[bestbits] Re: [I-coordination] [governance] Inter-stakeholder issues in a multi-stakeholder environment

[parminder]

On Tuesday 26 November 2013 03:11 AM, Milton L Mueller wrote:
>
> George
>
> Normally I would be very much in favor of shifting attention to issues 
> and substantive proposals. But in the present context, that 
> constitutes a diversion from the real problem at hand.
>
> The preparations for the Brazil conference have pushed 
> representational issues to the fore. Specifically, we have an entity 
> called 1net that has been given the authority to appoint half of the 
> members of the steering committees for the conference,
>

I dont think such an authority was ever give to 1net.... Though there 
seems to have been a strong attempt to claim it - so strong that many 
people thought they already had it . parminder

> and which has also promised that a fixed number of slots on these 
> steering committees will be given to specific stakeholder groups.
>
> Because these steering committees will control the agenda of the 
> conference, and hence will be in de facto control of our discussion of 
> substantive issues at the Sao Paulo conference, it behooves even those 
> of us exclusively interested in substan
>




> tive issues to pay attention to the composition of those committees.
>
> In particular, the coordinating committee of 1net itself needs to be 
> settled. Get that done, and yes, we can start to focus on substantive 
> issues.
>
> --MM
>
> *From:*governance-request at lists.igcaucus.org 
> [mailto:governance-request at lists.igcaucus.org] *On Behalf Of *George 
> Sadowsky
> *Sent:* Monday, November 25, 2013 12:38 PM
> *To:* Deirdre Williams
> *Cc:* governance at lists.igcaucus.org; gurstein michael; Peter Ian; 
> bestbits; Akplogan Adiel A.; Swinehart Theresa; 
> internetpolicy at elists.isoc.org; i-coordination at nro.net; Salanieta T. 
> Tamanikaiwaimaro
> *Subject:* Re: [governance] Inter-stakeholder issues in a 
> multi-stakeholder environment
>
> Deirdre, and all,
>
> Thank you, Deirdre.  I take your point that we should consider 
> shifting the focus to issue-based discussions and away from 
> stakeholder membership-based discussions.  That is a very good way to 
> phrase it.   (Note that accepting such a shift does not imply that it 
> should replace all other stakeholder membership activities.)
>
> Where should we have these issue-based discussions?  There have been a 
> number of good and provocative responses to what I wrote below, and I 
> really don't know where to post them and my reactions to them.  How 
> can we get these conversations started in a productive and inclusive 
> manner?
>
> We now have four relevant lists that I know of, and here may well be more:
>
> -  the IGC list,
>
> -  the BestBits list,
>
> -  the ISOC policy list, and
>
> -  the new 1Net coordination list.
>
> Many of us subscribe to some or all of these list, and therefore see 
> the same posting more than once.  I subscribe to all four of the above.
>
> With some trepidation, I'm going to post this message on all of the 
> above lists, with the hope that we can converge on an acceptable 
> solution.  [I have trimmed some early postings below that led to this 
> point in the discussion.]  I myself would favor the 1net list, simply 
> because it is new and meant to be all-inclusive specifically for this 
> purpose, whereas other lists may be (I think) somewhat restrictive and 
> more focused and used for other purposes also.
>
> If you respond to this, please consider trimming the response 
> significantly, since the content below will have been posted to all of 
> the four lists.
>
> IMO the question to be answered is: on which list, or using which 
> vehicle, can we collect broad involvement in issue-based threads that 
> have to do with aspects of Internet governance?  If we can converge on 
> an answer, then we'll eliminate some redundancy and we'll have a more 
> inclusive and more positive discussion of issues.  If the redundancy 
> is felt to be useful, then we can keep it; it's agreement on the focal 
> point that's important here.
>
> Comments?  Suggestions? Criticisms?
>
> George
>
> ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
>
>  On Nov 25, 2013, at 11:53 AM, Deirdre Williams wrote:
>
>
>
> I began this message 12 days ago in response to a thread started by 
> Michael Gurstein
>
>
>   Let's Get Real Folks--Re: [governance] Re: [bestbits] DISCLOSURE
>   REQUEST Re: Funding Available for Strengthening Civil Society
>
> I gave up. Now I am encouraged to try again by this new thread
>
>
>   Re: [governance] Inter-stakeholder issues in a multi-stakeholder
>   environment
>
> begun by George Sadowsky.
>
> Is there any way to shift the focus from the people to the issues?
>
> In the final analysis everyone belongs to civil society. That point 
> was made by a representative of a local telecommunications company at 
> a recent workshop on IXPs held in Saint Lucia. As he said, his 
> children also query the speed of the Internet at home when they have 
> to do their homework. The only people excluded from civil society are 
> incarcerated prisoners, and that also is a statement that can be 
> questioned. If I understand him correctly George Sadowsky is making 
> the same point. Civil society is us - all of us.
>
> Instead of trying to disentangle the stakeholders from one another 
> could we  try to reach agreement on the aspects of the issues? If no 
> one is wearing any particular hat then it should be possible to obtain 
> a clearer picture of the issues that need to be discussed, and the 
> multiple aspects of those issues.
>
> Surely at least a part of the "multistakeholder" configuration of WSIS 
> was to provide a means of identifying and harnessing the different 
> types of expertise available, to tackle the different aspects of the 
> challenges created by the Internet and its proliferation. In hindsight 
> the intention must have been partially collaboration and cooperation. 
> Sadly the focus shifted to a third "c" - competition - so that instead 
> of team-powered problem solving we ended up with separation and power 
> struggles. And now on top of that comes betrayal and the death of 
> trust. And the "little people" the "grassroots" become even further 
> excluded from discussion of the interests that affect them, washed out 
> in a wave of personalities and accusations.
>
> We do not need to let this breakdown continue. We CAN work together, 
> we've done it before. Trust can be rebuilt. It is a hard slow process, 
> but each of us retains threads of trust which we consider still to be 
> viable. Otherwise we would not be communicating at all. Weave these 
> threads together and we can build something stronger than what existed 
> before, because we will be depending on one another instead of on 
> abstract external factors. And together we will be able to 
> disaggregate the issues into their component aspects and negotiate a 
> point of balance among the differing needs of government, technicians, 
> business and society.
>
> Deirdre
>
> On 24 November 2013 12:59, George Sadowsky <george.sadowsky at gmail.com 
> <mailto:george.sadowsky at gmail.com>> wrote:
>
> All,
>
> _Please note that the opinions that follow are my own personal 
> opinions and are independent of any of the organizations with which I 
> am affiliated._
>
> <<snip>>
>
>
>
>     So with that understanding, I'd like to throw out some thoughts to
>     see if any of them resonate with any of you.
>
>     _First_, I believe that the introduction of the idea of
>     multi-stakeholder approaches has had a significant negative effect
>     between the Internet technical community and the community that
>     has coalesced to represent classical civil society concerns.  As I
>     recall in the 1990s, these communities were considerably
>     intermingled; the promise of the Internet encouraged us not only
>     to help it evolve in beneficial ways but also to explore how to
>     exploit it for social and economic benefits.
>
>     The solidification of different stakeholder groups resulting from
>     the WSIS process, caused informal differences to formalize.
>      Issues of representation, power, time at the microphone,
>     visibility on (sometimes competing) lists and victory in arguments
>     on those lists grew, while informal discussion gradually declined.
>      Polarization of opinion grew as willingness to respect others'
>     opinions and to agree civilly to disagree suffered.
>
>     _Second_, I believe that the specific role of the Internet
>     technical community as a stakeholder group for the purposes of
>     participating in the MAG and in the IGF is not properly
>     understood.  At this point in its evolution, the Internet is a
>     very complex system at most levels.  In order to understand fully
>     the implications of policies that have to do with Internet
>     administration, operation and governance, one has have a good
>     technical understand of what the effect of those policies will be
>     at a detailed level.  The primary role of representatives of the
>     Internet technical community, in a MAG and IGF setting, is to
>     study and understand such effects and to inform those deliberating
>     about them.  That function may well extend toward consideration of
>     broader thematic areas and suggestions of what needs to be
>     discussed for continued Internet health, either short or long
>     term, or both.
>
>     In the grand scheme of things, this is a moderately narrow focus,
>     but it is extremely important.
>
>     _Third_, I believe that one result of formalized
>     multi-stakeholderism appears to have been to separate groups of
>     people rather than separating groups of ideas.  A couple of
>     examples illustrate the point.  To the extent that the Internet
>     technical community does its work in guiding the MAG well to
>     enhance Internet evolution, I believe that involved
>     representatives of civil society benefit and should encourage
>     their participation.  Conversely, representatives of the Internet
>     technical community are people, and many are very likely to have
>     beliefs that are quite consistent with the positions espoused by
>     those same civil society representatives. The multi-stakeholder
>     approach, however, seems to create a silo effect that minimizes or
>     even denies the overlap of commonality of interest regarding
>     issues by separating people into different silos.  So instead of
>     recognizing positive overlap of beliefs, the approach encourages a
>     focus on inter-stakeholder group separation.
>
>     _Fourth_, I'd like to propose a reconceptualization of the term
>     "civil society."  In the multi-stakeholder instantiation that is
>     now employed by the UN/MAG/IGF axis , it refers to groups if
>     individuals, some representing organizations of various sizes that
>     agree to various extents regarding the importance of individual
>     rights of various kinds.  These groups represent civil society
>     goals and are therefore grouped as "civil society" to populate
>     that stakeholder group.  And although the goals of that group are
>     generally quite positive, their actions are often based upon
>     pushing back against other stakeholder groups, most notably
>     government but also others.  Perhaps that reflects the reality of
>     the tension between groups, but that tension is not moderated, as
>     it might sometimes be, by people bridging groups instead of being
>     siloed.
>
>     An alternate way to define civil society is to start with all
>     people in the world and remove government involvement, the private
>     sector involvement, and perhaps other large institutional
>     influences.  To borrow a phrase from Apple, what is left is "the
>     rest of us," and it contains fractions, generally large fractions
>     of most of us as individuals.
>
>     Most individuals have interests in more than one sector or
>     stakeholder group.  We have interactions with government and may
>     work for it.  Alternatively we may work for a private or other
>     public sector organization.  Almost all of us are increasingly
>     users of the internet.  Using this approach, perhaps an aggregate
>     of 5 billion of us constitute "civil society," as opposed to the
>     people who are now labeled as being in the civil society
>     stakeholder group.   If we are all civil society in large parts of
>     our lives, then we all have some claim to represent our views as
>     we live.  Thus, a representative of Internet technology on the MAG
>     is likely to, and has a right to opine on issues in the larger
>     space, just as self-defined representatives of civil society
>     positions have a right to do.  This illustrates again how the
>     various stakeholder groups, or silos, are really quite
>     intertwined, making the siloed and often competitive relationships
>     between them at a formal level quite unrepresentative of the
>     underlying reality,
>
>     _I conclude_ that the multi-stakeholder approach that is accepted
>     to be an approach to bring us together, has not insignificant
>     negative externalities that serve to keep us apart.  We need to
>     assess the multi-stakeholder approach with that in mind  If it is
>     retained as an organizing principle, we need to recognize and
>     understand those negative effects so that we can minimize them and
>     can exploit the positive aspects of that approach.
>
>     This is a much longer note than I ordinarily write, but it has
>     helped me to understand some of the roots of the often
>     unnecessarily antagonistic relationship between proponents of
>     issues important to civil society and technical community experts
>     guiding the evolution of the Internet.  Thank you for taking the
>     time to read it.  I realize that what I have written, and any
>     discussion of it, is considerably more nuanced than what I have
>     presented above.  However, I have tried to present the core of
>     some ideas that I think may be useful.  The more nuanced
>     discussion can and will come later.
>
>     Your comments are welcome.
>
>     George
>
> <<trimmed>>
>
>
>
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