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The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was delete. \ Backslash Forwardslash / (talk) 01:22, 18 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Comparison of Australian and New Zealand governments

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Comparison of Australian and New Zealand governments (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) – (View log)
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This page is essentially an essay better suited to a dissertation than an encyclopedia. Either it simply duplicates the content of the extensive articles on each country's system of government (which means it is redundant), or it compares from a non-neutral standpoint, making value judgements and tending towards a conclusion (which means it is biased and POV). Wikipedia is not a political consultancy, nor is it a game of Top Trumps. ╟─TreasuryTag►stannator─╢ 16:40, 11 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]

  • Keep all and unbundle for a relist if required. All three pages are on encyclopaedic topics but with major issues in the execution. However, the sourcing differs between them as does the content. Simply not suitable for a bundled nomination. I would add that Comparison of Canadian and United States governments is well-referenced. No indication that WP:BEFORE has been followed. No attempt has been made to clean up nor has consideration been given to merging as a section in the relevant 'relations' article. TerriersFan (talk) 17:00, 11 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]
    (edit conflict) I'm not arguing anything to which WP:BEFORE applies. I clearly stated in my nomination that either the articles are entirely neutral (in which case they merely duplicate, and are redundant to, the individual states' articles), or they aren't neutral, in which case the best that could happen is that they be made neutral, in which case they merely duplicate, and are redundant to, the individual states' articles. I don't think that that sort of page is appropriate for Wikipedia. ╟─TreasuryTag►CANUKUS─╢ 17:02, 11 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]
    Articles comparing and contrasting the government systems of closely connected countries are an entirely proper Wikipedia subject and I see no reason why they can't be cleaned up and sourced. "they merely duplicate, and are redundant to, the individual states' articles" is not correct. The individual countries articles do not carry out this comparison. It is not sensible to add the comparison to the individual articles because you would have essentially the same information added to each country article; wholly inefficient. However, if there is not enough sourced material available for a separate article then a section in the relations articles should be considered. WP:BEFORE is, of course, relevant. Alternatives to deletion should always be considered first. TerriersFan (talk) 17:14, 11 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]
    As a representative example, take this sentence from one of the articles: "In Australia, John Howard's conservative government supported the war, while the Left-leaning Clark administration in New Zealand opposed it." In the main Politics of Australia article or whatever, it will say, "John Howard's conservative government supported the war," and in the Politics of New Zealand article it will say, "The Left-leaning Clark administration in New Zealand opposed the war." It's just Top Trumps. ╟─TreasuryTag►co-prince─╢ 17:21, 11 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete All!!! As wonderful as these articles are (or may be) they are WP:Original research. An encyclopedia's job is to give information not make comparisons. There are other venues for that. WP would not have articles comparing French food to Italian food, J.R.R. Tolkien to Rudyard Kipling, the Ford Mustang to the Chevy Camaro, etc. That's the job of other venues, especially magazines and blogs. Northwestgnome (talk) 17:31, 11 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]
    That's a very good argument, I never thought of that actually! Well done. ╟─TreasuryTag►presiding officer─╢ 17:32, 11 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]
    It's cute but not valid. Work your way through the categories in Category:Comparisons, for example. TerriersFan (talk) 17:46, 11 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]
    You mean a bit like WP:OTHERCRAP? ╟─TreasuryTag►consulate─╢ 17:48, 11 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]
    I see Comparison of Star Trek and Star Wars is an article. I almost used that as an example. Perhaps my instinct warned me. :-) Again I am not saying these things should not be compared. They should be. Just not in an encyclopedia. Northwestgnome (talk) 18:00, 11 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep all problems with Neutrality, referencing, original research etc are entirely fixable. Comparison articles prevent you having to read (potentially reams of) virtually identical information in both articles to find the differences, which may be under-reported as they're only really significant in reference to how they differ from another, closely-related government. Also, contrasting different 'types' of 'thing' is a good way of illustrating/explaining 'type' and/or 'thing', and is a quick way of getting familiar with, e.g., the US government if you already have knowledge of the UK government; all of which == encyclopaedic imo --Arkelweis (talk) 18:13, 11 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • Note: This debate has been included in the list of Australia-related deletion discussions. -gadfium 19:05, 11 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • Note: This debate has been included in the list of New Zealand-related deletion discussions. -gadfium 19:05, 11 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep all per Terriersfan and Arkelweis. The articles have issues but those can be fixed without deleting and starting from scratch (or not starting at all). I would argue that these topics could be suitable for both a dissertation/essay and an encyclopedia article. The WP:OR argument doesn't really hold water in my mind; comparative government obviously isn't something new and unresearched. Finding references is the real problem, and that's no reason to delete an article. A Stop at Willoughby (talk) 21:17, 11 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete all. Even if such articles were referenced and an attempt made at being NOPV, it is pushing the limits of what WP is all about. Encyclopedias are collections of facts (!) and a comparison would be beyond this boundary. Also, it opens up the need for an extensive set of articles comparing every country with all others. I don't think we should go there. -- Alan Liefting (talk) - 22:27, 11 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Delete all I'm still of the opinion that, because one can compare and contrast anything with anything, this isn't a direction that we should be going in. What I see here is a series of articles to explain the rest of the world to Americans, Britons, Australians, New Zealanders, Canadians, rather than promoting a global view. What I see here is encouraging myriad OR essays-- Mexico and Guatemala, Ghana and Botswana, Russia and Belarus, Spain and Bahrain, etc. But the worst problem I see is true of any type of original research -- there are some tasks that people should do for themselves, rather than depending on other people to do it for them. Ideally, an American should learn about another nation's government from a Wikipedia article, and then draw his or her own conclusions about the similarities and differences (i.e, there are 105 Canadian Senators vs. 100 United States Senators). I'm sure this type of article is great for a college or high school assignment, but it's not great for Wikipedia. Mandsford (talk) 23:41, 11 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]
"Encyclopedias are collections of facts (!)" -- x differs from y in way z is a statement of fact. there's no reason why it couldn't be referenced and included in an article of similar facts. Also, there's nothing wrong with an article contrasting and comparing Mexico and Guatemala, for example -- it would both illustrate (by comparason) both Mexico and Guatemala better, and allow easyer understanding of Mexico for people already familiar with Guatemala (e.g., Guatemalans), and vice-a-versa. --Arkelweis (talk) 16:58, 12 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]
I agree entirely. By definition, something where a writer gives his or her 2 cents worth on what's similar, what's different, is going to violate both WP:NPOV and WP:OR. I predict, however, that this will close as a no consensus, without even acknowledging those two core Wikipedia principles. That said, I frankly can't imagine that anyone would consult an article of this nature unless they were already familiar with one system and had been asked to compare it against another; and that that the asking would be in the form of an assignment in a civics class. Cut, paste, use the online thesaurus to change some words, voila! Next Thursday's assignment taken care of. If it's an exam question, make sure to have your iPhone with you. I agree, these are an embarrassment, but no consensus usually trumps principle. Mandsford (talk) 13:24, 12 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]
If they're "an embarrassment to Wikipedia", then fix them --Arkelweis (talk) 16:58, 12 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]
That's an easy fix. Someone can make articles called Government of Australia, Government of Canada, Government of New Zealand, Government of the United Kingdom and Government of the United States. Or maybe someone can make an article called Comparison of governments of places that most of the Wikipedia editors come from, with some tables. Mandsford (talk) 17:15, 12 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Agree 100% with Mandsford: what's the point in investing time improving an article based on elements drawn from Her Majesty's Government and Foreign relations of the United Kingdom which have been "reinterpreted" in the light of the views of the writer? Anyone who genuinely cares about Wikipedia will vote to have this article and the two others deleted. Lamberhurst (talk) 18:11, 12 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]
I'm sorry, I looked through those articles, and couldn't find anything discussing how the UK government differs from the US government, leaving me to do my own original research to figure it out rather than, say, relying on expert opinion as presented to me in an encyclopaedia article on, say, differences between the UK and US governments. --Arkelweis (talk) 13:18, 14 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Funny that - I looked through the Comparison of United States and United Kingdom governments article and couldn't find discussion of any differences there either. Just a list of POV "facts" about the UK and US. Based on your reasoning, I could create Comparison of George Bush and Barack Obama and just copy entire sections from the existing pages on both individuals (adding in my own two cents of course), whilst hoping that one day my eminently non-notable article will be transformed by other editors into "expert opinion". Lamberhurst (talk) 16:45, 14 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]
I suppose, tho It'd be better if you did it correctly from the very beginning. btw, 'expert opinion' would mean 'based on comparisons which are cited to valid sources' (such as the stuff attributed to "Hauss, Charles. Comparative Politics. (Thompson-Wadsworth 2005)"). If you want to improve the article by deleting stuff, why not go through, pick 'facts', and -- if you cannot verify them -- delete just those 'facts' (or mention that you suspect they're crap on the talk-page, or add a [citation needed] tag), whilst citing any facts that you can? That'd stop them 'being embarrassments to wikipedia' whilst also actually adding useful content. I've added a refimprove template, lets keep for now and see if it improves some --Arkelweis (talk) 17:31, 14 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]
then why isn't your vote to merge? --Arkelweis (talk) 13:18, 14 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Because the texts are uncited messes better started from scratch. I suppose we could redirect somewhere as a lest resort. - Biruitorul Talk 14:39, 14 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete all This is not only original research, it is also contrary to the provision that wikipedia is not a manual - hypothetical users who can't already understand the potential differences by comparing, on their own, the countless articles dedicated to each of the two terms of comparison can't really be helped much, no matter how much we dumb down the message. Dahn (talk) 14:05, 13 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep. The question we should ask ourself is: Are there researchers performing a comparative study of, say, the governments of the United States and Canada? It seems from that article that there are, and indeed quite a few books were published on this. Therefore it seems that this is a notable topic, and the nominator's claim that there is no room for such articles on WP seems wrong to me. --Zvika (talk) 09:33, 14 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]
WP is blurring the line between news and encyclopaedia. If we allow these sorts of article to exist on WP we would be blurring the line between an encyclopaedia and a book. The subject of these article can easily be a mention in the "Politics of Foo" articles. -- Alan Liefting (talk) - 22:42, 14 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • Delete all. There are so many combinations of comparisons you can make and, as the articles stand, they're poorly written and very sparsely referenced. The content is covered in a wider sense in the articles associated with Forms of government. There's no need to go into such needless specifics. Rennell435 (talk) 11:55, 14 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment for Rennell435 or anyone else seeking deletion: I disagree strongly with the proposition that there's no way to draw a line between notable comparisons between major governments and non-notable comparisons between minor governments. We already make that distinction regularly for articles on diplomatic relations between various pairs of sovereign nations. If it was so problematic to determine which were notable and which weren't, we wouldn't keep Australia–Canada relations and delete Iraq-Malta relations (and yes, the latter article did exist before it was successfully AfD'd with my support). For the record, I wouldn't support an article comparing the Iraqi and Maltese governments! A Stop at Willoughby (talk) 20:08, 17 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]
The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.
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