Are you allowed to change citation style?

Question

I had had this happen to me several times. I had chosen one citation style that I generally did apply in all my old answers since some date, which goes like ^{Book <(edition)> <(year)> p.##}. Year and edition are optional, if needed to differentiate books of the same name or if the year is needed for a 'first mentioned'.

Now, I had to do partial rollbacks due to people messing up my citation style, for example here, and some two times last year. In all these cases I did a (partial) rollback to my style.

I believe it is very rude to fudge with citation styles that should be clear enough, as it usually doesn't provide any of the valid reasons for editing: either fixing spelling or adding extra structure to make it more readable.

for later readers

I did swap to a different style - superscript numeral + key in the bottom since this was posed, but the general question is untouched.

Answer 1

"Allowed to change..." is evidently "yes," since that user has edit privileges. But I'll answer what I think is the implied question "was this a good edit" or maybe "was I right to roll back" or even "what should I do ~about~ this user's edits?"

Was this a good edit?

I don't think so. The differences in citation presentation are minimal, and we've no universally-preferred citation style anyway. (See also Stance on using D&D Beyond for references?, Please consider using book references that will be understood internationally, and Is there a style guide for posts?)

Was I right to roll back the edit?

You were fine to roll back: edits should be substantial and actually improve posts. I do think it's good that in addition to rolling back you raised this meta. Not only do you get your confirmation but future learning editors have this example worked for their edification.

What should I do about edits I don't like?

I just recently learned that you can @-mention an editor in comments on a post--even if they've not commented. So there's a nice low-impact route to start with. Many of our most-active editors are also active chatizens, so they're often pingable in [chat], too.

If someone is often making edits you object to or seems not receptive to feedback feel free to flag for mod-attention and possible intervention. In that case a handful of examples and a brief description will be helpful.

Answer 2

In general citation style is a matter of personal preference that ought to be respected by editors. We don't edit to supplant personal preferences of the original author because otherwise we'd see infinite edit warring.

However, legibility can trump personal preferences, and I think that's relevant here.

Every citation style I know either cites the source naturally in the text—“According to Clarke (2004)”—or has a simple number either bracketed (1) or superscripted² or both^[3]. Now, we're not beholden to APA, Harvard, or any other citation style, but the point is none of them are using long strings of superscripted text without brackets.

Now, this is personal, but taking an example from one of my own posts, I think this is more legible with brackets around the citations:

Later, the Gods would take notice of this experiment. They visited the Mortal World and stabilised it, separating it into seas and land masses, and sprinkling it with life, making it what we know now.^{[MOP 70]} The Primordials eventually discovered this, found their work of art desecrated with Astral life and stability, and wished to return it to the chaotic thing it was before.^{[MOP 70]} Thus the Dawn War was fought between the Gods and Primordials over the fate of the World.^{[MOP 70]} The Gods won, and the Primordials who survived the conflict were imprisoned or scattered far throughout the Elemental Chaos.^{[TPB 65]}

... than without:

Later, the Gods would take notice of this experiment. They visited the Mortal World and stabilised it, separating it into seas and land masses, and sprinkling it with life, making it what we know now.^{MOP 70} The Primordials eventually discovered this, found their work of art desecrated with Astral life and stability, and wished to return it to the chaotic thing it was before.^{MOP 70} Thus the Dawn War was fought between the Gods and Primordials over the fate of the World.^{MOP 70} The Gods won, and the Primordials who survived the conflict were imprisoned or scattered far throughout the Elemental Chaos.^{TPB 65}

Simply because the brackets provide a clear visual break from surrounding text that helps me skip over them if I want to just focus on the text and not its citatinos.

I'm not about to say your citation style is wrong. It was not necessarily correct to replace it, although I can see where the editor was coming from in doing so. However, please consider that using brackets or parentheses around your citations is, I think, going to markedly improve the legibility of your posts.