Document Blocking (Was: I-D ACTION:draft-ietf-problem-process-00.txt)

[Keith Moore]

> > > The problem with the current process (as I understand it) is that it 
> > > allows documents to be blocked by one or two IESG members without the 
> > > consensus of the group. 
> 
> > I don't see this as a problem at all.
>
> I see a problem with Keith's statement here. It can be read to imply
> that Keith thinks it's fine for an AD to block a document without
> there being any other support for the action by the rest of the
> IESG. 

Not quite - but I should clarify that part of the reason I don't see this as a
problem is that I don't view a Discuss as "blocking a document".

IMHO IESG does not have enough power to block documents that are truly 
bad - the presumption is that IESG must tell the WG how to fix the document,
and sometimes that is simply infeasible.  And IESG wastes a lot of its energy
trying to reconcile problems with documents that should simply be discarded.
But if IESG were given the power to actually block documents, I agree it
should take a significant plurality of IESG to do so.

Note that even under our current processes and procedures if an AD were to
repeatedly vote Discuss for no good reason in order to block a document, there
are several avenues available to fix the problem.  The IESG has a procedure
that would require at least one other AD's support in order to continue
blocking - which seems unlikely if there's no good reason.  Failing that,
there is always the ability to appeal to IAB and/or recall the AD.  

But I don't really think this is a problem in reality, as opposed to
perception.  Generally, as Thomas says, when an AD votes Discuss there is
enough understanding of the issue among IESG for other ADs to support and/or
clarify the objection that is being raised.   But even if only one AD supports
the Discuss, I think it's reasonable to allow a single AD to raise the issue,
and send the document back to the WG, with the WG expected to respond in good
faith - either to fix the problem or refute the problem.  

And if they can't resolve their differences, I'd probably suggest that the AD
write up a "dissenting opinion" RFC - doing his best job to explain the
problem - and publish that simultaneously with the WG's RFC.  I've seen more
recalcitrant WGs than stubbornly incorrect ADs, so I don't presume that the WG
is more right than the AD - actually I think the AD is more likely to be
correct about the objections he/she is raising even when he/she has a hard
time explaining them to others.  But perhaps more importantly, I've seen each
of ADs and WG charirs and document authors refuse to cooperate or compromise
or even try to understand each other when they thought they could get their
way by exploiting the rules.  So I think we should try to avoid rules that
automatically permit either an AD or a WG to force his/her/its preferred
outcome.