[bestbits] RE: IGF plus

[JFC Morfin]

(At 14:38 25/08/2013, Andrew Puddephatt wrote:
>Hi everyone
>
>I'm collecting material and ideas for the debate on internet 
>governance that is coming up.  One of the option that has surfaced 
>at previous meetings is that of an IGF plus – an IGF with powers to 
>make Recommendations or Declarations – soft law in effect.  I'm 
>interested in whether anyone has written a paper on this or has an 
>material relevant to the idea and how it would work in a 
>multi-stakeholder environment (I'm assuming that, however 
>constructed, any recommendations/declarations would require 
>consensus among participants).  Anything out there I'm not aware of?

Please have look at the contribution I just sent this morning.
Actually, everyone has powers to make recommendations and 
declarations. The point is to know if they are pertinent, coherent, 
accepted, trusted, precautionary and usefull. Consensus does not make 
an error true.

>One model I'm interested in (in terms of mandate) is the World 
>Health Organisation (WHO) which acts as a coordinating body for 
>global health policy which is then implemented by national and 
>international health agencies. The WHO primarily makes 
>recommendations and has no power to directly intervene in national 
>health systems but is widely respected.  It monitors threats to 
>public health and has its own projects and programmes.  But the WHO 
>is governmental and frequently gets caught up in international 
>geo-politics although there are now calls for it to become 
>multi-stakeholder and involve philanthropic foundations, businesses, 
>public/private partnerships and civil society.

The Internet had a WHO equivalent: the IAB.

The IAB has relinquished that mission through RFC 6852 in chosing to 
foster better markets adequation rather than to strive for a common 
"better internet". This is a loyal move, but it leaves the digital 
world without compass and with two different north poles (market 
[OpenStand: http://open-stand.org] or people [WSIS: a people centered 
information society]).

The situation leans toward more or less interoperable forks within 
the multi-stakeholder network. They might be technically led by ITU, 
OpenStand and grassroots emergences. For basic interoperability 
reasons, it is likely that the forks be in strata, layers or plans 
rather than protocols. Proposing to enforce IPSec (an long existing 
built-in possibility) is a kind of such fork. Another one was the 
root file, another one is DNSSEC. This vertical balkanization is only 
introducing more NAT like complications.

Hopefully it will not create too-much problem to the Open-PRISM FLOSS project.
jfc