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<font face="Times New Roman, Times, serif">Hi All<br>
<br>
Enclosed is a spoken statement that IT for Change
made in the stock taking session at the IGF meeting. I met the Under
Secretary General as
part of a civil society (CS) delegation the previous day and made the
same comments to
him. He seemed very interested in the concrete suggestions on improving
the
IGF and encouraged me to mention the same during the formal stock
taking
session, which I did. <br>
<br>
In speaking with knowledgeable people at the IGF I am confirmed in my
belief that non-continuation of the IGF is not a serious
option. It is only being used by some to raise the stakes on seeking
some real changes to the IGF.<br>
<br>
In so far as the IGC has consistently asked for strong reforms in the
IGF, it is an urgent imperative that we propose some specific changes
which can both further our advocacy goals and possibly be a middle
ground between those who prefer abolition of the IGF and those who want
more or less the exact status quo. CS actors are perhaps the
best-placed ones to propose completely new possibilities and try and
work with important actors to fine-tune a solution</font><font
face="Times New Roman, Times, serif"> mutually acceptable to both
sides (status quoists and abolitionists), and which also</font><font
face="Times New Roman, Times, serif"> serves
our purpose best.<br>
<br>
At WSIS, in my opinion, much of the involved CS almost exclusively
'reacted' to the danger of UN and inter-governmental takeover of the
Internet and took mostly defensive postures. Post WSIS too it has
mostly not become alive to the other issue that is at least as
important - the fact that Internet as a global phenomenon needs global
policies to protect and further global public interest, and there is no
system, neither any efforts towards evolution of one, for this purpose.
Unless we address this crucial issue we would not win friends among
developing countries, including the political civil society of these
countries. <br>
<br>
After some very muted response to the 'enhanced cooperation' debate -
which is the WSIS designated space for such public policy development -
CS now once again seems content to see the whole IGF review issue from
a
status quo-ist lens - 'somehow block an ITU take over' (we have, in
very
early parts of our statement, spoken strongly against making any such
move). In
such a reactive stance, any openness towards seeking genuine structural
reform
in the IGF for the purpose of achieving the real purpose of the IGF
seems largely absent.<br>
<br>
Instead of just seeing red in everything China and Saudi Arabia says it
is better to address issues on which they are right - that there is
little meaning of public policy related deliberations when there are
hardly any real Internet public policy making institutional mechanism
at the global level. (No, OECD, EU, CoE and such do not constitute
global systems, though often try to be so in their impact but not
participation) We am absolutely convinced that they are very right on
this count - and the foot-dragging of the developed countries and, I
dare say, most of civil society involved in IG arena, is wrong and
unjustified. We seem to be very one-sided in choosing to villainize
countries. <br>
<br>
We also think that MAG has to take on more substantial role/ power, of
distilling from the work of committed issue-based working groups as
well proceedings of the wider IGF, and come out with non-binging
advices and recommendations, or at least meaningful compilation of
plausible views and options on important IG issues. The WGIG model
,which for some unknown reasons (the hegemony of dominant discourse, of
course) has become untouchable, gives us good leads of what can be
achieved if a mutlistakeholder group is given a definite task, where
some kind of outcomes just have to be produced in a time bound manner.
Why should that model not be used for important IG issues within the
IGF framework? <br>
<br>
In fact it is ironical that many CS actors at the same time hold that
purely inter-governmental systems should not make global Internet
policy while they are also against expanding the role and power of MAG
(maybe with a different name) when this is the only really
multi-stakeholder body in this space. If a purely inter-gov system
should not make policies who should ? I am not saying IGF should make
policies, but can they not even do preparatory work? And if a
mutltistakeholder system cannot even do purposive preparatory work, how
can it ever make policies? No one seems to be ready to even propose a
model. In
such circumstances, it may justifiably be concluded that many of these
actors really do not have much faith in global policy processes at all.
They are of the self-regulation, market supremacy kind... That is a
problem.<br>
<br>
Anyway, the burden of the argument here is that a model of structural
changes to the IGF is what is most required urgently. Much of the
negotiations in the next few months will take place around that. Does
the IGC want to hammer out a concrete proposal on this, and its members
try to advocate it with other actors? If we plan to do it, we need to
do it in the next month or so. I propose that the co-coordinators take
up this responsibility in the coming weeks. <br>
<br>
Parminder <br>
<br>
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