RE: [wg-d] What our product should resemble

["Antony Van Couvering" <avc@interport.net>]

Agreed, the critical metric is how to sign off on an issue with legitimacy.
I heard a lot of nonsense in Santiago about how some consensus was "very
rough" and I saw people discerning consensus where there probably wasn't
any.

There's too much at stake in this process and not enough peer pressure to
keep things fair.  Therefore I think we should move to a voting process,
where votes are counted and recorded, and concentrate on solving the
associated fraud problems.

As it stands now, "consensus" is not a workable concept.

Antony

>-----Original Message-----
>From: owner-wg-d@dnso.org [mailto:owner-wg-d@dnso.org]On Behalf Of David
>Schutt
>Sent: Friday, August 27, 1999 2:13 PM
>To: Michael Froomkin - U.Miami School of Law
>Cc: Wg-D@Dnso. Org
>Subject: RE: [wg-d] What our product should resemble
>
>
>This is one of those situations where you trade one potential abuse for
>another. What you describe is the ability of some to effectively exclude
>voices from the group (toss them out), and I for one can't think of any way
>to prevent abuse of this power, especially when you're doing 'soft' work
>such as politics or social policy or choosing ice cream.
>
>If you're going to do something like this, it is then best to measure and
>record the sense of the group through on the record voting. This way, those
>who make the decision to override the minority can be identified and held
>accountable for what they do.
>
>Notice that we are back to majority (or supermajority) rule. The difference
>is that what constitutes a minority is defined before a controversy erupts,
>and to override the minority the majority must *all* go on the record as
>supportive of the override.
>
>Some of the power of a true consensus is regained when one can say
>"thus and
>such a percentage of the interested parties agreed that it was important
>enough to implement a decision that we stop debate and move on". True
>consensus is almost unassailable, *if* the group contains all of the
>interested parties.
>
>Rough consensus, absent formal definition, is a very shaky
>platform on which
>to stand. Someone trying to judge the quality of the decision making will
>realize that the outcome *could* have come about simply because a few
>participants had the audacity to drive dissenters away or otherwise shut
>them out. No way to tell, and thus no way to judge the quality of the
>process.
>
>That leaves every decision vulnerable to constant challenge. Not a good
>position to be in.
>
>D Schutt
>
>
>-----Original Message-----
>From: owner-wg-d@dnso.org [mailto:owner-wg-d@dnso.org]On Behalf Of
>Michael Froomkin - U.Miami School of Law
>Sent: Friday, August 27, 1999 10:43 AM
>To: David Schutt
>Cc: Wg-D@Dnso. Org
>Subject: RE: [wg-d] What our product should resemble
>
>
>This is a useful discussion we should have.
>
>I personally reasonably comfortable with the concept of "rough consensus".
>I take it to mean that there ALMOST a true consensus...but a small number
>may be left out and the (vast) majority believe that (1) the minority is
>small; (2) its concerns are either zany or at best deeply mistaken; and
>(3) life must go on.
>
>While I love consensus, I fear the heckler's veto.  And I say this as one
>who thinks he's more likely to be a heckler...
>
>The critical point for me is that to be a rough consensus the majority
>must be prepared to explain why it is they feel justified in overriding
>the view of the minority.  And merely saying "we don't agree with them"
>isn't enough -- that's mere majority rule.  It should take quite a lot
>more--a sense that logic has prevailed, and some people aren't being
>logical.
>
>I would be the first to add, of course, that this concept works best when
>the issues are logical or technical ones, rather than political or
>aesthetic. Rough consensus works badly when the choice is chocolate or
>vanilla ice cream. (Then you need to change the option set to include free
>choice.  Or we're back at majority rule.)
>
>
><snip>
>
>--
>A. Michael Froomkin   |    Professor of Law    |   froomkin@law.tm
>U. Miami School of Law, P.O. Box 248087, Coral Gables, FL 33124 USA
>+1 (305) 284-4285  |  +1 (305) 284-6506 (fax)  |  http://www.law.tm
>                 -->   It's hot and humid here.   <--
>
>