path: root/includes/common/doc/constitution.txt

                              Debian Constitution
                                       
                  Constitution for the Debian Project (v1.0)
                                       
1. Introduction

   The Debian Project is an association of individuals who have made
   common cause to create a free operating system.
   
   This document describes the organisational structure for formal
   decisionmaking in the Project. It does not describe the goals of the
   Project or how it achieves them, or contain any policies except those
   directly related to the decisionmaking process.
   
2. Decisionmaking bodies and individuals

   Each decision in the Project is made by one or more of the following:
    1. The Developers, by way of General Resolution or an election;
    2. The Project Leader;
    3. The Technical Committee and/or its Chairman;
    4. The individual Developer working on a particular task;
    5. Delegates appointed by the Project Leader for specific tasks.
    6. The Project Secretary;
       
   Most of the remainder of this document will outline the powers of
   these bodies, their composition and appointment, and the procedure for
   their decisionmaking. The powers of a person or body may be subject to
   review and/or limitation by others; in this case the reviewing body or
   person's entry will state this. In the list above, a person or body is
   usually listed before any people or bodies whose decisions they can
   overrule or who they (help) appoint - but not everyone listed earlier
   can overrule everyone listed later.
   
  2.1. General rules
  
    1. Nothing in this constitution imposes an obligation on anyone to do
       work for the Project. A person who does not want to do a task
       which has been delegated or assigned to them does not need to do
       it. However, they must not actively work against these rules and
       decisions properly made under them.
    2. A person may hold several posts, except that the Project Leader,
       Project Secretary and the Chairman of the Technical Committee must
       be distinct, and that the Leader cannot appoint themselves as
       their own Delegate.
    3. A person may leave the Project or resign from a particular post
       they hold, at any time, by stating so publicly.
       
3. Individual Developers

  3.1. Powers
  
   An individual Developer may
    1. make any technical or nontechnical decision with regard to their
       own work;
    2. propose or sponsor draft General Resolutions;
    3. propose themselves as a Project Leader candidate in elections;
    4. vote on General Resolutions and in Leadership elections.
       
  3.2. Composition and appointment
  
    1. Developers are volunteers who agree to further the aims of the
       Project insofar as they participate in it, and who maintain
       package(s) for the Project or do other work which the Project
       Leader's Delegate(s) consider worthwhile.
    2. The Project Leader's Delegate(s) may choose not to admit new
       Developers, or expel existing Developers. If the Developers feel
       that the Delegates are abusing their authority they can of course
       override the decision by way of General Resolution - see s.4.1(3),
       s.4.2.
       
  3.3. Procedure
  
   Developers may make these decisions as they see fit.
   
4. The Developers by way of General Resolution or election

  4.1. Powers
  
   Together, the Developers may:
    1. Appoint or recall the Project Leader.
    2. Amend this constitution, provided they agree with a 3:1 majority.
    3. Override any decision by the Project Leader or a Delegate.
    4. Override any decision by the Technical Committee, provided they
       agree with a 2:1 majority.
    5. Issue nontechnical policy documents and statements.
       These include documents describing the goals of the project, its
       relationship with other free software entities, and nontechnical
       policies such as the free software licence terms that Debian
       software must meet.
       They may also include position statements about issues of the day.
    6. Together with the Project Leader and SPI, make decisions about
       property held in trust for purposes related to Debian. (See
       s.9.1.)
       
  4.2. Procedure
  
    1. The Developers follow the Standard Resolution Procedure, below. A
       resolution or amendment is introduced if proposed by any Developer
       and sponsored by at least K other Developers, or if proposed by
       the Project Leader or the Technical Committee.
    2. Delaying a decision by the Project Leader or their Delegate:
         1. If the Project Leader or their Delegate, or the Technical
            Committee, has made a decision, then Developers can override
            them by passing a resolution to do so; see s4.1(3).
         2. If such a resolution is sponsored by at least 2K Developers,
            or if it is proposed by the Technical Committee, the
            resolution puts the decision immediately on hold (provided
            that resolution itself says so).
         3. If the original decision was to change a discussion period or
            a voting period, or the resolution is to override the
            Technical Committee, then only K Developers need to sponsor
            the resolution to be able to put the decision immediately on
            hold.
         4. If the decision is put on hold, an immediate vote is held to
            determine whether the decision will stand until the full vote
            on the decision is made or whether the implementation of the
            original decision will be be delayed until then. There is no
            quorum for this immediate procedural vote.
         5. If the Project Leader (or the Delegate) withdraws the
            original decision, the vote becomes moot, and is no longer
            conducted.
    3. Votes are taken by the Project Secretary. Votes and tallies
       results are not be revealed during the voting period; after the
       vote the Project Secretary lists all the votes cast. The voting
       period is 2 weeks, but may be varied by up to 1 week by the
       Project Leader, and may be ended by the Project Secretary when the
       outcome of a vote is no longer in doubt.
    4. The minimum discussion period is 2 weeks, but may be varied by up
       to 1 week by the Project Leader. The Project Leader has a casting
       vote. There is a quorum of 3Q.
    5. Proposals, sponsors, amendments, calls for votes and other formal
       actions are made by announcement on a publicly-readable electronic
       mailing list designated by the Project Leader's Delegate(s); any
       Developer may post there.
    6. Votes are cast by email in a manner suitable to the Secretary. The
       Secretary determines for each poll whether voters can change their
       votes.
    7. Q is half of the square root of the number of current Developers.
       K is Q or 5, whichever is the smaller. Q and K need not be
       integers and are not rounded.
       
5. Project Leader

  5.1. Powers
  
   The Project Leader may:
    1. Appoint Delegates or delegate decisions to the Technical
       Committee.
       The Leader may define an area of ongoing responsibility or a
       specific decision and hand it over to another Developer or to the
       Technical Committee.
       Once a particular decision has been delegated and made the Project
       Leader may not withdraw that delegation; however, they may
       withdraw an ongoing delegation of particular area of
       responsibility.
    2. Lend authority to other Developers.
       The Project Leader may make statements of support for points of
       view or for other members of the project, when asked or otherwise;
       these statements have force if and only if the Leader would be
       empowered to make the decision in question.
    3. Make any decision which requires urgent action.
       This does not apply to decisions which have only become gradually
       urgent through lack of relevant action, unless there is a fixed
       deadline.
    4. Make any decision for whom noone else has responsibility.
    5. Propose draft General Resolutions and amendments.
    6. Together with the Technical Committee, appoint new members to the
       Committee. (See s.6.2.)
    7. Use a casting vote when Developers vote.
       The Project Leader also has a normal vote in such ballots.
    8. Vary the discussion period for Developers' votes (as above).
    9. Lead discussions amongst Developers.
       The Project Leader should attempt to participate in discussions
       amongst the Developers in a helpful way which seeks to bring the
       discussion to bear on the key issues at hand. The Project Leader
       should not use the Leadership position to promote their own
       personal views.
   10. Together with SPI, make decisions affecting property held in trust
       for purposes related to Debian. (See s.9.1.)
       
  5.2. Appointment
  
    1. The Project Leader is elected by the Developers.
    2. The election begins nine weeks before the leadership post becomes
       vacant, or (if it is too late already) immediately.
    3. For the following three weeks any Developer may nominate
       themselves as a candidate Project Leader.
    4. For three weeks after that no more candidates may be nominated;
       candidates should use this time for campaigning (to make their
       identities and positions known). If there are no candidates at the
       end of the nomination period then the nomination period is
       extended for three further weeks, repeatedly if necessary.
    5. The next three weeks are the polling period during which
       Developers may cast their votes. Votes in leadership elections are
       kept secret, even after the election is finished.
    6. The options on the ballot will be those candidates who have
       nominated themselves and have not yet withdrawn, plus None Of The
       Above. If None Of The Above wins the election then the election
       procedure is repeated, many times if necessary.
    7. The decision will be made using Concorde Vote Counting. The quorum
       is the same as for a General Resolution (s.4.2) and the default
       option is None Of The Above.
    8. The Project Leader serves for one year from their election.
       
  5.3. Procedure
  
   The Project Leader should attempt to make decisions which are
   consistent with the consensus of the opinions of the Developers.
   
   Where practical the Project Leader should informally solicit the views
   of the Developers.
   
   The Project Leader should avoid overemphasizing their own point of
   view when making decisions in their capacity as Leader.
   
6. Technical committee

  6.1. Powers
  
   The Technical Committee may:
    1. Decide on any matter of technical policy.
       This includes the contents of the technical policy manuals,
       developers' reference materials, example packages and the
       behaviour of non-experimental package building tools. (In each
       case the usual maintainer of the relevant software or
       documentation makes decisions initially, however; see 6.3(5).)
    2. Decide any technical matter where Developers' jurisdictions
       overlap.
       In cases where Developers need to implement compatible technical
       policies or stances (for example, if they disagree about the
       priorities of conflicting packages, or about ownership of a
       command name, or about which package is responsible for a bug that
       both maintainers agree is a bug, or about who should be the
       maintainer for a package) the technical committee may decide the
       matter.
    3. Make a decision when asked to do so.
       Any person or body may delegate a decision of their own to the
       Technical Committee, or seek advice from it.
    4. Overrule a Developer (requires a 3:1 majority).
       The Technical Committee may ask a Developer to take a particular
       technical course of action even if the Developer does not wish to;
       this requires a 3:1 majority. For example, the Committee may
       determine that a complaint made by the submitter of a bug is
       justified and that the submitter's proposed solution should be
       implemented.
    5. Offer advice.
       The Technical Committee may make formal announcements about its
       views on any matter. Individual members may of course make
       informal statements about their views and about the likely views
       of the committee.
    6. Together with the Project Leader, appoint new members to itself or
       remove existing members. (See s.6.2.)
    7. Appoint the Chairman of the Technical Committee.
       The Chairman is elected by the Committee from its members. All
       members of the committee are automatically nominated; the
       committee vote starting one week before the post will become
       vacant (or immediately, if it is already too late). The members
       may vote by public acclamation for any fellow committee member,
       including themselves; there is no None Of The Above option. The
       vote finishes when all the members have voted or when the outcome
       is no longer in doubt. The result is determined according to
       Concorde Vote Counting.
    8. The Chairman can stand in for the Leader, together with the
       Secretary
       As detailed in s.7.1(2), the Chairman of the Technical Committee
       and the Project Secretary may together stand in for the Leader if
       there is no Leader.
       
  6.2. Composition
  
    1. The Technical Committee consists of up to 8 Developers, and should
       usually have at least 4 members.
    2. When there are fewer than 8 members the Technical Committee may
       recommend new member(s) to the Project Leader, who may choose
       (individually) to appoint them or not.
    3. When there are 5 members or fewer the Technical Committee may
       appoint new member(s) until the number of members reaches 6.
    4. When there have been 5 members or fewer for at least one week the
       Project Leader may appoint new member(s) until the number of
       members reaches 6, at intervals of at least one week per
       appointment.
    5. If the Technical Committee and the Project Leader agree they may
       remove or replace an existing member of the Technical Committee.
       
  6.3. Procedure
  
    1. The Technical Committee uses the Standard Resolution Procedure.
       A draft resolution or amendment may be proposed by any member of
       the Technical Committee. There is no minimum discussion period;
       the voting period lasts for up to one week, or until the outcome
       is no longer in doubt. Members may change their votes. There is a
       quorum of two.
    2. Details regarding voting
       The Chairman has a casting vote. When the Technical Committee
       votes whether to override a Developer who also happens to be a
       member of the Committee, that member may not vote (unless they are
       the Chairman, in which case they may use only their casting vote).
    3. Public discussion and decisionmaking.
       Discussion, draft resolutions and amendments, and votes by members
       of the committee, are made public on the Technical Committee
       public discussion list. There is no separate secretary for the
       Committee.
    4. Confidentiality of appointments.
       The Technical Committee may hold confidential discussions via
       private email or a private mailing list or other means to discuss
       appointments to the Committee. However, votes on appointments must
       be public.
    5. No detailed design work.
       The Technical Committee does not engage in design of new proposals
       and policies. Such design work should be carried out by
       individuals privately or together and discussed in ordinary
       technical policy and design forums.
       The Technical Committee restricts itself to choosing from or
       adopting compromises between solutions and decisions which have
       been proposed and reasonably thoroughly discussed elsewhere.
       Individual members of the technical committee may of course
       participate on their own behalf in any aspect of design and policy
       work.
    6. Technical Committee makes decisions only as last resort.
       The Technical Committee does not make a technical decision until
       efforts to resolve it via consensus have been tried and failed,
       unless it has been asked to make a decision by the person or body
       who would normally be responsible for it.
       
7. The Project Secretary

  7.1. Powers
  
   The Secretary:
    1. Takes votes amongst the Developers, and determines the number and
       identity of Developers, whenever this is required by the
       constitution.
    2. Can stand in for the Leader, together with the Chairman of the
       Technical Committee.
       If there is no Project Leader then the Chairman of the Technical
       Committee and the Project Secretary may by joint agreement make
       decisions if they consider it imperative to do so.
    3. Adjudicates any disputes about interpretation of the constitution.
    4. May delegate part or all of their authority to someone else, or
       withdraw such a delegation at any time.
       
  7.2. Appointment
  
   The Project Secretary is appointed by the Project Leader and the
   current Project Secretary.
   
   If the Project Leader and the current Project Secretary cannot agree
   on a new appointment they must ask the board of SPI to appoint a
   Secretary.
   
   If there is no Project Secretary or the current Secretary is
   unavailable and has not delegated authority for a decision then the
   decision may be made or delegated by the Chairman of the Technical
   Committee, as Acting Secretary.
   
   The Project Secretary's term of office is 1 year, at which point they
   or another Secretary must be (re)appointed.
   
  7.3. Procedure
  
   The Project Secretary should make decisions which are fair and
   reasonable, and preferably consistent with the consensus of the
   Developers.
   
   When acting together to stand in for an absent Project Leader the
   Chairman of the Technical Committee and the Project Secretary should
   make decisions only when absolutely necessary and only when consistent
   with the consensus of the Developers.
   
8. The Project Leader's Delegates

  8.1. Powers
  
   The Project Leader's Delegates:
    1. have powers delegated to them by the Project Leader;
    2. may make certain decisions which the Leader may not make directly,
       including approving or expelling Developers or designating people
       as Developers who do not maintain packages. This is to avoid
       concentration of power, particularly over membership as a
       Developer, in the hands of the Project Leader. 
       
  8.2. Appointment
  
   The Delegates are appointed by the Project Leader and may be replaced
   by the Leader at the Leader's discretion. The Project Leader may not
   make the position as a Delegate conditional on particular decisions by
   the Delegate, nor may they override a decision made by a Delegate once
   made.
   
  8.3. Procedure
  
   Delegates may make decisions as they see fit, but should attempt to
   implement good technical decisions and/or follow consensus opinion.
   
9. Software in the Public Interest

   SPI and Debian are separate organisations who share some goals. Debian
   is grateful for the legal support framework offered by SPI. Debian's
   Developers are currently members of SPI by virtue of their status as
   Developers. 
   
  9.1. Authority
  
    1. SPI has no authority regarding Debian's technical or nontechnical
       decisions, except that no decision by Debian with respect to any
       property held by SPI shall require SPI to act outside its legal
       authority, and that Debian's constitution may occasionally use SPI
       as a decision body of last resort.
    2. Debian claims no authority over SPI other than that over the use
       of certain of SPI's property, as described below, though Debian
       Developers may be granted authority within SPI by SPI's rules.
    3. Debian Developers are not agents or employees of SPI, or of each
       other or of persons in authority in the Debian Project. A person
       acting as a Developer does so as an individual, on their own
       behalf.
       
  9.2. Management of property for purposes related to Debian
  
   Since Debian has no authority to hold money or property, any donations
   for the Debian Project must made to SPI, which manages such affairs.
   
   SPI have made the following undertakings:
    1. SPI will hold money, trademarks and other tangible and intangible
       property and manage other affairs for purposes related to Debian.
    2. Such property will be accounted for separately and held in trust
       for those purposes, decided on by Debian and SPI according to this
       section.
    3. SPI will not dispose of or use property held in trust for Debian
       without approval from Debian, which may be granted by the Project
       Leader or by General Resolution of the Developers.
    4. SPI will consider using or disposing of property held in trust for
       Debian when asked to do so by the Project Leader.
    5. SPI will use or dispose of property held in trust for Debian when
       asked to do so by a General Resolution of the Developers, provided
       that this is compatible with SPI's legal authority.
    6. SPI will notify the Developers by electronic mail to a Debian
       Project mailing list when it uses or disposes of property held in
       trust for Debian.
       
A. Standard Resolution Procedure

   These rules apply to communal decisionmaking by committees and
   plebiscites, where stated above.
   
  A.1. Proposal
  
   The formal procedure begins when a draft resolution is proposed and
   sponsored, as required.
   
  A.1. Discussion and Amendment
  
    1. Following the proposal, the resolution may be discussed.
       Amendments may be made formal by being proposed and sponsored
       according to the requirements for a new resolution, or directly by
       the proposer of the original resolution.
    2. A formal amendment may be accepted by the resolution's proposer,
       in which case the formal resolution draft is immediately changed
       to match.
    3. If a formal amendment is not accepted, or one of the sponsors of
       the resolution does not agree with the acceptance by the proposer
       of a formal amendment, the amendment remains as an amendment and
       will be voted on.
    4. If an amendment accepted by the original proposer is not to the
       liking of others, they may propose another amendment to reverse
       the earlier change (again, they must meet the requirements for
       proposer and sponsor(s).)
    5. The proposer or a resolution may suggest changes to the wordings
       of amendments; these take effect if the proposer of the amendment
       agrees and none of the sponsors object. In this case the changed
       amendments will be voted on instead of the originals.
    6. The proposer of a resolution may make changes to correct minor
       errors (for example, typographical errors or inconsistencies) or
       changes which do not alter the meaning, providing noone objects
       within 24 hours. In this case the mininum discussion period is not
       restarted.
       
  A.2. Calling for a vote
  
    1. The proposer or a sponsor of a motion or an amendment may call for
       a vote, providing that the minimum discussion period (if any) has
       elapsed.
    2. The proposer or a sponsor of a motion may call for a vote on any
       or all of the amendments individually or together; the proposer or
       sponsor of an amendment may call for a vote only on that amendment
       and related amendments.
    3. The person who calls for a vote states what they believe the
       wordings of the resolution and any relevant amendments are, and
       consequently what form the ballot should take. However, the final
       decision on the form of ballot(s) is the Secretary's - see 7.1(1),
       7.1(3) and A.3(6).
    4. The minimum discussion period is counted from the time the last
       formal amendment was accepted, or the last related formal
       amendment was accepted if an amendment is being voted on, or since
       the whole resolution was proposed if no amendments have been
       proposed and accepted.
       
  A.3. Voting procedure
  
    1. Each independent set of related amendments is voted on in a
       separate ballot. Each such ballot has as options all the sensible
       combinations of amendments and options, and an option Further
       Discussion. If Further Discussion wins then the entire resolution
       procedure is set back to the start of the discussion period. No
       quorum is required for an amendment.
    2. When the final form of the resolution has been determined it is
       voted on in a final ballot, in which the options are Yes, No and
       Further Discussion. If Further Discussion wins then the entire
       procedure is set back to the start of the discussion period.
    3. The vote taker (if there is one) or the voters (if voting is done
       by public pronouncement) may arrange for these ballots to be held
       simultaneously, even (for example) using a single voting message.
       If amendment ballot(s) and the final ballot are combined in this
       way then it must be possible for a voter to vote differently in
       the final ballot for each of the possible forms of the final draft
       resolution.
    4. Votes may be cast during the voting period, as specified
       elsewhere. If the voting period can end if the outcome is no
       longer in doubt, the possibility that voters may change their
       votes is not considered.
    5. The votes are counted according to the Concorde Vote Counting. If
       a quorum is required then the default option is Further
       Discussion.
    6. In cases of doubt the Project Secretary shall decide on matters of
       procedure (for example, whether particular amendments should be
       considered independent or not).
       
  A.4. Withdrawing resolutions or unaccepted amendments
  
   The proposer of a resolution or unaccepted amendment may withdraw it.
   In this case new proposers may come forward keep it alive, in which
   case the first person to do so becomes the new proposer and any others
   become sponsors if they aren't sponsors already.
   
   A sponsor of a resolution or amendment (unless it has been accepted)
   may withdraw.
   
   If the withdrawal of the proposer and/or sponsors means that a
   resolution has no proposer or not enough sponsors it will not be voted
   on unless this is rectified before the resolution expires.
   
  A.5. Expiry
  
   If a proposed resolution has not been discussed, amended, voted on or
   otherwise dealt with for 4 weeks then it is considered to have been
   withdrawn.
   
  A.6. Concorde Vote Counting
  
    1. This is used to determine the winner amongst a list of options.
       Each ballot paper gives a ranking of the voter's preferred
       options. (The ranking need not be complete.)
    2. Option A is said to Dominate option B if strictly more ballots
       prefer A to B than prefer B to A.
    3. All options which are Dominated by at least one other option are
       discarded, and references to them in ballot papers will be
       ignored.
    4. If there is any option which Dominates all others then that is the
       winner.
    5. If there is now more than one option remaining Single
       Transferrable Vote will be applied to choose amongst those
       remaining:
          + The number of first preferences for each option is counted,
            and if any option has more than half it is the winner.
          + Otherwise the option with the lowest number of first
            preferences is eliminated and its votes redistributed
            according to the second preferences.
          + This elimination procedure is repeated, moving down ballot
            papers to 2nd, 3rd, 4th, etc. preferences as required, until
            one option gets more than half of the `first' preferences.
    6. In the case of ties the elector with a casting vote will decide.
       The casting vote does not count as a normal vote; however that
       elector will usually also get a normal vote.
    7. If a supermajority is required the number of Yes votes in the
       final ballot is reduced by an appropriate factor. Strictly
       speaking, for a supermajority of F:A, the number of ballots which
       prefer Yes to X (when considering whether Yes Dominates X or X
       Dominates Yes) or the number of ballots whose first (remaining)
       preference is Yes (when doing STV comparisons for winner and
       elimination purposes) is multiplied by a factor A/F before the
       comparison is done. This means that a 2:1 vote, for example, means
       twice as many people voted for as against; abstentions are not
       counted. 
    8. If a quorum is required, there must be at least that many votes
       which prefer the winning option to the default option. If there
       are not then the default option wins after all. For votes
       requiring a supermajority, the actual number of Yes votes is used
       when checking whether the quorum has been reached.
       
   When the Standard Resolution Procedure is to be used, the text which
   refers to it must specify what is sufficient to have a draft
   resolution proposed and/or sponsored, what the minimum discussion
   period is, and what the voting period is. It must also specify any
   supermajority and/or the quorum (and default option) to be used.
   
B. Use of language and typography

   The present indicative (`is', for example) means that the statement is
   a rule in this constitution. `May' or `can' indicates that the person
   or body has discretion. `Should' means that it would be considered a
   good thing if the sentence were obeyed, but it is not binding. Text
   marked as a citation, such as this, is rationale and does not form
   part of the constitution. It may be used only to aid interpretation in
   cases of doubt.