Re: [wg-d] Robert's Rules

["Bret A. Fausett" <baf@fausett.com>]

>It is much simpler and cleaner to simply recognize that a rough
>consensus does not exist, and work from there.  The whole point of 
>"minority opinions" or "dissenting opinions" was to give a mechanism 
>by which consensus could bifurcate without destroying the process.

Two comments/questions, related to each other, that I would add:

If consensus bifurcates, then we don't have consensus. The possibilities 
at that point are: (a) full stop, until enough compromises are made to 
create consensus, or (2) determine whether one of the positions has 
enough support (query what level of support that should be and how it is 
determined) to justify moving it forward as the work of the group in the 
hope that consensus can build around it.

In the first instance, "full stop" might be the best solution for some 
cases -- a significant portion of the community may not want or need what 
the WG is proposing. In other cases though, "full stop" allows someone or 
some group to use the consensus requirement as an obstruction when delay 
against the common good benefits them. (This is the now familiar NSI 
argument, and whether you believe it true or not as applied to NSI's 
behaviour in these debates, assume such behavior is possible for some 
company or group for purposes of this discussion). How do you keep the 
good "full stop" and allow yourself to ignore the obstructionist?

In the second instance, there still needs to be a method -- voting, 
humming or reliance upon the Chairs -- to determine what is the majority 
position and what should become a "dissenting opinion." Sometimes that 
will be obvious (such as in a small group with vocal, visible members) 
but often (in the cases of very large groups or very narrow margins of 
popularity)  it will be difficult. Voting might be useless in the easy 
cases but the only possible mechanism in the hard cases. Roberts Rules 
seem to provide some flexibility to fix this. But we would still need to 
answer the question of what vote is enough to allow a proposal to move 
forward. 

        -- Bret