[bestbits] Civil society transparency

[parminder]

Ian, and reps of civil society networks on the Civil Society
Coordination Group (CSCG) ,

I propose that CSCG sets up a civil society transparency project,
somewhat on the lines of the EU Transparency Register, pl see
http://ec.europa.eu/transparencyregister/public/homePage.do .

It should in fact go beyond the EU initiative which is a general one for
all lobbying groups, whereas we here are concerned with civil society
which should set the highest example of transparency and accountability.
The 'register' can have self filled information on objectives of an
organisation, principles followed by it, if any, its funding, partners,
and so on....

This is at present just my proposal, but I hope one or more civil
society networks in the IG space can own it and push it... CSCG would be
well placed to run this project as a neutral space so that there is no
accusation of bias that any such initiative is being employed for
partisan purposes. In any case, a simple initiative for openness,
transparency and accountability can hardly be partisan.

The register can have optional higher level features whereby a group/
org can declare its means of public accountability, whether and how its
internal governance is done, how matters can be taken by with their
oversight bodies, like board etc, and whether they have any means
whereby they respond to public question on their work, etc.

For such genuine cases where such transparency can harm an organisations
work, or security, such organisations, and only such organisations, can
be exempted employing a clear process and set of criteria.

Remember, both the UN report on improvements to the IGF and the
NetMundial Statement highlight the issue of transparency. I also
recently read in these lists how we should make bridges with the OpenGov
movement which is almost wholly about this one thing. Time we begin
practising what we preach.

I look forward to hear responses to this proposal..

parminder
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.igcaucus.org/pipermail/bestbits/attachments/20150524/667acc2c/attachment.htm>