Table 2.

Ten principles which could underpin a governance framework for global species lists (Garnett et al.)³² and the ways in which WCVP already embodies them.

Garnett et al. principle	WCVP implementation
(i) the species list must be based on science and free from nontaxonomic considerations and interference.	A draft checklist based on scientific publications (peer-reviewed papers and books), is enhanced by expert review.
(ii) governance of the species list must aim for community support and use.	Work was often instigated by the scientific community working on a particular family. WCVP lists continue to be used by the scientific community in their outputs (see Table 1) and they continue to provide feedback to WCVP (see Background & Summary).
(iii) all decisions about list composition must be transparent.	All decisions on taxonomic status and geographic distribution made since 2003 are referenced. These are visible in World Checklist of Selected Plant Families and Plants of the World Online and will be available in WCVP once geographic data has been completed, maximising transparency.
(iv) the governance of validated lists of species is separate from the governance of the names of taxa	Names are sourced from the nomenclator the International Plant Names Index, thereby also providing stable LSID’s. A nomenclatural expert is part of the team. Nomenclatural considerations are separate from the taxonomic decisions taken on the same dataset.
(v) governance of lists of accepted species must not constrain academic freedom.	WCVP attempts a consensus view, but emphasizes that is just a snapshot in time. It changes continuously to incorporate new findings. It provides references to alternative taxonomies as well as all the names required to implement such an alternative taxonomy. Regular updates are made available to users who are free to use the content in forms that diverge from the taxonomic framework provided.
(vi) the set of criteria considered sufficient to recognise species boundaries may appropriately vary among different taxonomic groups but should be consistent when possible.	Consistency of application of species concepts within families is achieved by having a family-level focus for review, which involves expert input. Maintaining a central editing team collating the dataset as a whole maximises overall consistency.
(vii) a global list must balance conflicting needs for currency and stability by having archived versions.	Dated, archived versions of the data can be downloaded from the website.
(viii) contributors need appropriate recognition.	WCVP recognises contributors at multiple levels: individual corrections by experts are referenced as personal communications; a dedicated part of the website gives a full list of contributors; all contributors to a completed family checklists are referenced in the record of each name in that family
(ix) list content should be traceable.	In WCVP, both the protologue and the references used to make taxonomic decisions are cited via the link to Plants of the World online.
(x) a global listing process needs both to encompass global diversity and to accommodate local knowledge of that diversity.	The review process in WCVP is family-based in order to provide a globally consistent overview. However, many of the experts contributing to a family checklist choose to review subsets of the data most relevant to their expertise e.g. individual genera or taxa confined to particular regions. This approach maximises the opportunity to incorporate local knowledge. We also contribute data to regional databases who give feedback on their particular regions. As each species record includes detailed distribution information, it is easy to use regional filters to extract data for review and use by local experts.