If the law just said "no jaywalking", but the police started arresting everyone who crossed away from a crosswalk, and there was no court which could tell the police that their interpretation of "jaywalking" was wrong, then the police have de-facto made policy. (Especially if the police are also empowered to hand out sentences, which actual police don't do.)
However much anyone says that Arbcom doesn't make policy, given that the rules are complicated and often ambiguous, "deciding whether something fits existing policy" is often the same as "making policy". So you just end up with Arbcom making policy and pretending not to. And then you get Wikipedians who need a policy decision and recognize on some level that Arbcom makes policy, but need to go through hoops phrasing their complaint so that Arbcom can answer it "without making policy". _______________________________________________ WikiEN-l mailing list [email protected] To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
