User:Howard C. Berkowitz/MC/CZML

The account of this former contributor was not re-activated after the server upgrade of March 2022.

The access and implementation details are separate from the policy here. This is not, however, technically challenging and uses existing mechanisms.

Charter justification

CZ Charter Article 12 empowers the Management Council, in part, to "develop all rules of civility and behavior for participation on the Citizendium which shall apply equally to all Citizens regardless of status or position, adjudicate alleged violations of the rules, and impose sanctions for violations of the rules". This is a proposal for the creation of rules to cover situations not otherwise in existing rules, but that allows enforcement of civility and behavior in governing bodies.

The existing Point 2 of CZ Blocking Procedures, Offenses that will result in an immediate ban now states "It does not matter whether these attacks are made using Citizendium resources or other resources." Even though "other resources" logically includes email, there are practical problems in Citizendium having a trusted, auditable log of email commuincations.

Policy: Electronic mail in governing bodies

All electronic mail communications among all members of CZ governing bodies, including the Councils and Constabulary, shall take place via CZ mail servers to which the Constabulary either will have access when needed for specific dispute resolution. These communications will be archived.

Separation of powers

In no way does is the Constabulary empowered to act regarding the content of matters before the Constabulary, only its that its expression be civil. This is the same principle that separates Editor and Constable actions on the Wiki.

A safeguard might be to give the Constabulary access to the archives and list only when a member of the body makes the complaint, and then to change the password when the matter is resolved.

Responsible and civil conduct

Such a policy allows broad enforcement of Article 5, which, in part, says users "shall act responsibly and in a civil manner: derogatory or offensive language or behavior will not be tolerated." Article 12 states "Dispute resolutions should be resolved on the basis of the evidence and not upon the character, point of view, or politics of the Citizen," so those resolving the dispute need access to the evidence. It is not CZ policy that Citizens may be harassed or irresponsible conduct tolerated through the shield of private email by officials.

Discussion

While in some countries, there is an expectation of privacy in electronic mail sent, even unsolicited, to individuals, there is a much lesser level of privacy when the communications uses resources for which the participants do not pay. There is precedent for discussions of this type on the Constabulary's own mailing list, and other CZ mailing lists.