[EM] Comments re Robert's Rules of Order

[Abd ul-Rahman Lomax]

At 11:44 AM 8/2/2005, RLSuter at aol.com wrote:
>I have to challenge Dave's recommendation of Rober'ts Rules
>of Order. While I don't doubt that it is the result of a lot of thought
>and contains a lot of worthwhile advice about how to conduct
>meetings, it also has major weaknesses that its advocates have
>never adequately considered.

It also has strengths that are commonly overlooked. Among them is the 
provision that any organization can and should set its own rules. Robert's 
Rules are merely a set of time-tested rules that assign decision-making 
power to the majority at a meeting.

>First, at something like 800 pages, it is way too long. Much
>shorter alternatives to Robert's Rules have been written and
>used widely, especially outside of the U.S. One U.S. book I
>especially like is Cannon's Consise Guide to Rules of Order
>by Hugh Cannon (less than 200 pages), originally published
>in 1992. When meeting rules become as extensive as the
>latest version of Robert's Rules, they benefit people who have
>the time and patience to learn their details and harm people
>who don't.

There is an assumption here, which is that there is no chair who 
understands the rules and considers it his or her duty to help members to 
use the rules to get what they want. A good chair can make all the 
difference between a terrible meeting process and one which sings. A good 
chair can drastically reduce the time that it takes to make decisions by 
sensing consensus and proposing action to express it.

The fact is, however, that any member of the meeting can do the same, even 
in the presence of a biased or ineffective chair. It really only takes one 
member to understand the rules well in order for it to work. As long as 
that member uses the knowledge to advance the cause of democratic process, 
and not merely to pursue his or her own private agenda.

In a polarized environment, then, it would be important for any faction to 
have someone who knows the rules well. It is *not* necessary for everyone 
to understand more than the simplest rules. So for the average member, a 
simple summary of Robert's Rules is quite enough. And the full rules can be 
available to cover the more obscure contingencies.

>Second, Robert's was written and revised by people who
>weren't well informed about alternative voting methods for
>choosing among 3 or more options. As a result, the rules are
>written in such a way that they strongly encourage a series
>of yes or no decisions about particular motions and don't
>encourage votes among three or more alternative simultaneous
>motions.

Yet any member who wants to propose an alternate election method can do so. 
What Robert's Rules will suggest -- this is my sense -- is that the outcome 
of *any* process is best ratified, by a yes/no vote. Otherwise you end up 
with all the well-known quirks of election methods. A ratification stage is 
simple and quick.

Yes, Robert's Rules do encourage single-question motions. And, indeed, very 
many questions really are best addressed in that manner, provided that full 
amendment process is also available. And questions that do not seem to be 
single-question issues really should, in my opinion, be reduced, ultimately 
to a single yes/no question. "Shall the result of our fancy-dancy 
Condorcet/Approval/Range election system, being Bozo the Clown, be 
accepted?" If it is, then it really does not matter what system was used. 
The winner had majority approval, at least. But good process will produce, 
usually, in deliberative bodies, much better than a mere majority winner. 
As I've written before, I've seen very contentious multi-choice issues, 
with fierce partisans for each possible outcome, indeed swearing that they 
would never accept anything else, end up, after good process, with a 
*unanimous* vote to accept an alternative different from their favorite. 
They simply came to understand that the winner was better for the 
organization even though they preferred something else. An organization is 
weakened if it is divided over something important....

>Third, Robert's appears to encourage adversarial forms of
>decisionmaking whereby people try to push through motions
>they strongly favor instead of nonadversarial forms whereby
>people seek to to go beyond currently favored views in an
>effort to achieve more consensual win-win decisions.

The Rules are really quite neutral about this. If you've never seen the 
rules used well, by a skilled chair, then you may only have seen 
adversarial situations with a poor choice for chair. In addition, it would 
have to be that in this context, there was nobody present with the skills 
to advise the meeting, which any member can do under Robert's Rules (by, 
for example, raising a point of order, or by appealing the ruling of the 
chair to the body), or that those who had the skill were trying to use it 
to gain factional advantage rather than trying to unite the organization. 
All too common.

Robert's Rules, by themselves, will not heal a bitterly divided group. But 
they can assist the process if members who want this know how to use the 
rules. Most of what you'd need to know is in the brief compendia of the 
Rules you can easily buy or find in used bookstores. Or on-line. But if the 
members want to fight, what can the Rules do against the wish of the 
majority? If a member appeals the ruling of the chair, and the members 
don't listen and consider the appeal carefully but are just irritated that 
some troublemaker has been making waves, well, the organization will get 
what the majority deserve. Poor process. It is quick and easy to appeal and 
to get a definitive answer under Robert's Rules, and any chair who allows 
debate over the rules to proceed a long time doesn't understand his or her 
duty.

(If you want to *change* meeting rules, it is a really good idea to try to 
work on that in committee or in caucus, not to try to hash it all out on 
the floor, at least not unless a majority want to work on it in that way).

If a majority already knows what it wants to do, it can do it quickly and 
efficiently under Robert's Rules. Yet the Rules do provide many 
protections, in their default form, for the minority. Such as a 2/3 rule to 
cut off debate and proceed to vote. That rule can be abused, to be sure. 
But one person's "abuse" is another person's "protection of the 
organization from major decisions not widely accepted." It is fascinating 
to me, that, if I have understood the issue correctly, the plan to invoke 
cloture in the U.S. Senate in the presence of filibuster with less than the 
rule's 60% requirement, by a simple ruling of the chair, requires that 
chair to make an illegal ruling, which is then sustained by a majority 
vote. Under Robert's Rules, and the Senate does not use Robert's Rules but 
its own rules which resemble Robert's Rules, the chair is only a stand-in 
for the majority, which has absolute authority to overrule or confirm the 
chair. So Robert's Rules are vulnerable to this maneuver: all it takes is a 
chair willing to compromise his or her duty, and a majority willing to 
confirm that. And I don't see any way around that. A majority can, in a 
democracy, do pretty much what it likes, if it is determined and has enough 
time. A simple majority in the U.S., properly distributed and maintained, 
can amend the constitution, it just takes a little process. (Actually, a 
simple plurality can do this. I don't think people realize the risks.)


Robert's Rules are intended for deliberative bodies, whereas election 
methods in general are designed for aggregative process. Given a choice, 
where the outcome matters, I'd go for deliberative process over aggregative 
every time. If there is time. And if the process is truly democratic.