User:Arcticocean/Functus Officio

This is an essay.

It contains the advice or opinions of one or more Wikipedia contributors. This page is not an encyclopedia article, nor is it one of Wikipedia's policies or guidelines, as it has not been thoroughly vetted by the community. Some essays represent widespread norms; others only represent minority viewpoints.

This page in a nutshell: Functus Officio is a term that refers to a state, agency, or instrument that has fulfilled the purpose of its creation and can therefore be dissolved. This essay argues that the community and the WMF were once too immature to be responsible for much of ArbCom's present remit, but that both entities are now capable of taking back some of the committee's workload. This essay proposes ArbCom narrow its mandate and proactively refer to the community or the Foundation any matter which ArbCom does not strictly need to decide.

ArbCom is too judicially active and has too expansive a remit. I propose that:

We should refer allegations of sock-puppetry to our competent, sensible team of community checkusers. They would need their own mailing list (because raw checkuser data cannot be published on the functionaries' mailing list).
By agreement with the WMF Office, child protection investigations must be conducted by us. However, the Office have indicated they are willing to enforce our decisions in child protection investigations. We should let them do so.
Appeals of blocks or bans not imposed by the committee proper do not need to be heard by the Ban Appeals Subcommittee (BASC). We could appoint community representatives onto BASC, but better still the community could establish a public venue for hearing ban appeals to which community blocks and bans could be appealed. Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Ban appeals is a viable page name.

We have already devolved or returned some of our power to other bodies:

Article and content complaints from notable or semi-famous people are now routinely referred to the Oversighters (if suppression is needed) and to the "info-en" queue (if careful editorial action is needed).
Checkuser and oversight use is regulated by the Audit Subcommittee (AUSC), on which three community representatives are seated. Editors should continue to have the ability to complain to AUSC about an action by a checkuser or oversighter.

We would do the community a disservice by closing up shop, and there are many things that we will still need to do:

Clean starts are regulated (and in some cases authorised) by us. We would need to continue to do so; clean starts cannot be requested on a public noticeboard watched by thousands of people.
Employer and family harassment is resolved through ArbCom investigation and blocks. We should retain this system, which works well.
Previous committee decisions need to be amended and clarified, as required. Upon community request, we should continue to accept requests for clarification and amendment.
New arbitration proceedings will undoubtedly be necessary in future. Like it or not, a wiki will always contain intractable editorial and community disputes. ArbCom should continue to make itself available to resolve such disputes (by motion rather than by a full case, if it thinks it appropriate to do so), but proceedings should only be opened as a result of a clear community request to do so. Judicial activism is bad for the encyclopedia.

We would need an internal procedure for referring mail to other bodies, and a conscious effort on the part of our arbitrators would be needed if ArbCom's role is to be reduced.

Have I forgotten something important, or do you have thoughts on this essay? Your comments are welcome at the talk page. AGK [•] 23:39, 25 March 2013 (UTC)