Coding discourse moves in Antarctic Treaty meeting reports
Why I'm asking for your support
The Antarctic Treaty Consultative Meeting decides everything by consensus, so there are no votes to count. Whatever we can still learn about how agreement was actually reached — or quietly blocked — sits in the wording of the final reports, which tend to compress real disagreement into polite diplomatic prose.
I have an automated pipeline that labels what each report paragraph is doing: invoking a precedent, registering dissent, deferring a decision to next year, and so on. On its own that proves nothing. To find out whether those labels mean anything, I need people to code a sample of the same paragraphs independently, without seeing the model's answers. That benchmark is what your batch provides.
You have been assigned one of fifteen batches, at most 17 paragraphs. In the pilot this took about an hour. Progress is saved in your browser, so you can stop and come back later — just keep the exact URL shown in your address bar.
What you're coding, and what you're not
For each paragraph, decide what its wording explicitly does in the meeting: does it invoke a precedent, register dissent, defer a decision, smooth over a rejection? That is a discourse move. A paragraph is not a move just because it sounds diplomatic or mentions a proposal — the wording has to perform one of the functions described in the codebook.
You are not judging motives, sincerity, or whether a position was sensible. Don't guess what a delegation privately wanted, and don't reward positions you happen to agree with. If no function in the codebook fits, the answer is none — and none is a common, perfectly good answer in this material.
A worked example
Here is one paragraph with all four coding decisions filled in. The colours mark what each part of the sentence contributes.
“Several Parties recalled Decision 3 (2019), which requires proposals to meet the agreed environmental criteria, and argued that the proposal must be revised before it could proceed.”
recalled Decision 3 (2019), which requires proposals to meet the agreed environmental criteria, and argued that the proposal must be revised before it could proceedThis exact wording supports the move; no motive has been inferred.
Keep the fields separate
One habit worth forming: settle the primary move first — the paragraph's single main function. Only add a secondary move when there is a clearly distinct second function with its own supporting wording; when in doubt, leave it blank.
The codebook
You don't need to memorise any of this — the same reference sits in the sidebar while you code. Do read the boundary rules once, though; they settle most of the ambiguous cases.
Primary-move definitions
Boundary rules — please read these once
- Precedent has to be deployed to constrain what can happen now. Merely citing an earlier decision is not a move.
- Deadlock requires an explicit statement that agreement cannot be reached.
- Deferral postpones a decision; routine future activity is not enough.
- Agenda-setting is the one that trips people up most. It must place a concrete matter into the collective ATS work process for consideration, decision, coordination, or action. A formal WP proposal or a concrete collective plan can qualify. Merely presenting an IP, describing national or organisational experience, announcing a future document, reporting one actor's own plans, retrospectively describing how discussion was organised, or recording that a paper was “taken as presented” does not.
- Quick contrast: “Parties should establish or review X” can be agenda-setting. “SCAR intends to do X” or “a paper will be presented” is normally none unless an ATS body is also asked to consider, coordinate, decide, or act. If a concrete collective proposal is separately justified through cooperation, stewardship, or safety, use agenda-setting as primary and normative-appeal as secondary.
- Define-power-flow changes who holds authority, membership, or decision criteria. Disagreement about a policy's geographic scope, or a recommendation to keep discussing it, does not qualify.
- Face-saving preserves relations around a rejection or non-decision; routine courtesy does not qualify.
- Soft consensus requires both earlier dissent and a later partial agreement or supported outcome. “Many Parties highlighted challenges” is just discussion.
- Nearly everything in these reports is called important. Importance language alone is not a move — ask what collective action, authority, norm, or constraint the wording actually performs.
- Effect check: every non-none move must attempt a non-none effect. If no effect in the codebook fits, reconsider whether the paragraph performs a coded move at all.
Resource invoked — what gives the move force?
Intended effect — what does the move try to change?
Salience — how pointed is the move?
Try three before you start
These cover the distinctions coders found hardest in the pilot. Pick an answer, then compare it with mine.
1 · Choose the primary move
“Several Parties recalled Decision 1 and considered that the proposal must follow the criteria established there.”
Primary: invoke-precedent · Resource: precedent · Effect: constrain-options
Evidence: “must follow the criteria established there”
The earlier decision is deployed to constrain the present proposal; it is not merely mentioned.
2 · Choose the primary move
“The representative introduced the information paper and described the monitoring results from the previous season.”
Primary: none · Resource: none · Effect: none
This reports a presentation. Without a call to act, an appeal, a reservation, or another specified function, it is not a strategic move.
3 · Does an Information Paper set the agenda?
“State X presented an Information Paper describing its national implementation and encouraged Parties to cooperate and share their experiences.”
Primary: normative-appeal · Resource: norm · Effect: legitimate
Evidence: “encouraged Parties to cooperate and share their experiences”
The general appeal to cooperation is normative. The IP presentation alone is not agenda-setting. It would become agenda-setting if it placed a concrete new plan, instrument, procedure, or formal work proposal before the Meeting.
Ground rules
Please code blind and on your own: use only the paragraph, its agenda-item context, and the codebook on this page. Don't consult model output, another coder, or outside sources. Download an interim backup whenever you like; when you finish, the page downloads a JSON file — email that file back to me, or use whichever channel we agreed on. Nothing is uploaded automatically.