Wikipedia:Consensus

Wikipedia works by building consensus. Consensus is an inherent part of a wiki process. The basic process works like this: someone makes an edit to a page, and then everyone who reads the page makes a decision to either leave the page as it is or change it. Over time, every edit that remains on a page, in a sense has the unanimous approval of the entire community (or at least everyone who looks the page). "Silence equals consent" is the ultimate measure of consensus — somebody makes an edit and nobody objects or changes it. Most of the time consensus is reached as a natural product of the editing process.

When there are disagreements, they are resolved through polite discussion and negotiation, in an attempt to develop a consensus. If we find that a particular consensus happens often, we write it down as a guideline, to save people the time having to discuss the same principles over and over. Normally consensus on conflicts are reached via discussion on talk pages. In the rare situations where this doesn't work, it is also possible to use the Wikipedia:Dispute resolution processes, which are designed to assist consensus-building when normal talk page communication gets stuck.

Reasonable consensus-building

Consensus works best when all editors make a good faith effort to work together to accurately and appropriately describe the different views on the subject.

It is difficult to specify exactly what constitutes a reasonable or rational position. Good editors acknowledge that positions opposed to their own may be reasonable. However, stubborn insistence on an eccentric position, with refusal to consider other viewpoints in good faith, is not justified under Wikipedia's consensus practice. (Note that in the rare case if the "eccentric" position turns out to have merit, the consensus can change.)

Even if an editor's contributions appear to be biased, keep in mind that their edits may have been made in good faith, out of a genuine desire to improve the article. Editors must, in almost all situations, assume good faith and must always remain civil.

Consensus can change

Once established, consensus is not immutable. It is reasonable, and sometimes necessary, for the community to change its mind. A small group of editors can reach a consensual decision about an article, but when the article gains wider attention, members of the larger community of interest may then disagree, thus changing the consensus. The original group should not block further change on grounds that they already have made a decision.

This doesn't mean that we don't have precedent or that we should ignore previous decisions about related matters; for instance, it is strongly frowned upon to keep nominating an article to WP:AFD until it reaches the preferred outcome. However, neither should it be assumed that because something was decided in the past, it cannot be discussed again. If you think a consensual decision is outdated, you should ask around a bit, for example at the Village Pump, through a Request for Comment, or on the relevant talk page, to see if people agree with you. You cannot declare a new consensus all by yourself without the participants in the discussion agreeing that the previous consensus does not apply anymore.

It is the nature of the wiki to be ever-changing. New people visit every day, and through new information and new ideas, we may gain insights we didn't have previously. It is important that there is a way to challenge past decisions, whether they have been reached by poll or consensus. Decisions should therefore practically never be "binding" in the sense that the decision cannot be taken back.

Consensus vs. other policies

It is assumed that editors working toward consensus are pursuing a consensus that is consistent with the consensus on how to do things on a wider scale - especially the neutral point of view (NPOV). At times, a group of editors may be able to, through persistence, numbers, and organization, overwhelm well-meaning editors and generate what appears to be support for a version of the article that is actually inaccurate, libelous, or not neutral, e.g. giving undue weight to a specific point of view. This is not a consensus.

The preferred way to deal with this problem is to draw the attention of other editors to the issue by some of the methods of dispute resolution, such as consulting a third party, filing a request for comment (on the article in question), and requesting mediation. Enlarging the pool will prevent the railroading of articles by a dedicated few. In the case of a small group of editors who find that their facts and point of view are being excluded by a larger group of editors, it is worth considering that they may be mistaken.

Also see Wikipedia:Single purpose account for considerations relating to brand new users who appear and immediately engage in a specific issue.

Consensus in practice

Consensus does not mean that everyone agrees with the outcome; instead, it means that everyone agrees to abide by the outcome. The following description of consensus, from the mailing list, shows the difference between consensus and unanimity:

In fact WP's standard way of operating is a rather good illustration of what it does mean: a mixture across the community of those who are largely agreed, some who disagree but 'agree to disagree' without disaffection, those who don't agree but give low priority to the given issue, those who disagree strongly but concede that there is a community view and respect it on that level, some vocal and unreconciled folk, some who operate 'outside the law'. You find out whether you have consensus, if not unanimity, when you try to build on it.

Note: In disputes, the term consensus is often used as if it means anything from genuine consensus to majority rule to my position; it is not uncommon to see both sides in an edit war claiming a consensus for its version of the article.

Consensus vs. supermajority

While the most important part of consensus-building is to thoroughly discuss and consider all issues, it is often difficult for all members in a discussion to come to a single conclusion. In activities such as Requests for Adminship, Articles for Deletion or Requested Moves, consensus-building can be unwieldy due to the sheer number of contributors/discussions involved, therefore these processes may have been somewhat misdesigned. As a first heuristic in these decision-making processes, people might first see if the criterion of supermajority is achieved, and on that basis make a first order assumption on how close one is to rough consensus.

Formal decision making based on vote counting is not how wikipedia works (see Wikipedia is not a majoritarian democracy) and simple vote-counting should never be the key part of the interpretation of a debate. When polling is used, it should be seen as a process of 'testing' for consensus, rather than reaching consensus.

Nevertheless, some mediators of often-used Wikipedia-space processes have placed importance on the proportion of concurring editors reaching a particular level. This issue is controversial, and there is no consensus about having numerical guidelines. That said, the numbers mentioned as being sufficient to reach supermajority vary from about 60% to over 80% depending upon the decision, with the more critical processes tending to have higher thresholds.

See the pages for RM, AFD and RFA for further discussion of such figures. The numbers are by no means fixed, but are merely statistics reflecting past decisions. Note that the numbers are not binding on the editor who is interpreting the debate, and should never be the only consideration in making a final decision. Judgment and discretion are essential to determine the correct action, and in all cases, the discussion itself is more important than the statistics.

Exceptions

There are a few exceptions that supercede consensus decisions:

• Foundation Issues which lay out the basic principles of the site.
• Declarations from Jimmy Wales, the Board, or the Developers, particularly for copyright, legal issues, or server load, are usually held to have policy status (see Wikipedia:Policies and guidelines).
• Wikipedia:Office Actions on a specific article (such as stubbing or protecting it) are normally considered to be outside the policies of a specific project.
• Consensus decisions in a specific case cannot override content-related policies, although consensus can determine their interpretation. Unverifiable facts should not be included in an article even if the consensus is, or seems to be, in favor of inclusion; but determining whether a subject is encyclopedic and notable is usually determined via consensus.

See also

Articles

• Consensus
• Consensus decision-making
• Groupthink

Project pages

• Wikipedia:Featured article candidates
• Wikipedia:Policies and guidelines
• Wikipedia:Supermajority