Wikimedia Endowment and Global Council is not totally a bad idea, I understand the reason for this is to ensure there is equal representation which is on the positive side.

However, I feel this will lead to clash of power as the establishment of the council is to control the affairs of the board, how will the three bodies work together when there can only be a body making decision on behalf of others? this may hinder proper representation we actually envisage for the wikimedia community.

I believe a better way is to have a sub-committee within the board such that, all affiliate are properly represented. This way, there will be equal representation on the board without the need for clashes in power.

Victoria Doronina (Victoria)

Wikimedia Endowment and the proposed Global Council are entirely different entities. Wikimedia Endowment is separate from the WMF organisation and has a different goal—raising and investing money to ensure the existence of the Wikimedia projects in perpetuity—which is a very cool goal. However, while it started making grants, it doesn’t deal with the movement's operational questions and doesn't provide support for them.

There’s also Wikimedia Enterprise, which diversifies operational income sources as the banner revenue declines. So, only the proposed Global Council fits the description of “sharing the governance of the Wikimedia Movement.” I would also like to mention Hubs as places for fostering intra-regional and thematic collaborations, filling the gap between individual affiliates and the US-centric and serving the devolution of the responsibilities from WMF. The WMF has also delegated responsibility for the WMF grants to the regional grants committees.

I think that devolution of responsibilities is a good thing and should be encouraged. However, we must be careful to avoid creating more levels of movement bureaucracy, which will eat into the resources dedicated to our mission—growing and disseminating free knowledge—without providing any benefits. Creating such levels is a possible negative outcome.