[bestbits] Draft submission on 2014 IGF

[Tracy F. Hackshaw @ Google]

+1 to refocus at least one part of the IGF on issues of concern to
developing countries

/t

On Sun, Jan 19, 2014 at 10:40 AM, Fouad Bajwa <fouadbajwa at gmail.com> wrote:

> Dear Jeremy,
>
> Thanks for putting together this important submission and taking out
> the time needed from your busy schedule on behalf of the group.
>
> Where I am very comfortable of most of the text, I believe there is an
> evident need to voice developing country concerns. The notion of human
> rights varies in different developing contexts and regions and
> especially in the muslim world where there is a continuous challenge
> to understand the pluralism online and its contextual impacts on
> society, socio-religion, socio-culture, economic and political
> environments.
>
> What has been happening in the Middle East and the Youtube and
> frequent bans of other content in Pakistan are examples of the
> pluralism and the struggle to come to terms with. As such issues have
> been covered during BestBits and other workshops occasionally at IGF
> and regional IGFs, it would be prudent to help bring the IGF focus
> back to the developing context and reducing the talk-shop and
> defensive tactics of the develop world lobby groups, interest groups
> and private sector. Developing world participation is still a
> challenge and there really haven't been visible efforts beyond remote
> participation and some fellowship programs to improve the situation.
> Somehow I am able to draw such a view from the present text.
>
> On Sun, Jan 19, 2014 at 2:07 PM, Jeremy Malcolm <jeremy at ciroap.org> wrote:
> > I am offering this as the basis for a proposed joint submission to the
> IGF
> > on proposals for the 2014 meeting.  I will put it up on a pad for
> > amendments, but I'm mailing it around for initial comments first.
> >
> > Whilst the preamble is new, for the recommendations I've tried to draw on
> > and summarise the main points of previous papers or submissions taking
> stock
> > of the IGF including "Notes on an IGF Plus" that was contributed to our
> Bali
> > meeting.  It goes beyond fiddling with the themes, to suggest some of the
> > more significant changes that the IGF will need to become more useful.
>  We
> > do not need to achieve a full consensus on this, but as many of you as
> > possible should be able to support it.
> >
> > The IGF has always struck a balance between continuity and incremental
> > improvement in its themes and format.  But overall, over nine years since
> > the first meeting in 2006, whilst the names of themes and sessions
> formats
> > have changed, there has been relatively little change in their substance.
> > The IGF is still a discontinuous, face-to-face, four day meeting,
> composed
> > of overlapping main sessions and workshops.  For those who do not admit
> of
> > gaps in current Internet governance arrangements or do not desire for
> those
> > gaps to be filled by a natively multi-stakeholder institution, the IGF's
> > resistance to change is neither a problem, nor a coincidence.
> >
> > But in the wake of revelations of major systemic flaws in present
> > arrangements that have enabled systematic human rights abuses of Internet
> > users, the recognition of governance gaps has become more widespread and
> > inspired more urgency for significant reform.  This has fuelled
> discussions
> > outside of the IGF, such as the CSTD Working Group on Enhanced
> Cooperation
> > and the Brazil Multi-stakeholder Meeting on the Future of Internet
> > Governance, yet in those discussions, the possibility of a reformed IGF
> > taking a more significant role in future Internet governance arrangements
> > continues to come up.
> >
> > The IGF is challenged to respond to this call for more substantial
> reform to
> > its processes, and there is no better time to do this than in preparation
> > for its ninth meeting in Istanbul in September 2014, following on from
> the
> > Brazil meeting, and heading towards its second review by the UN General
> > Assembly.  With an entirely new IGF MAG also in place for 2014, the
> > opportunity exists for a fresh start, in which a number of unchallenged
> > assumptions about how the IGF should operate can be critically examined
> > again, and new ideas tried out.  Yet none of the suggestions for reform
> > given here are actually new.  Several of them have been made every year
> > since the IGF's formation in 2006, or earlier, but have never been
> adopted
> > before now.  The following are actionable immediately, without any need
> for
> > change to the IGF's mandate:
> >
> > Themes
> >
> > The main theme of the 2014 IGF should be to discuss, and if appropriate
> > affirm and commit to implementing the recommendations from the Brazil
> > Multi-stakeholder Meeting on the Future of Internet Governance.
> > In general, the IGF should address policy questions that are
> controversial
> > and/or time-critical, and that currently lack any other multi-stakeholder
> > mechanism for global coordination.  It should avoid themes that are too
> > broadly framed like "openness" and "security" that are not grounded in
> any
> > specific real-life context.
> > Themes and outputs should be explicitly shared between the global IGF and
> > the regional and national IGFs, so that they can feed into and reinforce
> > each other, without this detracting from the ability of the latter to
> also
> > deal with more specialised regional and national issues.
> >
> >
> > Session formats
> >
> > To make the IGF more practically useful, designated workshops should be
> > dedicated to developing non-binding opinions, recommending policy
> principles
> > that stakeholders can follow to address pressing current issues.
>  Workshop
> > report formats should be standardised so that these recommendations, how
> > they were arrived at, and any areas of divergence, can be easily
> > communicated.
> > There should be a reduction in the number of parallel workshops, to a
> more
> > manageable number of purposeful workshops with more focus on the main
> themes
> > selected for the meeting.
> > Main sessions can and should also be used to develop outputs on the most
> > important issues of cross-cutting importance.  A number of Best Bits
> > participants described one simple way in which such a session could
> work, in
> > a statement issued on 20 May 2013 that is available at
> > http://bestbits.net/igf-opinions/.  Speed dialogues were another method
> > considered by the MAG in the past, but never tried.
> > To that end, main sessions and workshops should be separated.  When these
> > overlap each other, it becomes impossible for all interested IGF
> > participants to join together to address important shared issues in an
> > outcome-oriented, deliberative plenary session.
> >
> >
> > Online deliberation
> >
> > The IGF should address its incapacity to sustain a work programme between
> > meetings.  A step towards this can be made very easily by offering IGF
> > participants, when registering for the meeting or following it remotely,
> the
> > opportunity to join an online collaborative platform for interacting with
> > other participants throughout the year on issues of shared concern.
> > Such a reform would add much value for online participants, essentially
> > providing an online and intersessional equivalent of the annual IGF
> meeting.
> > Currently, online participants have little incentive to invest in the
> IGF,
> > because they are not granted the same status as those who attend the
> > face-to-face meetings.
> > Data from the IGF (including calendar data, publicly-available
> participant
> > data, meeting transcripts, and working documents) should all be made
> > available in open data formats.
> > It is vital that the development of the IGF's online platform be
> adequately
> > resourced.  Even so, it would only incur a small fraction of the expense
> of
> > the annual meeting, and need not be elaborate: for example, in other
> > Internet governance institutions, participants are encouraged to join
> > mailing lists, whereas most IGF participants are never offered that
> > opportunity.  Whilst individual stakeholders have attempted to provide
> > community-based platforms for the IGF in the past, these have not been
> > supported or publicised by the Secretariat.
> >
> >
> > Management structure
> >
> > The Secretariat and the MAG conceived as a programme committee, are not
> > sufficient high level structures for the IGF.  In particular the
> > reappointment of a Special Advisor as Chair is important to provide a
> > charismatic public face for the IGF as well as a formal interface with
> the
> > United Nations system and other high-level stakeholder representatives.
>  A
> > Special Advisor will also make it easier to attract funding for the
> event,
> > and to provide leadership as the IGF undergoes necessary changes.
> > The Tunis Agenda called for the IGF to have a bureau, which was never
> formed
> > for fear that this connoted an intergovernmental governing structure.
> > Whilst the name is not important, there is no warrant for the MAG to be
> > limited to the role of a programme committee, as it is now.  It is also
> > important for a multi-stakeholder committee of the IGF to perform
> > substantive tasks such as:
> >
> > liaising with external bodies including national and regional IGFs
> (pursuant
> > to IGF mandate 72(c));
> > defining orphan issues and other areas in need of research or
> deliberation;
> > preparing or approving balanced briefing materials on issues to be
> addressed
> > by the IGF;
> > assessing the extent of consensus reached on proposed IGF outputs
> presented
> > at a main session;
> > reviewing and ensure the accountability of all fora involved in Internet
> > governance (pursuant to IGF mandate 72(i));
> > establishing ad hoc working groups; and
> > preparing an annual report.
> >
> > For some of these tasks, it may be that smaller working groups of the
> larger
> > MAG could perform them more efficiently than the full MAG.  For others,
> the
> > more organisational tasks should be offloaded to the Secretariat,
> allowing
> > the MAG to perform more of a steering and oversight role.
> > The MAG representatives should be appointed directly by the stakeholder
> > groups without the intermediation of the UN Secretary General.  Whilst
> the
> > involvement of the UN was important to bootstrap the fledgling IGF, it
> can
> > now stand on its own two feet and appoint its own representatives,
> through
> > processes devolved to the stakeholder groups themselves.
> >
> >
> > Funding
> >
> > A more flexible mechanism for funding the IGF is needed.  The terms and
> > conditions on which UN DESA accepts contributions to the IGF are
> > unfavourable to donors, they lack transparency, and also limit the
> ability
> > of participants to contribute small sums.  There is no reason why a pool
> of
> > funding separate to that administered by UN DESA could not be set up and
> > administered transparently by a multi-stakeholder working group under the
> > MAG's oversight.
> > Host country agreements should be made public, and host countries should
> be
> > permitted to open tenders for non-security-essential services publicly,
> > rather than being required to take these from UN DESA.
> >
> >
> > The deadline is 10 February 2014.  Please send your initial comments and
> > then I'll put this up on a pad.
> >
> > --
> >
> > Dr Jeremy Malcolm
> > Senior Policy Officer
> > Consumers International | the global campaigning voice for consumers
> > Office for Asia-Pacific and the Middle East
> > Lot 5-1 Wisma WIM, 7 Jalan Abang Haji Openg, TTDI, 60000 Kuala Lumpur,
> > Malaysia
> > Tel: +60 3 7726 1599
> >
> > WCRD 2014 - Fix Our Phone Rights! |
> http://consint.info/fix-our-phone-rights
> >
> > @Consumers_Int | www.consumersinternational.org |
> > www.facebook.com/consumersinternational
> >
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>
> --
> Regards.
> --------------------------
> Fouad Bajwa
> ICT4D and Internet Governance Advisor
> My Blog: Internet's Governance: http://internetsgovernance.blogspot.com/
> Follow my Tweets: http://twitter.com/fouadbajwa
>
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