---
name: document-kinds
version: "1"
date: 2026-07-29
category: vocabulary
title: Document-kind tokens for assumption entries
language: en
type: full-text
license: CC0-1.0
notes: "Shared vocabulary per IFP-22 Section 3. Tokens for the kind field this registry adds to entry frontmatter — a registry extension offered as feedback toward IFP-22. Adding a token is publishing a new version of this entry; published versions are write-once."
---

# Document-kind tokens for assumption entries

Not everything a principal cites is a code of conduct. The instruments communities actually live by come in recurring shapes, each answering a different question — and the strongest institutions distribute their commitments across several documents rather than one. This vocabulary names those shapes. Entries in this registry carry a token from this list in their `kind` frontmatter field; declarations and displays may use it to say *what sort of thing* is being cited.

| Token | Main question the document answers |
| ----- | ---------------------------------- |
| `creed` | What do we believe? (creeds, declarations, manifestos, social contracts) |
| `principles` | What considerations guide us? (principle sets, guideline frameworks) |
| `oath` | What do I personally promise? (oaths, pledges, vows — first-person, performative) |
| `code-of-ethics` | What duties arise from this role? (professional codes) |
| `code-of-conduct` | What behavior is required or prohibited here? |
| `charter` | How is authority structured, exercised, and changed? (charters, constitutions, bylaws) |
| `enforcement-policy` | What happens when commitments are violated? (reporting, remedies, appeals) |
| `teaching` | What does this tradition's authority teach? (magisterial and doctrinal documents, encyclicals, restatement-style treatises) |

## Conventions

- Kind is orthogonal to category: an oath may be professional (`ethics`) or religious (`religious`); a creed may be a political philosophy or a project's social contract.
- The token names the document's *form*, not its weight. IFP-21's commitment axis carries the citer's stance; the kind explains what shape of instrument that stance is toward — declaring `bound-by` an oath, a charter, or an enforcement policy are meaningfully different acts, and receivers may render them differently.
- Jurisdiction facts and vocabularies (this entry included) typically carry no kind.
- To add a token: open a pull request adding a new version of this entry. The new version supersedes this one; citations to this version remain valid.