The following is a proposed Wikipedia policy, guideline, or process. The proposal may still be in development, under discussion, or in the process of gathering consensus for adoption.
This is a code of conduct for members of the Arbitration Committee. The Committee is Wikipedia's final dispute-resolution body. Its members are expected to have integrity, to be honest, and to be demonstrably fair and neutral in their dealings with other editors. Editors should not stand for membership of the Committee if they are not willing to abide by this code of conduct, and should resign if they violate it.
Preface
As Wikipedia is not a bureaucracy, this code is to be honoured in spirit as well as letter; it is not an exhaustive list of the expected proper conduct of Committee members.
Previous accounts
Candidates are expected to publicly disclose any previous accounts and current alternative accounts during their candidacy.
If there are privacy concerns, they should declare the number of accounts they have operated, the period during which the accounts were active, whether the hidden accounts had clean block records, and the number of edits made by the accounts or with anonymous IPs. They should pass the IP addresses and names of the accounts to at least two Committee members, Foundation employees, or members of the Board of Trustees, together with an explanation as to why the information cannot be made public. Those in receipt of this information must satisfy themselves that there is a genuine privacy concern. If they are unable to do so, they must make a declaration to that effect on the candidate's page.
Candidates are expected to declare any other matter they believe the community might regard as an impediment to their service in good standing on the Committee.
Members must recuse themselves from cases in which they could reasonably be said to have a conflict of interest. This includes holding strong views on the topic at hand, and significant involvement with one of the parties, either on favourable or unfavourable terms.
Upholding site rules and policies
Members are expected to apply Wikipedia's policies and the Committee's decisions equally to all editors, and to uphold the rules themselves, on- and off-wiki.
Where a Committee member becomes aware of a serious violation of policy or of the Committee's decisions, that member is obliged to inform the rest of the Committee.
Resignation
Members who violate this code of conduct are generally expected to resign immediately.
To protect the integrity of the Committee, members should ensure that any member in violation resigns quickly. Where a member refuses to resign, and where the violation is clear, the Committee is expected to remove that member's access without delay.
Where a member resigns under a cloud, resigns preemptively to avoid being forced to resign under a cloud, or has his membership removed by the Committee, he will lose his checkuser and oversight access, as well as access to all functionary and arbitration related mailing lists.
