Bright lines and fuzzy borders

Intro

Whether individuals are welcome to do paid work in a building is a matter of policy. Policy is not a simple matter: it has been evolving for several thousand years. The two major forms of law (enforceable policy) in Western nation-states are common law and civil law. In common law, cases are judged primarily on precedent - how a similar case was treated before. It allows for subjective interpretations, changing norms and exceptional circumstances. In civil law, cases are judged primarily from statues. This is far more deterministic and rigid. Many systems hybridise between the two. These ways of dealing with policy can be more humanly described as 'bright-lines' and 'fuzzy-borders'.

Bright-lines

For example, the case of residents of a Wupphaus earning money personally. A simple bright-line approach might be:

Individuals personally earning money at the Wupphaus will not be tolerated.

But this is not so clear. When is someone 'earning money at the Wupphaus'? What if they only stay for one night? What does 'not ... tolerated' look like? Accomodating the complexities of life into the bright-line approach leads to increasingly complex policy, such as:

1. Residents of the Wupphaus must state their income at a quarterly general meeting.
1.1. A resident is someone who has used the Wupphaus as their primary residence (>75 % of nights) for 3 consecutive months.
2. Residents must pay any income exceeding 10,000 directly into the Wupphaus e.V.
3. Residents refusing to comply with points 1. and 2. within three months will be asked to leave.
3.1 If a resident refuses to leave, national authorities may be called to service.

OK, it's clearer, but there's still a wealth of complexity that simply cannot be codified. Bright-lines work well with well-known and stable circumstances.

Fuzzy-borders

Same scenario, money-earning in the Wupphaus, policy using the fuzzy-border approach could be:

Be here to contribute to everyone, not just your bank account

for example, or even just the story of yunity so far. This is far less predictable because it is vague. The process for deliberation and decision is all the more important in this case. Fuzzy-borders work well with unknown and changing circumstances