I was reading Sherry Arnstein's 1969 paper "A Ladder of Citizen Participation" (JAIP, Vol. 35, No. 4, July 1969, pp. 216-224) available at http://lithgow-schmidt.dk/sherry-arnstein/ladder-of-citizen-participation.html or at http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/01944366908977225 and found it remarkably relevant to the issue of the engagement beween the volunteer community and the formal structures of the WMF (Board and executive).
The analysis proposes eight stages or rungs to the ladder: 1. Manipulation 2. Therapy 3. Informing 4. Consultation 5. Placation 6. Partnership 7. Delegated Power 8. Citizen Control They are grouped as 1-2: Non-participation; 3-5: Tokenism; 6-8: Citizen Power (see https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Ladder_of_citizen_participation,_Sheey_Arnstein.tif ) Reading "volunteer" for "citizen" throughout, I thought it instructive to map some of the WMF activities onto the scale, with quotes from the analysis. 1. Manipulation "In the name of citizen participation, people are placed on rubberstamp advisory committees or advisory boards for the express purpose of "educating" them or engineering their support. Instead of genuine citizen participation, the bottom rung of the ladder signifies the distortion of participation into a public relations vehicle by powerholders." 2. Therapy "under a masquerade of involving citizens in planning, the experts subject the citizens to clinical group therapy." 3. Informing. "the emphasis is placed on a one-way flow of information - from officials to citizens - with no channel provided for feedback and no power for negotiation" 4. Consultation. "People are primarily perceived as statistical abstractions, and participation is measured by how many come to meetings, take brochures home, or answer a questionnaire. What citizens achieve in all this activity is that they have 'participated in participation.' And what powerholders achieve is the evidence that they have gone through the required motions" 5. Placation. "An example of placation strategy is to place a few hand-picked 'worthy' poor on boards [...] If they are not accountable to a constituency in the community and if the traditional power elite hold the majority of seats, the have-nots can be easily outvoted and outfoxed." 6. Partnership. "At this rung of the ladder, power is in fact redistributed through negotiation between citizens and powerholders." Can there be aby doubt that the majority of WMF group meetings world-wide falls under the heading of 1 and 2? Or that the communications strategy and product development strategy of the WMF falls under 3? Or that 4 is a desciption of the WMF approach to community consultation? Or that 5 is an uncannily exact description of the way the community nominates (under the guise of "electing") a minority of board members who may be removed if they ask impertinant questions? Or that there is precisely zero substantiative activitity that has risen to level 6? It is clear that on this analysis the WMF/Community engagement is still at best "Tokenism" -- discussion is invited. "Rogol" _______________________________________________ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, <mailto:wikimedia-l-requ...@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe>
