<html>
<head>
<meta content="text/html; charset=utf-8" http-equiv="Content-Type">
</head>
<body bgcolor="#FFFFFF" text="#000000">
<font face="Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif">Parminder, just two
comments below. </font><br>
<br>
<div class="moz-cite-prefix">On 02/07/16 04:57, parminder wrote:<br>
</div>
<blockquote cite="mid:56B71505.6040409@itforchange.net" type="cite">
<meta content="text/html; charset=utf-8" http-equiv="Content-Type">
<font face="Verdana">my question to you all is, what is your
response to my proposal (forget others) to develop a Internet
related public policy development mechanism inside the UN... And
if I do not get it, keep asking this question. </font></blockquote>
<br>
<font face="Verdana">You could, of course, continue repeating the
question, if you are not happy with the answers you get, but let's
look at the only relevant fact: <br>
<br>
The WSIS+10 <a
href="http://workspace.unpan.org/sites/Internet/Documents/UNPAN95735.pdf">outcome
document</a> was passed at the UN General Assembly, and it
addressed your concerns. <br>
<br>
The document was drafted with the active participation of the
governments of India, Brazil, China, Russia, USA, as well as G-77,
the EU, and many others. Clearly majority of the world population!
<br>
It was accepted with no objections whatsoever. <br>
You were there, you spoke at the end of the WSIS High Level
Meeting, and you made your point there, too. I am not sure why you
continue to ask the question over and over again, as if you expect
a different response on this mailing list, than the one you got
via the WSIS+10 review process. A simple reference to the accepted
outcome document is the natural response.<br>
<br>
But since we, at ISOC-Bulgaria, have had similar issues like yours
years ago, allow me to share our experience, and our conclusions,
which slightly differ from yours.<br>
<br>
In our chapter we had to fight with the government for the "right
of democratic participation", as you say it, in the
Internet-related public policy discussions - this was about 17
years ago. We were a very young ISOC chapter, if I remember
correctly, we were the 6th chapter historically. <br>
It was 1999. <br>
We started a fight against the proposed by the government
Internet-policy with a court case at the Supreme Administrative
Court (see details <a href="http://isoc.bg/kpd/index-eng.html">here</a>,
in English). So, even in a developing country, with less
democratic traditions than India (don't forget - we had our
Constitution accepted just 8 years earlier, and there has not been
a case against the government until then; we couldn't find a
lawyer to represent us, so I had to take personally this task, as
I my degree is in law), such a thing is possible - to successfully
change the Internet-related policy of a country. <br>
<br>
Listening and watching the contributions by the member-states at
the UN, I can share something you have also observed, as you were
at the UN in December: governments around the world have engaged
to different degree with the broader Internet community,
businesses, academic institutions, end-users, experts, etc., to
better understand the way the Internet works. I assure you - 17
years ago was much more difficult: we had to explain to the
government what the Internet is, and did that by comparing it
to... the fax;-) </font><br>
<br>
<blockquote cite="mid:56B71505.6040409@itforchange.net" type="cite"><font
face="Verdana">This is about the denial of the right of self
determination and right of democratic participation of the huge
majority of the world's population (non OECD countries). <br>
</font></blockquote>
<br>
<font face="Verdana">Clearly there's disagreement between your
assessment of the WSIS+10 outcome document, and the way we at
ISOC-Bulgaria (Bulgaria is not a member of the OECD, by the way),
and many other chapters around the world, see the way we
participate in these debates. <br>
From national and regional point of view, we have found the
national and regional IGFs to be an excellent way to approach the
Internet issues, and solve some, if not all. <br>
At the UN agencies, we have seen increased cooperation between
ISOC and some of them, and between ISOC chapters on the national
turf, too. For example, ISOC Bulgaria executed an UNDP project for
e-municipality back in 2003, and this was one of the many projects
we have done successfully. And it gave us yet one more avenue
towards the government, and the way they define their policies. <br>
Fast forward to 2010, the Bulgarian government participated at ITU
PleniPot 2010, and had a contribution, which ISOC Bulgaria
supported. Nobody has denied participation, and if a country has
done that, perhaps you could reach to the local chapter of the
Internet Society (if <a href="http://www.isoc.org/apps/maps/">there</a>
is such in the respected country), and see how they could engage
(with) their governments in a substantive way. But certainly, you
don't mean that India is such a country, as they were (as I
witnessed) very active in the WSIS+10 discussions, and were
actually among the leaders, as noted by the New York Times (I've
sent you the URL couple of weeks ago, in another discussion on
this list). <br>
</font><br>
<pre class="moz-signature" cols="72">--
Best,
Veni Markovski
Internet Society - Bulgaria
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="http://www.isoc.bg">http://www.isoc.bg</a>
</pre>
</body>
</html>