MyWiki:WikiProject Organizations/Categorization

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New categorization scheme proposed

This categorization scheme, assembles all organizations through the four main super-categories of Geography, Field, Ideology and Type. All sub-categories and articles will likely have parental categories that belong to more than one 'super-category', and more than one category within them. That being said, the main navigational structure should be location. Each category within field, ideology and type super-categories should have sub categories corresponding to respective location at all levels.

Organizations by Field

Business organizations

• Note that by filing all these subcategories under "business", what would we do with non-profit advocacy, regulatory, and other bodies on the same subject that are not conducting business? I think that these items should be under "subject" and that "business organizations" should be considered a "purpose"; so that "companies" trees should be subcatted under "business orgs" (as their purpose) and also under a relevant subject (as their subject). Thoughts? --Lquilter (talk) 16:34, 12 December 2007 (UTC)

Organizations by Ideology

• Aren't all organizations based on an ideology or shared interest or shared belief or shared commitment of some sort? What is the common theme between political, religious, and philosophical? How could we distinguish it, for instance, from civil rights groups? Or would we want to? (I guess those would be political?) --Lquilter (talk) 16:32, 12 December 2007 (UTC)

Organizations by Kind

This will be one of the more challenging super-categories to organize. For now I'm going to quickly list all the types of organizations I can find, and with others hopefully a scheme will emerge.

• I think in general this category should be better thought of as legal status and activity. We can evade this public/private distinction; I'm not sure that it's helpful for wikipedia categories. --Lquilter (talk) 16:30, 12 December 2007 (UTC)

Private

• I wouldn't have this; it's not clear what it means. Many organizations define themselves as "private" with a fairly open membership policy; other organizations are privately owned but have membership open to the public; and so on. --Lquilter (talk) 16:30, 12 December 2007 (UTC)

For-profit organizations

• I think this is probably one of four fundamental categories in a Category:Organizations by legal status category: "for-profit organizations", "non-profit organizations", "governmental organizations", and "religious organizations" (which are not necessarily non-profit in all jurisdictions). Other specific legal statuses should also be included, such as "criminal" and "corporate". --Lquilter (talk) 16:30, 12 December 2007 (UTC)

Institutional organizations

• Not sure what this meas. Isn't it redundant? --Lquilter (talk) 16:30, 12 December 2007 (UTC)

Public

• I wouldn't have this; it's not clear what it means. Many organizations define themselves as "private" with a fairly open membership policy; other organizations are privately owned but have membership open to the public; and so on. --Lquilter (talk) 16:30, 12 December 2007 (UTC)

Non-profit organizations

• I think this is probably one of four fundamental categories in a Category:Organizations by legal status category: "for-profit organizations", "non-profit organizations", "governmental organizations", and "religious organizations" (which are not necessarily non-profit in all jurisdictions). Other specific legal statuses should also be included, such as "criminal" and "corporate". --Lquilter (talk) 16:30, 12 December 2007 (UTC)

Council organizations

• What would this be? I think "council" is a little vague. --Lquilter (talk) 16:30, 12 December 2007 (UTC)

Union organizations

• Organizations that are part of unions or are comprised of unions? --Lquilter (talk) 16:30, 12 December 2007 (UTC)

Community organizations

• Is this supposed to be for local communities? --Lquilter (talk) 16:30, 12 December 2007 (UTC)

Conferences

• Do we need a tree for Category:Organized events? Maybe as part of Category:Events? --Lquilter (talk) 16:30, 12 December 2007 (UTC)

Protests

• Could fit within Category:Organized events. --Lquilter (talk) 16:30, 12 December 2007 (UTC)

Societies

• Same issue as "associations" below -- seems to imply peer-societies, social societies, interest societies, professional societies, but in practice is often used as a synonym for organization or association. --Lquilter (talk) 16:30, 12 December 2007 (UTC)

Corporations

• Could fit within Category:Organizations by legal status --Lquilter (talk) 16:30, 12 December 2007 (UTC)

Charitable

• This is sometimes considered a purpose (e.g., medical, health, welfare), and sometimes considered a legal status, synonymous with 501c3 in the US. I think with that ambiguity we should avoid this term and stick to "non-profit" as much as possible. --Lquilter (talk) 16:30, 12 December 2007 (UTC)

Associations

• It seems to me that this term is rather vague: Although I think of it more as peer-associations, as in, associations of union members, professional associations, etc., it is also used in the States as a synonym with organization. --Lquilter (talk) 16:30, 12 December 2007 (UTC)

Lobby

• This is an activity -- I think it should be part of Category:Organizations by activity. --Lquilter (talk) 16:30, 12 December 2007 (UTC)

Militant

• Militant seems to be an attitude not a "kind", perhaps a type of activism or political organization. What's envisioned for this category? --Lquilter (talk) 16:20, 12 December 2007 (UTC)

Proposed basic set of categories for each organization

I'm proposing that the categories for each organization cover the following basic topics: its "birth", "death", "location", "legal status/organization", and "purpose". Note that legal status & purpose can be combined in various ways -- for instance, "professional associations" are both within legal structure (non-profit) and activity.

1. Purpose - subject (e.g., Category:Science organizations)
2. Purpose - activity (e.g., Category:Lobbying organizations)
3. Legal structure / status (e.g., Category:Non-profit organizations, Category:Governmental organization, Category:For-profit organizations, etc.)
4. Year of establishment, e.g., Category:Organizations established in 1900
5. Year of disestablishment if appropriate, e.g., Category:2001 disestablishments (eventually we should have an organizations disestablished in year tree)
6. Organizations by location/geography

Within the above proposal, most of the "organizations by field" are "subject" categories and that tree is being filled in -- Category:Organizations by subject. I believe that Category:Organizations by kind is better thought of as Category:Organizations by activity and Category:Organizations by legal status, and hopefully those terms are a bit more descriptive than "kind". Category:Organizations by geography is clearly the location category.

Thoughts?