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<div class="moz-cite-prefix">On Wednesday 03 April 2013 10:02 PM,
Milton L Mueller wrote:<br>
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<pre wrap="">"Coalition for Privacy and Free Trade " is exactly the kind of issue
based network that are getting formed. (Bertrand, please note.) And we
know what they are upto. Soon there will be others, that is the trend,
like perhaps one led by Shell on green economy, and Nike on labour
friendliness.... No, this is not acceptable, We are better off with
evolving old fashioned democratic systems from within, with a deepening
democracy focus.... We have seen movements, especially in Europe, of a
new kind of democratic politics bypassing the existing political party
captures - that is where I would put my hopes instead of these dangerous
neolib trends. I appeal to the civil society to recognise the dangers
that we are headed towards in all this mushy talk of "equality of all
stakeholders in decision making" (read, corporate led 'governance'
systems), and issue based networks as the prime next gen governance
paradigm...
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Let me see if I understand your point.</pre>
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Milton, your understanding of my point on 'issue based networks', or
at any rate your statement of it, has a fundamental flaw, which I
discuss below.<br>
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<pre wrap=""> This issue network is bad and should not be allowed because you don't agree with their policy agenda? </pre>
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I would say that this is a bit rhetorical, but in any case, here you
are positioning 'issue networks' as basically advocacy networks,
right. No, advocacy oriented issue networks are not the real problem
- they are indeed the network age form of policy advocacy. (Although
the nature of relationship of civil society actors with corporate
and state actors will need to continually be critically scrutinised
and analysed even in the network age). <br>
<br>
Let me bring you back to what kind of 'issue networks' we have been
discussing here, and I quote Bertrand's last email; "<span
style="font-family:"Verdana","sans-serif";color:#1F497D"></span><span
style="font-family:"Verdana","sans-serif";color:#333333">The
only viable approach is rather to build on the concept of
distributed governance frameworks, and build issue-based
governance networks, associating in a transparent and accountable
manner the "relevant stakeholders".<br>
<br>
To which you responded "</span> <span
style="font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";color:#1F497D">Yes,
networks focused on specific issues</span>" (Milton)<br>
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The above makes it amply clear that we have *not* been discussing
advocacy network but discussing 'issue networks <i><b>as</b></i>
governance mechanisms'. Importantly Bertrand made these comments in
relation to the Tunis Agenda imperative for global governance
related institutional developments, and indeed closed his email by
speaking of 'enhancec cooperations' in plural. Obviously his 'issue
networks' idea has aclose connection with this term of of 'enhanced
cooperations'. <br>
<br>
My critique of 'issue networks' is in terms of their employment as
new forms of governance systems in a manner that tends to supplant
the more institutional democratic governance systems. You may or may
not agree with such a critique, but I cant see why you have to
divert the debate by accusing me of being against advocacy networks
per se, and freedom of political expression....<br>
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<pre wrap="">In the name of democracy you are saying that private sector actors (or presumably anyone else you don't agree with) should be prevented from organizing transnational issue networks to influence policy,</pre>
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They (businesses) shouldnt/ cannot be prevented as such, but civil
society will take an independent view of how trans national capital
shapes and distorts the global polity, and include that particular
issue in its struggles. Most trans-national civil society has
routinely taken such a stance, but if some IG kinds want to stand
completely apart from this general trend, that is entirely their
choice. <br>
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<pre wrap=""> and/or that corporate stakeholders should not be considered equal stakeholders? </pre>
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I dont consider private sector 'equal to' public interest actors in
the polity, but they indeed have a right to lobby, make political
demands etc. Do you think that they are 'equal stakeholder' as
governments and civil society, and if so, what does such equality
mean. Should they vote at times of substantial policy making, and do
you advocate similar stances within the US national polity? <br>
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If you're rabidly anti-corporate that all sounds fine and good, I suppose,</pre>
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Again, a needless and diversionary accusation.... Corporates are a
prime and indispensible form for organising our productive efforts
today. Being against inappropriate policy influence of corporates is
not being against corporates. All political systems, including the
US, include measures for insulating governance from such
inappropriate corporate influences.<br>
<br>
parminder <br>
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<pre wrap="">but if you believe in democracy, free expression and free association it does not sound so good. I would like to know how you can limit one group's political participation without limiting everyone's political participation. Organizations, ranging from labor unions to business corps to public interest organizations that are inevitably incorporated, as well as individuals, are going to lobby and jostle for benefit from the political process - regardless of whether we are talking about the national level or the transnational level.
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