There are two types of general topics lists:Outlines andIndexes. Outlines are arranged hierarchically, while the topics in indexes are presented alphabetically.
The vast majority of lists on Wikipedia present the items of a class of things – those are item lists. The rest are general topics lists which are different than item lists because they present the subtopics of a givensubject – their scope is an entire subject.
For example, forsharks, the item list isList of sharks and it presents shark species. A general topics list on sharks is theOutline of sharks, and its scope is everything about sharks.