Guideline 7: Safety before perfect process

Ensuring safety must not be contingent on having a perfect process. A good process is valuable, but safety is not delayed until one is complete. In urgent or serious situations — serious harm, intimidation, retaliation, refusal to respect clear boundaries, or an immediate safety concern — temporary exclusion may be needed while the community assesses the risk.

Deliberately left open

Interim-measure decision authority is open (OD-011, OD-015).

Who may impose an urgent temporary exclusion

This guideline allows temporary exclusion in urgent or serious situations while risk is assessed, but who is authorised to trigger that interim measure is open (OD-011, OD-015).

If left open Urgency is the hardest case for legitimacy: the situations that most need a fast interim measure are also the ones where an unauthorised or contested call does the most damage to trust. Undefined authority invites both paralysis and overreach.

Options for resolution

Authorise a named on-call role to impose interim measures, subject to prompt review
Require two people to concur before any interim exclusion, even urgent ones
Bound interim measures with a fixed expiry unless ratified by the committee/community

Where this comes from · 9 source items

This draft merges what the community actually said across 9 source items — every source ID is permanent and traceable.

JBG-027 Safety cannot depend on a perfect process.
JBG-028 In urgent or serious situations, temporary exclusion may be necessary while the community assesses the risk.
JBG-029 This is especially true where there is serious harm, intimidation, retaliation, refusal to respect clear boundaries, or an immediate safety concern.
JBG-030 A good process matters. But safety cannot depend on completing a perfect process before acting.
OPIN-038 Safety cannot depend on a perfect process.
OPIN-039 In urgent or serious situations, temporary exclusion may be necessary while the community assesses the risk.
OPIN-040 This is especially true where there is serious harm, intimidation, retaliation, refusal to respect clear boundaries, or an immediate safety concern.
OPIN-041 A good process matters. But safety cannot depend on completing a perfect process before acting.
GTC-054 Safety cannot depend on a perfect process

Themes · scope of community safety · investigation and fairness · repercussions and exclusion

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