Issuepedia:Wikicitizens

Overview

Wikicitizens is the working name of a project to create an online forum for reaching group consensus on difficult issues via rational discussion of relevant information.

While Issuepedia does allow non-NPOV writing within articles, those opinions are not intended to reflect any kind of consensus or agreement amongst Issuepedia's contributors (see Issuepedia:About for explanation of this policy).

The purpose of Wikicitizens, by way of contrast, is specifically to arrive at a set of opinions or decisions upon which the contributors can agree.

Site Roles

How all these different-but-similar sites fit together

• Wikicitizens will draw upon the sketching-out of issues and opinions in Issuepedia. Its job is to allow a group (or groups) of like-minded people to reach rational opinions and make rational decisions (with some documentation of how those decisions were arrived at, to help others understand better), making use of Issuepedia as a primary source for what is known about the facts and extant opinions on each issue.
• Issuepedia draws upon the more complete and (more or less) unbiased information in Wikipedia, and possibly anecdotal and practical information in HTYP. Issupedia's job is to extract the "bones" of the issue from the surrounding "matrix" of related facts, opinions, and arguments in Wikipedia and elsewhere.
• Wikipedia's role, while generally not regarded as authoritative, can be thought of as reasonably thorough and even definitive; if anyone disagrees with its statements on any given subject, there will almost certainly be discussion to that effect on the "talk" page. No significant stone will be left unturned, and many insignificant ones will be checked as well. Wikipedia may not have all the facts, or even have them all correct (though it generally does a pretty good job), but it can at least be a guide to what pieces of information there are which might need verifying and where one might find more definitive information. Its only flaw, for our purposes, is excess: there is much information which, though clearly on-topic, is not relevant to any issues under discussion.

Woozle's take on things

Multiplicity

It seems almost inevitable to me that any given social group (online or not) will gravitate towards any of several tenable ideological viewpoints, and that as the group consensus moves closer to any particular viewpoint, those who disagree with that viewpoint will no longer feel comfortable and will cease to participate.

Alternatively, a group may attempt to be too inclusive, and nobody will feel comfortable expressing a strong opinion for fear of alienating everyone else, and eventually very little of real substance will be discussed.

In order to avoid either of these scenarios, it seems to me that it will be necessary to be able to split off separate groups as needed in order to accomodate irreconcilable viewpoints. This does not mean that there can be no further dialogue once a viewpoint has become "split off" into its own social group; on the contrary, allowing members of a group to work out their point of view in safety means that when discussions take place between groups, underhanded discussion tactics and rhetorical deceptions should be much less tempting (each participant knowing that they are not fighting alone for truth and justice) and easier to spot (all participants havinghaving access to the same facts and being well-armed with the ability to spot poor discussion technique).

Ultimately it should then be easier for an inter-group dialogue to work out some acceptable compromises. The design of Wikicitizens should take this into account at the earliest possible stage.

This mirrors the existence of political parties; these parties originally formed around ideological points-of-view (though in many cases they have moved away from their original positions). It is important, however, to avoid setting up any kind of system where only the top two parties have any notable influence on inter-group discussions (a two-party system); this should be easy enough to accomplish.

This is not to say that I see wikicitizen groups paralleling existing political parties, though there will probably be some overlap. I hope we can start moving away from the current outdated system and towards something where people stay with a group for two reasons: (a) because they all agree on basic philosophy, even if they're still working out the details of how to apply that philosophy, and (b) because they like each other, as conversation partners and as people.

This also means that we are not so much looking at the design of a single "wikicitizens" site as a meta-design for multiple sites to use, of which we will create at least one in order to get things rolling. We will also need to work out how group-forming discussion takes place. Where does someone go if they want to announce "Hey, I want to start a group whose central premise is X"? Should there be a central, non-partisan site? Or should such announcements be posted in appropriate places within groups whose members might be sympathetic?

Another question: what is the nature of "citizenship" within a wikicitizen group? Can individuals belong to more than one group? We can probably start out by saying that such rules should be decided by each group; some may choose to be exclusive and others may choose to be open &nash; but these are among the considerations which a new group must decide upon during formation. The role of the central, "seed" site, then, will include listing such questions and, as various different policies are tried by different groups, maintaining notes on how the different policies have worked out for each group.

This page isn't really finished yet, but it's a good start...

E.J.’s Response

I think “multiplicity” will definitely be a central (if not the central) issue to take into account with WikiCitizens. It will be in the best interest of both the website and its users to create a forum that is flexible enough to accommodate many points of view. How to achieve this in the face of obstacles such as “vandalism and inflammatory content,” as others have put it, will hopefully be something that can be worked out after some experimentation.

A Restatement of the Purpose of WikiCitizens

First, it appears that my original proposal was a little confusing and requires some clarification. It was never my intention for WikiCitizens to be a forum for discussing ideological viewpoints. Rather, I proposed WikiCitizens with the hope that it would serve as a forum for providing individuals with (1) a neutral account of various political issues and (2) a database of the various actions that people are engaging in to either oppose or support them.

On Reaching a Group Consensus

While I think the idea of creating a forum to help people reach a group consensus on a political topic—be it a general worldview or a stance on a single, specific issue—is a very noble one, I am skeptical that such a project will result in notable action or real-world progress. I believe most people have already decided what is best for themselves, their families, and their communities. While it is fun to discuss social and political opinions, I think one will find that most people’s values and beliefs have been that way for a long time, and no amount of discussion is going to change them.

Political party affiliations are fairly stable, yet group consensus within parties is almost non-existent. One feature of the two-party system is that there is actually no agreement on what it means to be either a Democrat or a Republican. For example, not all Democrats are pro-choice and not all Republicans are pro-life. Yet much of the dialogue in politics focuses on how to strengthen one’s party and support one’s party members—all with the implicit (but often incorrect) assumption that everyone involved is working toward the same ideals.

On Focusing on Issues, Individuals, and Action

WikiCitizens will bypass this feature of bi-partisan politics by overstepping the need for group-consensus and focusing instead on graspable issues and executable actions. Therefore, when I suggest that discussions take place on an issue-by-issue basis, it is my intention that an individual be able to read about a single topic like Net Neutrality, learn what it means to be against or in favor of Net Neutrality, and see how other people are acting in order to oppose or support it—all of this without having to take into account any individual’s overarching philosophy or political affiliation. The implicit assumption in this case will be that the individual will decide for himself what is right and what is wrong.

I’m a bit optimistic in that I think most people’s values and beliefs don’t need to be changed at all. What I do think has to change is people’s lack of awareness of what is going on around them. I believe people’s hearts are in the right place, they’re just misinformed about the facts, and ignorant of what they can do to change them. Therefore, WikiCitizens is not meant to spark debate amongst individuals, but provide individuals with the information necessary to form their own opinions and act upon them.

Setting single issues as the primary unit for WikiCitizens will allow the website to accommodate each individual regardless of her values or affiliations, because she will be able to use the website to support any combination of beliefs. --E.J. 23:48, 11 June 2006 (EDT)

Further discussion on the discussion page...

Links

• Wikicitizens proposal in Meta