Re: What is a "management position? [Last Call: <draft-farrresnickel-harassment-05.txt> (IETF Anti-Harassment Procedures) to Best Current Practice]

[Dave Crocker <[e-mail]>]

On 3/16/2015 2:46 PM, Andrew Sullivan wrote:
> On Mon, Mar 16, 2015 at 02:27:29PM -0700, Dave Crocker wrote:
>> On 3/16/2015 1:46 PM, Andrew Sullivan wrote:
>>> Someone who has no formal authority but is influential has two ways to
>>> make that influence effective:
>>
>> Sorry for my confusion, but I thought the issue concerned the powers of
>> an Ombud to remove someone.
> 
> Yes, and I'm suggesting that there are two possibilities.  One is that
> the ombuds needs to investigate the case fully, and in the event that
> the appointed officially-powerful person is not exercising that duty
> correctly then the ombuds is in a position to remove that person
> anyway.  The other is that there is no confidentiality problem because
> things are happening in the open (in such cases, there may still be
> scope for the ombuds to act, but there is no particular problem
> arising from confidentiality provisions).


Public vs. private is entirely orthogonal to 'formally powerful' vs.
'has leverage but no formal authority'.

By way of example:

   A document writer has made statements to a participant that violate
the boundaries acceptable to the Ombud team.  The statements were made
in private, but have been sufficiently verified. The Ombud feels that
the document writer needs to be removed from any position of leverage in
the IETF, other than "regular participant".

   Currently, it's the Chair(s) who have the authority to remove that
person, not the Ombud.  But confidentiality constrains the Ombud
possibly from making the request and certainly from explaining why.

d/

ps.  Extra credit:  Note that the confidentiality thing prevents any
sort of persistent application of a decision.  There's no way to bar
someone from being a document writer going forward, even if we figure
out how to handle the immediate situation.

-- 
Dave Crocker
Brandenburg InternetWorking
bbiw.net