Date: Sun, 30 Mar 2003 16:24:49 -0500
From: Rob Austein <sra@hactrn.net>
Subject: Faith and Practice of the IETF

Several recent conversations have drawn my attention to the extent to which my own perception of the IETF's decision making process has been influenced by the practices of another group that uses a similar decision process. It would be difficult to translate that group's practices into input suitable for the IETF, but given that the other group has running code which they've been debugging for more than 300 years, I'm tempted to try.

A few excerpts which seem especially relevant to certain behavior patterns that we've been seeing on some IETF mailing lists:

• We observe silence between individuals' contributions. These silences are crucial, not only for the period of reflection they provide; but also because they enable a meeting to proceed as a gathered body. They act as a brake against one or more individuals seizing control of the meeting through rhetorical display, appeal to emotions or other means.
• In the meeting, we strive to lay ourselves open to others' arguments: no matter how much we may think truth is on our side we must consider the possibility that we may be mistaken. The true spirit of the business method is thus one of attentive listening.
• We normally speak once only on a subject unless responding to a direct question or giving factual information. (We may speak on another subject if we want, however.) We speak plainly. We do not speechify, hector or attempt to filibuster. It is appropriate to speak with conviction or with passion, but not with prejudice.
• We may express contradictory views, but do not argue with one another in meeting. We state what we want to say frankly and briefly without belittling each others' points. The meeting thus should never become a debating club; nor should the situation ever arise where we try to interrupt or shout down another's contribution. Having spoken once to the issue, we must trust that if further valid points occur to us, others will raise them.

References:

Quaker Business Meetings: how Friends make decisions

An introduction to the way in which the Society of Friends runs "meetings for business" (discussions of secular matters). Includes fair amount of practical advice, at least some of which strikes me as relevant to some of the problems facing the IETF.

Yes, this description mentions religion occasionally. Sorry if that bothers anybody, it's a side effect of the beliefs which motivate Friends to use this decision process. I've yet to find any purely secular written descriptions of their decision process.

How many Quakers does it take to change a lightbulb?

Worth reading for giggle value even if the rest of this strikes one as utter hogwash.