CZ:Charter

Mission statement
The Citizendium is an online environment in which reliable knowledge is hosted and structured collaboratively and made freely accessible to the interested public by polite contributors &mdash; henceforth Citizens &mdash; who use their real names, recognize expertise and adhere to the principles laid out in this charter. The Citizendium will be devoted to accessible presentation of content in its context, to easy navigation across content and to simple organization of the community.

Fundamental policies
See also CZ:Fundamentals.

Professionalism
Citizens are required to behave professionally. This means acceptance of guidance from experts and from the wider Citizendium community and the obligation to remain polite and constructive even in cases of dispute. A set of persons of mature judgment &mdash; hereafter the Constables &mdash; shall be specially empowered to enforce rules laid out in this Charter or its accompanying documents. The enforcement of these rules &mdash; up to and including the ejection of participants from the project &mdash; is to be carried out with reasonable pragmatism and leniency, including in those situations where the applicability of existing rules may be unclear.

Real names
All Citizens must register using their real names, which will define their user name. Exceptions are possible, including non-Citizen accounts used for specific community purposes.

Objectivity
Information presented objectively is based on careful, unbiased and documented observation. When conflicting information exists, enough background must be given that the reader can understand the merits and weaknesses of the major alternatives. The Citizendium is not a place for advocacy, nor for advertisement.

Expertise
Expertise will be respected. It shall be recognized through publications (including contributions to the Citizendium), credentials or employment, or through any other means established by the Editorial Council.

Collaboration
The Citizendium is a collaborative project, open to contributions by any Citizen on any of its content. The Citizendium welcomes collaboration with external partners on any matters relevant to the project's mission, provided that the interaction does not lead participating Citizens to a conflict of interest with respect to this charter.

Accessibility
The content provided at the Citizendium is intended for an audience with completed high-school level of education. As far as possible, special needs of visually or otherwise impaired users and of machines will be taken into account.

Being Bold
See also CZ:Be bold.

Whenever Citizens are unsure whether some contributions they plan are conform with this charter and its subordinate policies, they are advised to seek comments from the wider community. In the absence of negative feedback, they should feel encouraged to proceed. A basic Professionalism rule, however, is that large deletions or revisions, or renaming pages other than for clear errors, should not be made without a reasonable attempt to get consensus on the Talk Page.

Governance
The Citizendium is devoted to transparent and fair governance at a minimum of bureaucracy. Special roles will not be created without excellent reason.

Authors
Citizens who have made a contribution to the project's content or structure will be considered Authors.

Editors
See also CZ:Editors.

Editors are Authors who &mdash; because of their recognized expertise &mdash; are responsible for the scope and quality of the content presented by CZ. Specifically, in their areas of expertise, they are entitled (1) to make decisions about specific questions or disputes concerning particular articles, and (2) to approve high-quality articles.

Management Committee
A Management Committee shall be responsible for matters concerned with the non-editorial policies of Citizendium, such as finance, external alliances, communications, administration, and behavior. To this end, it may appoint Administrators and Task Managers whose activities it will oversee. It will also appoint Constables and oversee their activities.

It shall consist of thirteen Citizens, who may not simultaneously serve on the Editorial Council. They may, however, be Constables or Task Managers. A quorum shall consist of seven members.

The Management Committee shall consist of thirteen Citizens, who may not simultaneously serve on the Editorial Council. They will be elected by vote of active Citizens and Authors, with two-year renewable terms; the intention is to elect half each year, so of the first group, one-half will be selected, by lot or personal agreement, to serve one-year terms.

Editorial Council
An Editorial Council will be responsible for guiding content and establishing policy. It will be made up of active Citizens, no less than one half of whom shall be Editors, the remainder shall be Authors.

The Editorial Council shall consist of thirteen Citizens, who may not simultaneously serve on the Management Committee or be Constables. They will be elected by vote of active Citizens and Authors, with two-year renewable terms; the intention is to elect half each year, so of the first group, one-half will be selected, by lot or personal agreement, to serve one-year terms.

They may, however, be Task Managers. A quorum shall consist of seven members. During deliberations on a matter covered by specific workgroups, the Chief Editor of that Workgroup, or another member, may be part of a quorum if that individual is not a Council member. If, however, the matter under discussion involves a dispute with such an Editor, that Editor may state positions to the Council but not vote on them unless already a member.

Workgroups
See also CZ:Workgroups

The Editorial Council may create and reorganize workgroups to organize areas of content, and to encourage collaboration among authors and editors in areas of expertise. Workgroup members will build top-level articles and knowledge structures for the articles in a discipline.

When there are disputes on content issues, assuming there are multiple Editors in a workgroup, they will attempt to resolve the dispute. Failing agreement, the matter will be taken to the Editorial Council.

Administration
The Citizendium's administration handles the legal, financial and technical operations necessary for the project to fulfil its mission.

Dispute resolution
Disputes will be settled at the lowest possible level, such as by bringing in peer Editors or Constables. Next, the Ombudsman will be contacted for non-binding mediation. Should that fail, the matter will go to the appropriate body, Editorial Board/Council for content matters and Management Council for behavioral and administrative matters. As a last resort, both Councils will appoint members to an arbitration panel, over which the Ombudsman shall preside and, if necessary, break ties.

Ombudsman
The role of Ombudsman shall be vested in one or more persons, with substantial CZ experience and widely respected judgment, who will be elected by majority vote of both the Editorial Council and Management Council, for an indefinite term. An Ombudsman may be recalled by a supermajority (75%) of both the Editorial and Management Councils.

Final arbitration
In the event of a dispute that cannot be resolved at a level below that of the Editorial Council or the Management Committee, appeals boards may be constituted on an ad hoc basis. They will consist of three members nominated by the Editorial Council and three members nominated by the Management Committee, who shall not have been involved in the specific dispute. An Ombudsman will preside; that official shall direct the Board and will be non-voting other than to possess a tie-breaking vote vote. Should no Ombudsman be available who is not a party to the matter, the Councils shall appoint a special presider from the Citizenry.

Electorate
All Authors are entitled to vote on the adoption or modification of this charter.

License
The content of the Citizendium will always be free to use, reuse, and redistribute. Content originating at the Citizendium is available under a Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license. Content that originated elsewhere may also be incorporated into the Citizendium if such reuse is permitted by the copyright owners.

Legal status
The Citizendium will be owned and ultimately controlled by a non-profit organization.

Languages
The official language of the Citizendium is English. Branches in other languages require approval by the Editorial Council and have to be based on this English-language charter or an approved translation.

Ratification of this charter
If this charter has been ratified by more than two thirds of the votes validly cast in a referendum for this purpose, it shall be certified by the existing Editor-in-Chief within a week after the closing of the referendum. For future amendments, a certifying official or officials shall be agreed upon by the joint Management Committee and Editorial Council.

Entry into force of this charter
This charter shall enter into force on the day following ratification.

Interim guidance for the transition period
As long as the administrative prerequisites for implementing the charter are not entirely fulfilled, the rules listed in this section shall provide interim guidance to the Editorial Council, Management Council, and other bodies. Such material may be modified by those bodies by their normal procedures, without a full Charter amendment.

Citizens with pseudonyms
Citizens currently registered with a pseudonym will be granted up to one year of time to re-register for a new account under their real name. One year after the entry into force of this charter, all pseudonym accounts shall be locked by the Constabulary.

Inactive Editors
CZ:Editorial Council Resolution 0012 will be extended such that newly registered Editors who have not yet contributed to the project shall be regarded as Inactive Editors.

External partners
The Management Council shall elaborate a strategy and policy on collaboration with external partners, paying particular attention to fostering the collaboration with instructors by way of Eduzendium, and with external experts or professional organizations for the purpose of reviewing content at the Citizendium or providing content to it.

Workgroups
The Editorial Council shall elaborate a strategy and policy on topic-specific collaboration, chiefly based on CZ:Workgroups. In addition to subject specific Workgroups, there shall be a General Workgroup with jurisdiction over general issues of style and content, and for articles of very wide scope. There may be, in addition, interdisciplinary or specialized Subgroups. In addition, there may be Area Groups, as for (e.g., Science or Science & Technology) to deal with broad issues affecting many but not all workgroups (e.g., units of measurement).

Amending this charter
Any Citizen can suggest to the Management Council specific amendments to this charter. If the proposal is taken up by the Management Council, it shall prepare a set of up to three alternatives to the current phrasing in the charter, and present them to the electorate to express its opinion via a vote. To come into effect, an amendment requires more than two thirds of the votes validly cast.