| Manual of Style (MoS) |
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The WikiProject Conservatism Style Guide is a style manual for conservatism-related articles. The guide focuses on the most prevalent article types, people and organizations. For general matters of style and format not treated specifically here, follow the Manual of Style and its subpages to achieve consistency of style throughout Wikipedia.
Article structure
Articles should be structured in such a way as to have an introduction, body and optional appendix and footer. While Wikipedia does not have a standard for section headings, WikiProject Conservatism has developed these standard article structures for articles in the conservatism topic area. [1]
Lead section
The lead section serves as an introduction to the topic and a summary of its most important contents. The lead contains several elements. Infoboxes are panels which appear in the top right of an article. Infoboxes are recommended for people and organizations, in particular politicians and political parties. WikiProject Conservatism maintains a list of appropriate infoboxes. [2]
When using an infobox an image should be added where possible. Unless you created the image yourself, this can get a little tricky when you take into account licenses, copyright, etc. To determine of your image is free or copyrighted see this guide " Public domain". Note that organization logos are usually not free but can be used with a non-free use rationale. Images of living people in most cases must be free.
Navigation templates located in the top-right corner of articles (sometimes called a "sidebar" or "part of a series" template) should be treated with special attention, because they are so prominently displayed to readers. The collection of articles in a sidebar template should be fairly tightly related. Every article that transcludes a given navbox should normally also be included as a link in the navbox so that the navigation is bidirectional. WikiProject Conservatism requires that only articles with Top importance be included in the conservatism topic main sidebar.
Body
Politicians
Areas which are of particular interest with articles about politicians are policy positions and electoral history. The standard order of sections for politicians is:
- Early life
- Political career
- Election of election_year
- Term as office_title
- Later life: also labeled Personal life
- Political positions
- Legacy
- Awards
- Works published
Organizations
The standard order of sections for organizations related to conservatism is:
- History
- Objectives
- Leadership: also labeled Organizational structure
- Membership
- Policies and positions
- Programs
- Accomplishments
- Sources of funding: can also be placed under Organizational structure
Political parties
Areas which are of particular interest with articles about political parties are policy positions and electoral history. The standard order of sections for political parties is:
- History
- Positions: also labeled Policies
- Party factions
- Electoral performance
Political campaigns
The standard order of sections for political campaigns is:
- Background
- Early stages: also labeled Campaign developments
- Announcement
- Primary campaign
- General election campaign
- Withdrawal
- Results
- Aftermath
Bottom section
Several elements may appear in the bottom section or bottom matter. The "See also" section contains a bulleted list of internal links including the portal {{
Portal|conservatism}}.
Succession boxes are a great tool to view officeholders and WikiProject Conservatism recommends their use especially for politicians. Succession boxes are template-created wiki-tables. The base template is Template:S-start. For complete instructions on adding boxes see Succession Box Guidelines.
If the articles in the sidebar are not tightly related, a footer template is used. The main footer for the conservatism topic is Template:Conservatism footer.
The central goal of the category system is to provide navigational links to Wikipedia pages in a hierarchy of categories which readers, knowing essential—defining—characteristics of a topic, can browse and quickly find sets of pages on topics that are defined by those characteristics. The Conservatism category structure is constructed so as to conveniently capture almost every article related to conservatism.
Positions sections
A positions or policies section describes the subjects views on a variety of issues. A positions section is commonly found in political articles. It is important that a subject's positions be described neutrally and sourced to reliable sources. Politicians and organizations often release position statements. While these are considered to be self-published sources, they can be used with certain requirements. [3] In the development of the section prose is preferred over an embedded list. This is the recommended structure for elements within a positions section:
- Domestic positions
- Fiscal
- Other
- Foreign positions
Criticism and controversy sections
Under Wikipedia's neutral point of view (NPOV) policy, articles must present differing viewpoints on the subject matter fairly, proportionately, and without bias. Articles should include both positive and negative viewpoints from reliable sources, without giving undue weight to particular viewpoints, either negative or positive. The policy of verifiability requires attributing all viewpoints to reliable, published sources, with appropriate citations. Wikipedia's policy against original research, in addition to the NPOV requirement, forbids editors from favoring their own point of view. Wikipedia's policy on biographies of living persons requires exercising special care in presenting negative viewpoints about living persons. In most cases separate sections devoted to criticism, controversies, or the like should be avoided in an article because these sections call undue attention to negative viewpoints. Articles should present positive and negative viewpoints from reliable sources fairly, proportionately, and without bias.
The internal structure of an article may require additional attention, to protect neutrality, and to avoid problems like POV forking and undue weight. Although specific article structures are not, as a rule, prohibited, care must be taken to ensure that the overall presentation is broadly neutral. Segregation of text or other content into different regions or subsections, based solely on the apparent POV of the content itself, may result in an unencyclopedic structure, such as a back-and-forth dialogue between proponents and opponents. It may also create an apparent hierarchy of fact where details in the main passage appear "true" and "undisputed", whereas other, segregated material is deemed "controversial", and therefore more likely to be false. Try to achieve a more neutral text by folding debates into the narrative, rather than isolating them into sections that ignore or fight against each other.
To identify criticism or controversy sections which need to be integrated into the article body use Template:Criticism section.
Technical
Election results boxes
Election results boxes are created using the Template:Election box family of templates. For example this sequence
{{Election box begin |title=[[United Kingdom general election, 1979|General Election 1979]]}}
{{Election box candidate
|party = Conservative
|candidate = Margaret Thatcher
|votes = 13,697,923
|percentage = 43.9
|change = 8.1
}}
{{Election box candidate
|party = Labour
|candidate = James Callaghan
|votes = 11,532,218
|percentage = 36.9
|change = 2.3
}}
{{Election box end}}
Will create this:
| Party | Candidate | Votes | % | ±% | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Conservative | Margaret Thatcher | 13,697,923 | 43.9 | 8.1 | |
| Labour | James Callaghan | 11,532,218 | 36.9 | 2.3 | |
Election maps
Election maps are created using the vector graphics editor Inkscape. This is the overall process:
- Download a blank SVG version of the desired region from Commons. The root category is commons:category:Election_maps.
- Open the map using Inkscape
- Add election results
- Save. Then upload to Commons:.
See also
Notes
- ^ Manual of Style (layout) § Names and orders for section headings: "The order of sections in the body of a Wikipedia article may be recommended by a relevant WikiProject, or may not exist at all for some topics. Some WikiProjects have developed their own topical style advice pages which include section naming and ordering recommendations."
- ^ Categories, lists, and navigation templates § Navigation templates: "Whether to include navboxes, and which to include, is often suggested by WikiProjects..."
- ^ Verifiability § Self-published or questionable sources as sources on themselves: Self-published and questionable sources may be used as sources of information about themselves, usually in articles about themselves or their activities