Background

The Drupal Community Working Group (CWG) was originally chartered in 2013 to maintain a friendly and welcoming contributor community for the Drupal project. The CWG is currently chartered directly by the Project Lead, who appoints (or approves) its members. The Project Lead also reviews any appeals of the CWG’s decisions.

Chartered duties of the CWG include:

  • Upholding the Drupal Code of Conduct.
  • Maintaining documentation and processes focused on the health of the community (community code of conduct, conflict resolution process and resources, etc.).
  • Helping community members resolve conflicts through an established process.
  • Acting as a point of escalation, mediation, and/or final arbitration for the Drupal community in case of intractable conflicts.

The CWG does not currently have a formal relationship with the Drupal Association, but often consults with the DA on issues relating to Drupal.org and/or DrupalCon. The CWG also works with those responsible for other community spaces (e.g., Drupal Slack, local and regional event organizers) as needed on issues that relate to those spaces.

As the Drupal project and community have grown and evolved over the past several years, so has the role of the CWG. While the CWG is not allowed to make changes to its own charter, in January and February 2017 the group explored a number of potential changes to help make the CWG more effective and better positioned to proactively address the needs of the Drupal community.

That work was put on hold following a highly-publicized incident in the spring of 2017 that resulted in a series of Drupal Community Discussions. Those conversations surfaced questions, suggestions, and concerns about the accountability, escalation points, and overall role of the CWG, many of which were documented and addressed in the group’s public issue queue. During this time, CWG members periodically discussed potential methods of addressing the suggestions and issues that were surfaced.

In addition, the CWG has taken some concrete steps based on community feedback:

While we were able to address many of the issues that were raised, some can only be addressed with changes to the CWG’s charter.

While we fully support and appreciate the ongoing work of community members around governance and the Governance Task Force, we feel that there are some changes related to the CWG that need to be made as soon as possible. We understand that additional changes may occur pending the outcome of the overall governance reform process.

Problem/motivation

The specific issues that the proposed charter changes aim to address are:

  • The CWG being chartered by the Project Lead and having him as our sole escalation point is no longer tenable or scalable in the long term. Many members of the community (including the project lead) have indicated that they are no longer comfortable with this structure.
  • The CWG is not currently seen by many as being accountable to the community-at-large.
  • Due to the sensitive and potentially professional ramifications of some of the work that the CWG does, access to legal advice and protection is sometimes necessary.
  • The CWG has no direct access to funds for resources such as external consultants, professional development, or training.
  • The CWG would like to expand its membership to be more representative of our global community.
  • Under the current charter, it is not always clear what authority the CWG has to enforce its decisions.
  • In order to maintain a friendly and welcoming contributor community, the CWG needs to be able to focus on proactive measures to promote community health as well as conflict resolution and mediation.

Proposed resolution

CWG members, combining feedback from the community and potential stakeholders, propose the following changes to the CWG charter:

  1. Instead of being overseen by the Project Lead, the CWG would be overseen by a new three-person review panel that consists of the two community-elected Drupal Association board members plus an independent representative from a different open source project that is appointed by the DA board:
    • The review panel would not be involved in the CWG’s day-to-day activities and would only be involved in matters that are brought to it as part of the appeals process, or at the discretion of the CWG.
    • When an appeal is made:
      1. The review panel would review all relevant information relating to the issue.
      2. The review panel can:
        • Choose to not get involved, in which case the CWG’s decision would stand.
        • Choose to override the CWG decision.
      3. The review panel will provide an anonymized summary of the issue and its decision to the full DA board. The DA board may involve itself in the issue if they feel there is a significant impact to the project, but would otherwise not have access to any confidential materials relating to any CWG matters.
    • The review panel would approve the addition of new members to the CWG, who would be nominated by the group itself. The review panel would also have the authority to remove a CWG member in case of a violation of its code of ethics or other misconduct.
    • The review panel will always consist of three voting members, although the review panel may choose to bring in additional non-voting consultants to serve in an advisory capacity at its discretion.
    • All review panel members and consultants must agree to abide by the CWG’s Code of Ethics. If one or more panel members must recuse themselves due to a conflict of interest, the DA board may appoint a temporary replacement.
    • Should one of the community-elected board members be unwilling or unable to serve on the panel, any vacancies will be filled by the DA board until the next community board member election. The DA board will also be responsible for appointing the independent representative and their replacement as appropriate.
    • While the CWG would not report to any member of DA staff, it would continue to meet with staff members and involve them in issues as necessary and appropriate. This includes timely referral of issues brought to either the CWG or staff that should be addressed by the other body.
  2. The chartering entity of the CWG would be changed from the Project Lead to the board of the Drupal Association, who would assume responsibility for approving any future changes to the group’s charter.
  3. The CWG’s charter would be updated to limit membership to two 3-year terms, or 6 years total. Terms would be staggered so that 1-2 members rotate every year or two.
  4. Language would be added to the CWG’s charter to make it more explicit that the CWG’s responsibilities include proactive measures to promote community health in addition to conflict resolution and mediation:
    • Advice and consultation: The CWG acts as a resource for the Drupal project on matters relating to community health. They share knowledge, raise awareness, and promote engagement on issues that impact the Drupal community.
    • Community initiatives: The CWG works to develop and/or support community initiatives that promote the health of the Drupal community and help to prevent conflict and burnout.

The authors of this proposal feel that this arrangement, while perhaps unconventional, addresses many key issues that were surfaced by Drupal community members. It also provides additional opportunities for us to share knowledge and experience with other open source communities, as well as gain access to Drupal Association resources and legal protection.

Challenges

  1. The Drupal Association does not currently have any community groups that report to a subset of the board.
  2. This arrangement creates new responsibilities for community-elected board members, who were not necessarily elected to serve as the CWG’s escalation point.

Next steps

  • 11/3/18: Post revised draft proposal for feedback from the community.
  • 11/23/18: Deadline for community feedback.
  • 11/28/18: Submit finalized proposal/charter to Association Board.
  • 12/5/18: Discussion and potential approval of new charter by the Drupal Association board, and, if so, revocation of existing charter by the Project Lead.

Comments

gdemet created an issue. See original summary.

gdemet’s picture

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gdemet’s picture

Issue summary: View changes
DamienMcKenna’s picture

Thank you for putting this together.

IMHO this could be a great improvement, primarily taking the pressure off Dries as the sole overseer for community disputes.

Regarding the person who would be invited from another community group, would there be criteria that the person and/or the community they're from have ideals, values, principles similar to that of the Drupal community, maybe even individual community response training, etc?

mherchel’s picture

I honestly love everything this. Totally agree w Damien that Dries shouldn't oversee this. I also like that the CWG would report to the community elected board members.

+1 from me :)

dasjo’s picture

Hi there,

thanks so much for sharing this proposal! I agree with the previous commenters: this looks like an awesome improvement to the CWG and the community at large.

One detail I might not fully understand because of language: I understand from the proposal that
- the "three person review panel" would take care of escalations for the CWG instead of Dries
- any changes to the charter would require approval from the DA board instead of Dries
- the DA board would appoint the person from the review panel besides the two other community elected board members

What isn't clear to me is how you would proceed with appointing members of the CWG. is this part of the "charter" activity that the DA board oversees?

Thanks for clarifying & regards,
dasjo

gdemet’s picture

Great question. The charter is the document that defines the group’s purpose, authority, and organization. Currently the CWG is chartered by Dries (and/or his designates), who is also our point of escalation and responsible for appointing (or removing) members. The way it works in practice is that the CWG self-nominates new members, who are then approved by Dries.

Under the new proposal, the three-person review panel would be our point of escalation and responsible for appointing (or removing members). The CWG would continue to self-nominate new members, but they would be approved by the review panel instead.

The full board of the Drupal Association would become the CWG’s chartering authority and they alone would have the power to change the group’s charter.

RainbowArray’s picture

I think overall this sounds positive. The one point I'd want to add is that for the person from an outside open source group, it matters a great deal both what open source group that is and who the individual is. Is this an open source group that has similar values to the Drupal community? Keeping in mind that the Drupal community is still working on refining what our values are. A lot of the crises in the past that led to something that a review board might consider revolved around issues related to diversity and inclusion. That's still something the Drupal community is working on, but there seems to be more and more general support for prioritizing diversity and inclusion concerns. That's not as true for many open source groups, and in fact many open source groups are unfortunately actively hostile to diversity and inclusion. So I'd really like to see some more definition around that review board position to ensure that we don't end up bringing in somebody who would undermine the culture we're trying to build within the Drupal community. I think that proposal for somebody from another community was well-intentioned, I'd just like to see some guard rails to ensure some safety around that role.

hestenet’s picture

Status: Active » Fixed

The board of directors of the Drupal Association voted to adopt the changes to this charter at the board meeting on Dec 5, 2018.

To address the other major concern, which is that ensuring that third member of the panel appropriately uphold the culture, values, and principles that we want this body to uphold - the new charter does include some discretion for the existing two panel members in how they vet and choose candidates, and also provides discretion to say 'hey there's someone who is a perfect cultural fit for this role, but technically they don't meet the third-party project criteria - let's make sure we can utilize their expertise anyway'.

It is necessarily fuzzy, because it involves a lot of personal vetting, but there should be some basic guard rails, and if we see an instance of abuse the board will have the authority to make further amendments to the charter to create greater protections.

The charter has been updated on the main CWG landing page, as well as in the Governance repo.

hestenet’s picture

gdemet credited adshill.

gdemet credited emma.maria.

gdemet credited jordana.

gdemet credited ultimike.

gdemet’s picture

Status: Fixed » Closed (fixed)

Automatically closed - issue fixed for 2 weeks with no activity.