Manila Indymedia Guidelines on Conflict Resolution

"If war is the violent resolution of conflict, then peace is not the absence of conflict, but rather, the ability to resolve conflict without violence." -CT Butler

• Respect all people and be aware of how your verbal and nonverbal interactions affect people around you.

• Hold each other accountable at all times. Let people know in a non-angry manner when they say or do something that offends you or others.

• Listen to other people’s point of views. We all have much to teach each other.

• Try to resolve conflicts by communicating directly with the persons/individual involved.

• A concern is legitimate if it is based upon the principles of the group and therefore relevant to the group as a whole.

The collective may decide to put sanctions to a member who failed to comply the Guidelines:

• 1. Threats of violence may result in a one week ban/moderation, if consensed upon by the collective. (each case should be concensed upon by the collective individually depending on context).

• 2. Continued threats should recieve indefinite ban/and or expulsion from the collective.

When Consensus Fails

Occasionally, a group that uses consensus will find itself unable to move forward due to an issue that causes a group to be divided and is unable to reach consensus. Many groups will often adopt a de-facto policy of Consensus-Minus-One (or Two) and the ability to move towards a super majority (2/3) vote in the case of difficult proposals.

Consensus-Minus-Two

Consensus minus two is a concept that allows a group to move forward in the case of repeated blocks to proposals. In order for a proposal to be blocked, the block should be supported by a minimum of three (3) people. In other words, the group could move forward with a proposal if only two (2) people choose to block. In a group with at least ten (10) people, this allows 80% of the collective to agree on a given proposal.

Two-Thirds-Majority

Another option to dealing with controversial proposals is to fall back to a superior majority vote in which two-thirds (2/3) of the group supports a given proposal. In order to move to a two-thirds vote and out of the consensus process, it requires a superior majority vote (i.e. a two-thirds 2/3 vote). It may often be the case that while two-thirds may agree on a particular topic, they may not agree in moving out of the consensus process.

References:

LA imc documents

DC imc documents

Wowi and Manila imc discussions

-- JongPerez - 09 Mar 2005
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