Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Elections and Referendums/Archive 1

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To include an article in this project, please add {{WikiProject Elections and Referendums}} to the talk page.

Proposals/lists

Scope:

• elections
• referenda

Proposals:

• standardized format for articles about elections
• naming convention for psephological articles (to standardize the election/elections, legislative/parliamentary, "XXXX Somewhereian thingummy elections"/"Somewhereian thingummy elections, XXXX", ... messes)
• possibly an infobox for elections (?)
• article assessment

{{user E&R}}

This user is a member of WikiProject Elections and Referendums.

Members

1. Angelo 13:09, 20 April 2006 (UTC) especially Italy
2. // Big Adamsky • BA's talk page 22:03, 23 March 2006 (UTC) Just curious :) (can't promise to be very active or prolific)
3. ConDem^Talk 22:51, 5 April 2006 (UTC)
4. David | Talk 13:50, 1 April 2006 (UTC) But can we get rid of cod latin 'referenda' and talk about referendums already?
5. Electionworld = Wilfried (talk 18:03, 22 March 2006 (UTC)
   
6. E Pluribus Anthony | talk | 12:06, 20 March 2006 (UTC)
   
7. Knoepfle 04:03, 1 September 2006 (UTC)
8. Nightstallion (?) 10:22, 20 March 2006 (UTC)
   
9. WikieZach| talk 21:34, 21 March 2006 (UTC)
10. Joe Llywelyn Griffith Blakesley _{talk contrib} 14:17, 1 August 2006 (UTC) especially UK (when or if I have time; cannot promise anything)
11. People Powered 13:20, 8 October 2006 (UTC)
12. AndrewRT(Talk) 19:02, 13 February 2007 (UTC)' - As I'm doing it anyway I may as well get involved!
13. --Petrovic-Njegos 10:10, 28 June 2007 (UTC) I'm interested in all those red-links but also African, French, and Canadian elections- also templates.
14. --Jonte-- 16:59, 31 August 2007 (UTC) - Mostly working on Category:Elections in Japan, but adds bits and pieces everywhere.
15. Captain Zyrain 21:01, 14 October 2007 (UTC) - Working on the Electoral reform in the United States state-by-state articles, with a particular interest in Virginia.
16. Valenciano 18:54, 15 November 2007 (UTC) Ireland North and South, Great Britain and Spain.
17. McCart42 (talk) 21:04, 28 December 2007 (UTC) United States of America
18. Dr who1975 (talk) 20:00, 10 May 2008 (UTC) I've been mostlyworking congressional interim special elections in the United States... may start working some the general elections too. I can help put data into tables if anyone needs that. Just let me know.
19. Gr8opinionater (talk) 22:19, 5th June 2008 (GMT)
20. Chadlupkes (talk) 02:46, 18 June 2008 (UTC) - I've been collecting results down to the precinct level in Washington State. That's too deep for Wikipedia, but I'll join the Project and see what I can do to help.
21. Kestrelvenus (talk) 4:51, 18th June 2008 (GMT)

---

Discussion

So, for all who are interested in this, a few questions:

• What do you think of the scope? What should additionally be included? Please note that there are a number of similar WikiProjects at WikiProject Politics, and that overlap should be avoided.
• Are the proposals feasible? What other projects should we undertake?
• Any other thoughts?

Please bear with me, this is my first WikiProject I'm founding here. ;) Take care, —Nightstallion (?) 10:31, 20 March 2006 (UTC)

Item 1: Image to be used for this WikiProject

The first image I found which we could use for the userbox, talk page template, and similar things: . If anyone's got something more ballot-like, though, that would be even better... —Nightstallion (?) ^{Seen this already?} 13:29, 20 March 2006 (UTC)

We could use this one: Election. E Pluribus Anthony | talk | 13:46, 25 March 2006 (UTC)

I like . The other is prettier, but this one is more professional and compact. If there's a rational objection to it, please list design requirements and I'll supply a replacement. John Reid 00:16, 26 March 2006 (UTC)

Not necessarily because I placed it, I prefer the other. First, it is used in various Wp elxn templates ... so is vaguely familiar. Moreover, a check mark is rather non-descript: invariably, votes are registered with an X (at least in Canada, without which they are spoiled; this is even captured in the Elections Canada logo) and having a ballot fall/placed into a ballot box perfectly exemplifies this Wikiproject. (This isn't a big issue for me, though.) :) E Pluribus Anthony | talk | 00:34, 26 March 2006 (UTC)

I also personally prefer the ballot box, though the image should probably be in png format, and not gif... What do you say? —Nightstallion (?) ^{Seen this already?} 09:15, 27 March 2006 (UTC)

P.S.: John, it'd be great if you could design a logo which exemplifies the principle of voting better than the check mark, but which also meets your standards of professionality. —Nightstallion (?) ^{Seen this already?} 09:16, 27 March 2006 (UTC)

Sorry, but I don't know how I'd improve on the ballot-box without imposing my own views. Personally, I dislike that kind of abstract-shaded post-modernist style; I don't do it. I tend to go for the minimalism of the checkbox above, a straight modern look, or something in the neoclassical vein.

From a technical viewpoint, the ballot-box is wrong because the telling element -- the X -- is small in relation to the overall design; also, the background is not transparent. But the X cannot be made much larger without making the box itself unclear and if the background becomes transparent then the ballot itself blends into the page. I don't think I can fix it without starting over from a different point. John Reid 00:34, 2 April 2006 (UTC)

I've uploaded a PNG version of the ballot box image here: Election E Pluribus Anthony | talk | 13:29, 27 March 2006 (UTC)

I'd also go for the cross in the box. The tick just doesn't represent elections or voting for me at all. BigBlueFish 10:36, 7 April 2006 (UTC)

I prefer the ballot box. When you see the image, you automatically think "voting". The check mark could mean anything... ConDem^Talk 11:30, 7 April 2006 (UTC)

Me too, personally. —Nightstallion (?) ^{Seen this already?} 16:31, 7 April 2006 (UTC)

Item 2: Naming convention for elections

We should probably come up with one before doing anything else. Current standard seems to be to use "election", and not "elections", and to use the general template "Austrian presidential election, 2004". One point which is still open to discussion is whether to use "legislative", "parliamentary", or something else entirely for elections to parliament... Thoughts? —Nightstallion (?) ^{Seen this already?} 13:18, 22 March 2006 (UTC)

Well legislative deals with some countries, while parliamentary others. We cannot combine them. WikieZach| talk 21:33, 22 March 2006 (UTC)

I tend not to agree, since legislative covers also parliamentary. But there is no reason to uniform this.

But on what basis do we decide which one to use? Why should the national election in Austria this fall be called "Austrian legislative election, 2006", or why should it be called "Austrian parliamentary election, 2006"? We needs some kind of NC for this. —Nightstallion (?) ^{Seen this already?} 22:07, 22 March 2006 (UTC)

Note that many countries have established titular renditions: e.g., Canadian federal election, 2004, Canadian federal election, 2006. Also note "parliamentary" might be somewhat inaccurate in this instance since the Canadian Senate (one of the pillars of the Canadian parliament) is appointed; thus, "legislative" might be more appropriate. I think we only need specificity when it's required and should use parlance appropriate to each country: e.g., United States presidential election, 2004, United States Congress elections, 2004, etc. Whether (particularly for the U.S. example) "Congress" or "congressional" should be used (probably the latter, for consistency) is up for debate, however. Perhaps we can use proposed and consistent nomenclature for categories instead, or summatively when comparing systems in various countries? E Pluribus Anthony | talk | 13:46, 25 March 2006 (UTC)

Why are election articles for specific years titled with the year last when just about every other type of event pertaining to specific years are titled with the year first? The convention of titleing with the year last is especially boggling when you consider within the bodies of articles, an election for a given year is usually written with year first anyway. Has anyone ever proposed moving election articles to the more widespread format of titleing? Spicy (talk) 19:47, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

Item 2a: Naming convention for political ideologies

Here's a thought: In order to ease comparability of political parties that never compete because they run for elections in different parliaments, I tend to find it helpful to roughly categorize them by bloc or political colour. Usually, this will conveniently translate into a two-dimensional left-right classification, although this allows only for a superficial analysis that ignores powerful local or national issues. Still, I like the simple red-or-blue scale because it makes it so easy to comprehend and to convert for comparisons with other election results elsewhere. Cf the EP political groupings here. Even more pedagogical are the graphical representations that are in effect maps of parliamentary plena with the seats coloured to show the relative size of parties and blocs. (What are those called?) // Big Adamsky • BA's talk page 22:40, 23 March 2006 (UTC)

The problem is thal labelling ideologies, especially in two-dimensional spectrum, in tables could be biased or non-neutral. I would prefer not to do that. Electionworld = Wilfried (talk 13:04, 24 March 2006 (UTC)

I'm unsure exhibiting parties on a spectrum is problematic, particularly if they are done sublimely through charts exhibiting legislative representation/coalition (as The Economist does). Most parties generally advertise their ideology and, for example, the Encyclopædia Britannica classifies parties (L,LC,C,CR,R, etc.) periodically with their (annual) Book of the Year. And, in case such a scheme is challenged, perhaps we can use the EB as one among a number of cited sources for classification? As for colourising based on ideology, generally fine, but also see (3). E Pluribus Anthony | talk | 14:09, 25 March 2006 (UTC)

The left right spectrum is not really useful and leads to much debate. E.g., is my party ([{Democrats 66]] a right wing, centrist or left-wing party. On economic issues, it could be considered right wing, on religious, social, cultural and ecological issues more a left-wing party. Let us not start that kind of debates. There is no problem trying to have country specific lables. In that case I would label D66 as a social liberal party. Electionworld = Wilfried (talk 22:08, 28 March 2006 (UTC)

Item 3: Convention for Tables with summaries of the results

In the last months I have transferred or made all latest election results in all countries and dependencies in one specific layout. I use the template:Electiontable or in older versions template:Election-table. These tables are allways put in a template, to enable the consistency of the results troughout Wikipedia. The templates are named for e.g. Netherlands parliamentary election, 2003 and should have the same name as an entry on that election. These templates are placed in the Elections in 2006 (or 2005) article, in Elections in XX (allways the latest for each national office and body) , in Politics of XX in the section Political parties and elections (only the latest for each national office and body), in the entry on the elected body of office and in the specific entry on the election. Each legislative election table includes at least space for the name of the party, preferably in English and native language, the number of votes, the percentage of popular vote and the number of seats. Parties without representation with less than 1 % of the vote are usually not included. More data can be included. At any office election table, each candidate is listed with name, party and at least space for number of votes and percentage of popular vote. If you don't object, I will pace this as an item on the project page. I will try and replace election-table with electiontable in the future.Electionworld = Wilfried (talk 13:04, 24 March 2006 (UTC)

Much as above (2a); this seems generally fine; however, none of this should trump regional colours and usage. For instance, there are systematic efforts to classify, organise, and colour Canadian electoral content/articles in Wp. E Pluribus Anthony | talk | 14:15, 25 March 2006 (UTC)

No problem, the templates used respect the colors used in the Canadian pages. Electionworld = Wilfried (talk 22:06, 28 March 2006 (UTC)

Item 4: Politics of XX series

For every country and dependency a Politics of XX series has been made. The series templates, which use similar layout use the politbox template and should at least include entries on:

• the head of state
  • the office holder (the template is not placed itself in that article)
• the head of government
  • the office holder (the template is not placed itself in that article)
• any article on the government (in narrow sense, not on individuakl ministries or ministers)
• the parliament
  • the chambers of parliament
• the list of political parties
  • when there are only a few relevant parties: these parties
• the elections in this country
  • the latest election (head of state and chambers of parliament), this is not yet a fact)
• when available: human rights, foreign relations and other issues

The template can include data on administrative divisions (i would like that to happen at all entities) and judiciary. The template should be placed in the right top of any article included in the template as well as of any article on any (national) election and political party in the country. Australia has a separate bottom template. A solution should be found for the template in combiantion with a infobox on parties. Electionworld = Wilfried (talk 13:04, 24 March 2006 (UTC)

List of election results

Chronological order

I believe that lists of election results should be in chronological order from earliest to latest. In some articles, I see it in reverse order. What's the consensus?—Markles 12:11, 17 April 2008 (UTC)

Arghh

The plural of referendum is referendums (unless we are going to conduct this page in Latin). Adam 08:54, 25 March 2006 (UTC)

As per the Oxford English Dictionary, either form – referendums or referenda – is acceptable. E Pluribus Anthony | talk | 14:15, 25 March 2006 (UTC)

Well it shouldn't be. Anyone writing about constitutional referendums in Australia should note that "referendums" is the official usage. Adam 14:25, 25 March 2006 (UTC)

...noted when making appropriate official references to Australian referendums. E Pluribus Anthony | talk | 14:29, 25 March 2006 (UTC)

If we are talking Latin, 'referendum' comes from a gerund stem. There is no plural of a gerund so the plural should be that in the appropriate language, which is referendums. David | Talk 20:16, 1 April 2006 (UTC)

Trivia: I believe there are in fact plurals in Latin gerunds. Cf. propaganda, agenda and legend(a), none of which is feminine singular. // Big Adamsky • BA's talk page 20:24, 1 April 2006 (UTC)

Indeed. One of the two functions of gerunds is to have declinable verbs (with the other being to express "should/must be done"). —Nightstallion (?) ^{Seen this already?} 09:02, 3 April 2006 (UTC)

When you write an article on referendums at the Latin Wikipedia (Wikipedium?), you can use all the gerunds you like. Here we speak English, and the English plural of referendum is referendums. Adam 11:09, 3 April 2006 (UTC)

Or referenda. Why can't you just accept that either plural is acceptable? —Nightstallion (?) ^{Seen this already?} 12:01, 3 April 2006 (UTC)

The thing is, if we're going to make this a WikiProject, shouldn't we be consistent? And doesn't that mean trying to use one plural? Although I believe that both are correct, in the interest of consistency, it seems logical that we should use the one which is acceptable to both sides - referendums. ConDem^Talk 22:54, 5 April 2006 (UTC)

I don't know if this is at all scientific, but to me, "Referenda" is more general and less specific than "Referendums" in tone, perhaps because it reflects words like "Miscellanea". So you might use "referenda" when the referenda in question are not specific one, but "referendums" when referring to a specific set of referendums, e.g. "in 1996, the government held two referendums on the issue". Official or common usage in any specific context wins over consistency though, as with American vs Commonwealth English. BigBlueFish 16:36, 7 April 2006 (UTC)

Wikipedia uses the word "miscellany" (e.g. Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion). I think that "referenda" is more mellifluous. Captain Zyrain 20:22, 14 October 2007 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Version 1.0 Editorial Team cooperation

Hello. I'm a member of the Version 1.0 Editorial Team, which is looking to identify quality articles in Wikipedia for future publication on CD or paper. We recently began assessing articles using these criteria, and we are are asking for your help. As you are most aware of the issues surrounding your focus area, we are wondering if you could provide us with a list of the articles that fall within the scope of your WikiProject, and that are either featured, A-class, B-class, or Good articles, with no POV or copyright problems. Do you have any recommendations? If you do, please post your suggestions at the listing of all active Humanities WikiProjects, and if you have any questions, ask me in the Work Via WikiProjects talk page or directly in my talk page. Thanks a lot! Titoxd^{(?!? - help us)} 01:26, 15 April 2006 (UTC)

Help, Please

Hello,

Wikipedia:Community Justice/Elections has just began, and I'd appreciate some non-members as election staff. I know this isn't your responsibility, but I think you may be interested. Thanks. Computerjoe's talk 21:22, 17 April 2006 (UTC)

Election results to be deleted from Wikisource

I would like to alert this community to the fact that Wikisource has decided to delete all reference data, some of which may be of interest to this project. This raises the question of whether some of this material should be hosted at Wikipedia. See Wikisource:Category:Deletion requests/Reference_data and the discussion at Wikisource:Scriptorium. In particular all the tables of election results are to be deleted.--agr 15:41, 20 June 2006 (UTC)

Well, we should keep the information on Wikipedia, of course... —Nightstallion (?) 13:12, 22 June 2006 (UTC)

Wikipedia:WikiProject Elections and Referenda/Overview of results

There are a number of fair use images (mostly logos of political parties) on this page, probably coming from the templates. Per Wikipedia:Fair use criteria #9, fair use images are explicitly prohibited outside the article namespace. Please come up with some way to exclude these images from this page. Might I suggest a "noimg" parameter for the template? howcheng {chat} 18:52, 25 July 2006 (UTC)

As these templates are only intended to be used in their respective election articles and were only created for ease of use, we'd all very much prefer to keep the images in the templates; if that can be done by using the noimg parameter, then I'd kindly ask you to elaborate as to how that would be employed. Thanks in advance! —Nightstallion (?) 12:33, 28 July 2006 (UTC)

Mainspace

I have made an overview article holding all results of national elections in countries and dependencies. This can be found at Wikipedia:WikiProject Elections and Referenda/Overview of results. Electionworld = Wilfried (talk 13:08, 24 March 2006 (UTC)

Presumably, this is only for the most recent results? This seems to be an incredibly useful resource... ConDem^Talk 23:05, 5 April 2006 (UTC)

Also, the page takes an extremely long time to load. Forgive me, but is the intention to put this article in the mainspace? If so, maybe it should be split into continents... ConDem^Talk 23:06, 5 April 2006 (UTC)

It is a page for everybody who wants to complete data in the most recent results. It is not the intention to put this article in the mainspace. Electionworld = Wilfried (talk 20:34, 7 April 2006 (UTC)

administrative caetgory for lame-duck officials

I've just created Category:Outgoing politicians as an administrative aid to making sure that all politicians who lose in primaries/general elections can have their bios modified in a timely fashion once they step down. -- nae'blis 20:34, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

Single Transferable Vote

Single Transferable Vote is up for a featured article review. Detailed concerns may be found here. Please leave your comments and help us address and maintain this article's featured quality. Sandy 22:37, 18 August 2006 (UTC)

Peer review

As far as I can tell, this Wikiproject doesn't have its own Peer review system. Therefore, could I request comments at Wikipedia:Peer review/List of British Columbia general elections/archive1 - which also combined similar lists for Alberta, Saskatchewan and Manitoba. Any suggestions or comments would be greatly apreciated. Tompw 19:05, 26 October 2006 (UTC)

Stablepedia

Beginning cross-post.

See Wikipedia talk:Version 1.0 Editorial Team#Stablepedia. If you wish to comment, please comment there. ★MESSEDROCKER★ 03:20, 26 November 2006 (UTC)

End cross-post. Please do not comment more in this section.

Robert Johnson move

Could someone with proper authority please add the proper boilerplate to the Talk:Robert Johnson (musician) survey to preserve it by indicating that it should not be modified. Basically, I was hoping to see something like what has been done at Talk:Samuel_Johnson#Requested_move. TonyTheTiger 22:10, 1 December 2006 (UTC)

Featured list candidates

It may interest you to know that the following elections-related articles are currently Featured List Candidates:

• List of Alberta general elections
• List of British Columbia general elections
• List of Manitoba general elections
• List of Nova Scotia general elections

Any comments or votes regarding their nomination are welcome. Tompw 23:35, 1 December 2006 (UTC)

Serbian constitutional referendum

Main article: Serbian constitutional referendum, 2006

There was a big referendum in Serbia for approval of a new Constitution suggested by the Serbian political body on October 28-29 2006. The old Constitution of the Republic of Serbia was heavily outdated and not changed since 1990; so this comes really as a gigantic thing in Serbia (where everything takes a very slow pace). The Referendum was also slightly controversial, as the Liberals boycotted it and not to mention the ongoing dispute over the status of Kosovo. --PaxEquilibrium 22:11, 18 December 2006 (UTC)

Wikipedia Day Awards

Hello, all. It was initially my hope to try to have this done as part of Esperanza's proposal for an appreciation week to end on Wikipedia Day, January 15. However, several people have once again proposed the entirety of Esperanza for deletion, so that might not work. It was the intention of the Appreciation Week proposal to set aside a given time when the various individuals who have made significant, valuable contributions to the encyclopedia would be recognized and honored. I believe that, with some effort, this could still be done. My proposal is to, with luck, try to organize the various WikiProjects and other entities of wikipedia to take part in a larger celebrartion of its contributors to take place in January, probably beginning January 15, 2007. I have created yet another new subpage for myself (a weakness of mine, I'm afraid) at User talk:Badbilltucker/Appreciation Week where I would greatly appreciate any indications from the members of this project as to whether and how they might be willing and/or able to assist in recognizing the contributions of our editors. Thank you for your attention. Badbilltucker 23:18, 29 December 2006 (UTC)