User:Maxim/Thoughts on arbitration

Here are some thoughts and observations on the nature of being on the Arbitration Committee, whether for prospective arbitrators, new arbitrators, or anyone curious in general.

• Unblock requests: the Committee accepts appeals for blocks based on private evidence; in practice, these include checkuser, oversight, and arbcom blocks. Of these, the overwhelming majority (95%+) are checkuser blocks. While the workload isn't particularly high (no more than 20-ish in a given month), it is quite dreary and perhaps requires a slightly different skillset compared to what one could assume based on the Committee's on-wiki actions.
  • Corollary: it is useful to have an experienced and technically confident checkuser (and then maybe a second one) on the Committee.
• Email load: definitely not as bad as has been stated to have been in the past. In terms of the core mailing lists (namely arbcom-en, arbcom-en-b, arbcom-en-c, functionaries-en, checkuser-l, oversight-l, and clerks-l), a ballpark figure is perhaps 10 discrete threads per day (i.e. 300 separate threads in a month). Of these, perhaps half are arbitration business. The rest are useful but optional, particularly checkuser-l and oversight-l (if you're not that into being a checkuser or oversighter).
  • The functionaries list can be particularly useful. One major reason is that we now have generations upon generations of ex-arbs on that list, and a simple "why are things done this way"-type question will yield plenty of very useful (and prompt!) responses from the list members.
  • There is significant variety as to the emails sent to arbcom. Sometimes, we receive them because there's no other good place to send them.
• It has always been the case that plenty of people will think that your intelligence has plummeted the moment you got elected. (Or: the previous year's committee is always better.) Take care to not take this personally. The goodwill towards the Committee in 2020 and the latter half of 2019 is likely a function of Trust and Safety being the new "evil organization" in town.
  • That said, also note that there's a particular learning curve to being an effective arbitrator. In some cases, what makes someone an effective editor or administrator does not always translate to having a good time as an arbitrator.
• On AE: remedies that end up punting stuff back to individual admins (or groups of admins) at AE are a double-edged sword. On one hand, perhaps it is not reasonable to throw the book/banhammer at everyone in front of the Committee. On the other hand, cases are proposed with the purpose of putting the drama/conflict collectively behind us. Certain situations end up being an ongoing problem that was never truly resolved; this problem is especially true when a given sanction is particularly difficult to enforce. Finding the right balance between throwing the book and throwing the dispute back (with DS, other bespoke sanctions, and so on) is one of the more difficult parts of the job.
• Admin cases: when arbcom desysops an admin, it runs the risk of telling someone that they are not fit to be an administrator now or ever. While nowadays desysops are likely the only arbcom decision truly appealable to the community, the track record of subsequent RfAs is quite poor. This reason is likely one of many why the Committee can appear reticent to desysop administrators because we have to consider whether an admin's behaviour was so poor that it merits what is likely to be a permanent revocation of access.
  • Possible corollary: it makes it difficult to accept cases that are likely to end with a slap on the wrist. A particular consideration is whether it's worth subjecting a volunteer to a month-long circus that ends with an admonishment (or nothing at all!).
  • Apparently I may have a bone to pick on this issue; for full details, see User:Maxim/ArbCom and desysops.
  • Possible second corollary: a particular perennial problem is that we don't have a good mechanism to deal with less-than-ideal-but-not-terrible administrator behaviour.
• While the Arbitration Committee is considered to be the final step in Wikipedia's dispute resolution framework, it in practice tends to be a disciplinary committee that can, but not always, rely on previous decisions. While first optimizing for the best interest of the project (disciplinary committee), there is also an element of finding a solution that is reasonably acceptable to the parties and to anyone tasked with enforcing it (arbitration).
  • Corollary: we tend to be leery of a-pox-on-all-your-houses solutions, even if such an option might actually be the most acceptable to the project's interests.

Update, November 2022

• The above is generally still accurate. I think that the statement about Trust and Safety may be starting to get dated, but I think they are in some ways as a foil to the Committee. I find that we generally are on the same page, but not always, although in the past three years, that has not meant that we are wildly out of sync.
• We need arbs who are interested in "global" issues, whether that be working with T&S or other non-enwiki groups. Regardless of one's opinion of the Wikimedia ecosystem outside the English Wikipedia, I think a certain Realpolitik applies where it would probably be better to get along rather than to be at loggerheads with the rest of the ecosystem.
• Worm That Turned's taxonomy of arbs is a set of very valuable observations. The committee would probably work a bit more efficiently if we had a handful more worker arbs. I think that in the past two to two-and-a-half years, we are generally good at following up on emails and open business, with one major exception of problems that don't have a logical home and end up by necessity with us. Usually, these problems are not necessarily exceptionally pressing or urgent, and they may fall through the cracks because no arb takes point on the problem. Chances are that the problem is tedious and takes considerable time to investigate, and frankly, might not be that interesting to work on for available arbitrators.
  • To summarize, somewhat reusing Barkeep49's language, the committee could use an extra arb or two, who could stomach an extra bowl of shit once or twice a month.
• ArbCom could still benefit a lot from more experienced checkusers on the Committee. This statement is not only in reference to appeals, but also in reference to the functionary appointment and oversight processes. While all arbitrators have been assigned that right, very few have used it prior to appointment. For example, I have generally been the most active arbitrator-checkuser during my time on the committee, but I have racked up that number of checks overwhelmingly on committee business, and I thus lack the perspective of community checkusers in general (never having been one) and, particularly, checkusers who run checks anywhere but something related to ArbCom.

See also

In aleatory order:

• User:Barkeep49/So you're thinking about running for ArbCom
• User:David Fuchs/Thoughts on ArbCom
• User:Worm That Turned/Rant On/Being an arbitrator
• User:Risker/Thoughts for Arbitration Committee Candidates
• Wikipedia:Arbitrator experiences