DrupalCon Denver 2012: THE FUTURE OF DRUPAL GOVERNANCE
Channel: Drupal Association
Date: 2013-03-28

Presentation is at lb.cm/governance and the related blog series at randyfay.com/topics/governance Governance basically means the processes by which we make decisions, make plans, and solve problems. Drupal has always (and admirably) had a very light touch in the area of governance, due to our light-touch founder and Benevolent Dictator for Life, Dries. For core development decision making we aim for consensus and Dries is the final arbiter. We have a great community, and this has definitely worked for the community. But...
From Wikipedia: Governance is the act of governing. It relates to decisions that define expectations, grant power, or verify performance. It consists of either a separate process or part of management or leadership processes.
But... our community is much more than Drupal Core development. And we have many, many issues of decision making, problem solving, and conflict resolution that should never, ever have to clutter Dries' brain. In fact they couldn't. We're a worldwide community with a huge number of participants and a gigantic level of initiatives. But we have no method of dealing with those except a lightly-defined "Consensus" model. This Core Conversation is about Drupal's governance structure. We'll touch on:
What governance is.
How other open source communities manage themselves.
Drupal's current governance structure.
Problems with Drupal's current governance structure.
Options for the future.
Risks of mucking with our governance.
If you are an advocate of forking Drupal, replacing Dries, or changing the BDFL model of leadership, please propose your own core conversation. The intent of this conversation is to discuss fleshing out governance in the Drupal world in areas where there is currently no effective decisionmaking/problemsolving/conflict resolution structure. It is not to challenge Dries authority. This isn't a radical session, but rather a very practical one: What should be the future of decision making and problem/conflict resolution within the Drupal Community?