This is a CTP of initiative: Hackspace 4 (South-Central England, UK)
This CTP describes the process by which the organisation learnt how to manage its difficult and disruptive members; the development of different forms of rules and implementation to do so.
As documented in “CTP1: Tapping into a new community”, the hackspace was unexpectedly popular, attracting a high level of interest and large numbers of members. The founders made a decision early on to ride this wave of growth, welcoming all new participants. With hindsight, this decision was seen as a mistake:
“What we did wrong was grow really big, rather than capping the numbers and saying, we will help you start another space, we will give you money to start another space.“
The early ethos of the hackspace was that all members were welcome, with the underpinning assumption of good will from all participants. This meant that when troublesome members joined, the organisation was ill-equipped to either recognised or address their behaviour and its effects. As the co-founders described from their discussion across the international hackspace community, all hackspaces experience problems of some flavour - “injuries, legal threats, catastrophic directors being installed and then having to be removed; all problems coming down to bad community management”. However, these issues are rarely acknowledged publically, instead forming the bulk of discussion in the private spaces of mailing lists and emails.
As one of the co-founders described, the organisation experienced a series of disruptive members: “Someone will join with a very specific idea of how it [the organisation] operates, and will try and make it work that way. It causes total explosions, people leaving. Every time it happens, it has been disastrous for the community; and every time those people should have been banned, but because we’re too welcoming and willing to give people chances because we’re welcoming and lovely to everyone, by the time it’s actually dealt with it has caused unbelievable damage. And they are always men.”
The specific situation cited was that of a new member T, who whilst pleasant in person, was loud and abusive through the hackspace’s online channels. At the time, the organisation’s board of directors were taken up with dealing with another difficult member, who had - inspired by the Occupy movement - decided to “occupy” the space, despite it being against the lease; and were not fully aware of T’s behaviour. With few rules in place to mediate against this, and little public acknowledgement of the harms that it was doing, members of the space began to leave.
As problems escalated, the organisers eventually introduced a series of rules to mediate against the harms. These rules eventually led to T’s being temporarily banned and returning “a changed person”, but more importantly, also created the tools for the hackspace directors to implement against toxic members; and, in doing so, articulate and codify new values about the purpose and priorities of the organisation. One co-founder described how, if he now had to advise people starting hackspaces around similar issues, he would recommend "Banning early, banning often".
The main actors involved were T; the members of HS4 who were affected by his behaviour; and the directors who developed new policy.The organisation also engaged with, and learnt from, similar dynamics and events that were happening in other hackspaces in the UK, Europe, the US, and Australia. Another member of HS4 who had been disruptive and was banned, was later also banned from other international hackspace mailing lists for similar online abusive behavior.Hackspaces were felt to attract a certain type of person (keen on technology, less understanding or aware of social behaviour). However, the physical spaces hackspaces are commonly instantiated in - open all the time; little monitoring; rules socially enforced - were also felt to attract certain types of people who were likely to abuse this system.
This CTP was shaped by the disruptive behaviour of several members; learning from other hackspaces; the Occupy movement; and the use of a physical space
This was an inherently contested moment in the organisation’s history, which – together with having to deal with other toxic members – one of the co-founders described as ‘very traumatic’. Those in leadership positions found it exceptionally difficult and upsetting to ‘call out’ other members poor behaviour as they didn’t have any experience or guidelines in ‘how to deal with it’. Many also experienced deep guilt when they realised how much damage had been done without their knowledge, as one member explained:
“I realise now how common it is. Whenever someone turns up and starts causing problems, people won’t complain or argue against it. They’ll just leave and by the time you notice, it’s too late. You’ve lost a whole section of the community, the things that matter. It’s absolutely devastating”.
As this quote illustrates, many of the tensions and unhappiness around this conflict passed unnoticed initially to many members, as the norms and values of the space were enforced at socially at that time (rather than hierarchically). As a result, many of those who were affected by T’s behaviour chose to quietly leave the space entirely, rather that having to confront it directly or even raise the issues with the directors.
This CTP was seen as critical at the time, as it represented the moment when the co-directors were forced to realise that their current codes of conduct (or lack thereof) were causing harm to the organisation; and were thus moved into creating policy which codified deliberate choices about who was permitted to be in the space and under what circumstances. In doing so, it instantiated hard choices about what “openness” meant for a community space, and how to prioritise safety for some members over the presence of others. As one of the co-founders described, the good-faith nature of the hackspace community made its members particularly ill-equipped to deal with bad-faith actions:
“In hackspaces, we’re really bad at making people unwelcome, or spotting people who are sociopaths, or spotting people who have an agenda that isn’t entirely in line with what we’re up to”.
As described above, all facets of this CTP were unanticipated: the toxic behaviour, how unprepared directors were to deal with it, and the fractures to the community. It is difficult to assess what would have happened in this CTPs absence as the co-founders described in interviews a number of similarly difficult events taking place (which had, for various reasons, not spurred the full moment of realisation that this one had); but also realised how many other similar moments might have been missed as members quietly chose to absent themselves from the organisation, rather than raising it as an issue.
This CTP acted as an intense learning experience for the organisation, centring on their transformational aims with regard to openness and inclusivity; and also their location in the wider hackspace movement:
“Initially I thought everyone should have a right to use [hackspaces], it’s about access to tools, and we do things that aren’t fulfilled by anyone else. No-one is letting people make their dreams. Everyone should have a space to go to, and I fundamentally believe that. But it doesn’t have to be this space”.
One co-founder described how it had made him realise the importance of the community management element of hackspaces:
“I get emails – ‘I’m thinking of resigning, I can’t deal with the people any more, this isn’t what I set out to be running’. And that’s what everybody says. The any come into it with an idea of what should happen, they focus on the space and the tools and how it will operate, and not about the people. The thing I’ve learnt most from doing all of this is that everything you thought people wouldn’t do in real life, they actually do and actually some people are awful’. You need to be prepared for that”.
These lessons about the importance of focusing on social and technological elements, and the different forms of skills and expertise in play, were diffused across the hackspace network – as the quote above indicates, the co-founders are in constant contact and learning from other hackspaces in the UK, Europe, the US, and Australia. The long term effects also passed on to members who reported burnout from having to deal with these issues, repeatedly, even after various codes of conduct had been developed.
Stay informed. Subscribe for project updates by e-mail.
