Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/How to present a case

Please note that this guide is descriptive, not normative: it doesn't describe how the Committee should behave. It is based on empirical observation of what arguments have worked in front of the ArbCom, and what have not, as well as discussions with Arbitrators about what they pay attention to.

There are two very important things to realize about the Arbitration Committee and its members:

1. They do not have much time, and
2. They care much more about product than process.

Almost everything below is a corollary of one or both of these two lines.

Finally, and rather obviously, the absolute best way to fare well in an ArbCom case is to just not violate policy beforehand. If you are trolling, POV pushing, etc, you're not going to fare well in a case against you regardless of how you present your case.

The ArbCom's perception of your case

At any one time there are likely ten to twenty or more active cases in Arbitration, and hundreds of closed ones. Individual arbitrators cannot keep close track of each of these. If you mention a user that the ArbCom has sanctioned to an ArbCom member, they are likely to remember the user. They are not likely to remember particular details of the ruling or which POV that user was advocating.

Write your evidence and proposals so that they help jog their memories. Assume that every time an Arbitrator pulls up the evidence page, the proposed decision page, or the workshop page, they won't remember what they concluded last time. They are not clueless — but they may need to be reminded.

What the ArbCom will and won't look at

Evidence pages get very long very easily and quickly. Arbitrators do not have time to read through 100 KB evidence pages, and they especially don't have time to reread them after they've forgotten which case is which.

Try hard to keep your evidence page short and to the point. Be concise, direct, and clear. You do not need to show every single instance of a given user being a problem — doing so can be counterproductive. Pick the clearest examples you can, and present them with as little commentary as is necessary.

Context and the ArbCom

The ArbCom do not read up on disputes that might reach them eventually. It is very unlikely they know the history of the dispute going in — that someone is a known advocate of a point of view, that someone has a history of defending problem users, or that everybody who has ever dealt with a user recognizes them to be a complete lunatic. Point these things out to them. If you point to an edit that comes after a month of heated discussion, it may not make sense to someone who was not a part of that discussion.

Take care with evidence that requires context. If there is better evidence for the same point, use that. Otherwise, be ready to explain the context. Note that the more explanation a piece of evidence requires, the less likely the Arbitrators are to have time to pay attention to it.

Expertise of the ArbCom

Arbitrators are not subject experts. This is why they avoid ruling on content disputes. In practice, they are likely to be very cautious about basing a ruling on the grounds that one side is right in a content dispute. There are minor exceptions to this — in general, the ArbCom has looked unfavorably on people who are using Wikipedia as a platform for advocacy, and people who allege a conspiracy to suppress their point of view. The exact relationship between this and particular minority points of view is subtle.

Content issues are complicated and take time to figure out. So try other approaches. Instead of arguing that somebody is advancing a nutty conspiracy theory with no credibility, find statements on talk pages where they express a desire to advocate a cause, instances of them removing well-sourced information, instances of them accusing those who disagree with them of conspiracy, and other more concrete and self-explanatory things. Almost no AC cases have actually required careful attention to content issues to get the necessary result.

Effective arguments

The ArbCom generally considers that the Wikipedia method works, that Wikipedia is on the whole a successful project, that admins are generally trustworthy. They explicitly choose any outcome that results in Wikipedia working better.

Arguments opposing Wikipedia's basic principles, suggesting a massive cabal of rogue admins, or holding the process to be an end in itself will not work.

Arguing about flaws in the Arbitration process is usually a waste of time and will make Arbitrators look dimly upon you. Take the time that you could spend arguing about the details of process and apply it to trying to gather useful evidence. The first to try to wikilawyer the arbitration process invariably loses — because they wouldn't be wikilawyering if they had a case.

Discussion

Clear and persuasive presentation of evidence will almost always be more effective than anything you can say here. Almost nothing useful ever comes out of arguments between and among parties on the workshop page, the evidence page, or any of the talk pages. The chance of anything on these pages getting noticed or cared about drops dramatically the longer they get. If you must engage in discussion, short and simple questions to Arbitrators are probably most effective.