[bestbits] [governance] CSCG and the speaker selection process for WSIS+10

Lee W McKnight lmcknigh at syr.edu
Fri Nov 6 11:09:42 EST 2015


+1

________________________________
From: governance-request at lists.igcaucus.org <governance-request at lists.igcaucus.org> on behalf of Mueller, Milton L <milton at gatech.edu>
Sent: Friday, November 6, 2015 10:09 AM
To: governance at lists.igcaucus.org; Ian Peter; bestbits at lists.bestbits.net; forum at justnetcoalition.org
Subject: RE: [governance] CSCG and the speaker selection process for WSIS+10

Nice job, support the content of the letter
--MM

From: governance-request at lists.igcaucus.org [mailto:governance-request at lists.igcaucus.org] On Behalf Of Ian Peter
Sent: Friday, November 6, 2015 4:45 AM
To: governance at lists.igcaucus.org; bestbits at lists.bestbits.net; forum at justnetcoalition.org
Subject: [governance] CSCG and the speaker selection process for WSIS+10

Dear Civil Society members,  (with apologies for cross posting)
Below is a letter just sent by CSCG to the organisers of the WSIS speaker selection process, a matter  which has been under discussion on various lists. (and as a result much discussion within CSCG)
This is also to let you know that CSCG has also decided to endorse Ian Peter and Lea Kaspar to represent its interests on the selection committee, and they will be forwarding details in due course. We acknowledge and respect the decision of JNC not to participate in the process as outlined by DESA, and hence in the selection of candidates to be endorsed by CSCG for their proposed  selection committee.
We imagine that some discussions will take place in forthcoming days as regards the issues raised in our letter. We will keep you informed of any major developments.

LETTER FOLLOWS

Dear Co-facilitators of WSIS + 10 process,

We are writing to you on behalf of the Internet Governance Civil Society
Coordination Group (CSCG), a “coalition of coalitions” working actively on
internet governance issues. Our member coalitions (Association for
Progressive Communications, Best Bits Coalition, Internet Governance Caucus,
Just Net Coalition,  and Non Commercial Stakeholders Group of ICANN) extends
to some thousands of individual members and hundreds of civil society
organisations working actively on internet governance issues. Many have been
involved with the WSIS process since its inception.

Firstly, we wish to commend you for your efforts to include voices of
non-governmental actors in the WSIS + 10 process.

However, we would like to raise a serious concern about one part of the
process, whereby selection of civil society speakers for various events
appears to be being done by a selection committee which includes
representatives of other non-governmental stakeholder groups.

You will understand that it is of utmost importance for maintaining the
independence of civil society that its representatives are chosen by civil
society alone, and having other stakeholder representatives as part of a
selection committee for civil society representation, or as final arbiters
of our representation, is problematic for us.

Indeed, in the evolution of the multistakeholder model of internet
governance, this was made quite clear in the Netmundial Outcomes
Declaration. I quote:

"Stakeholder representatives appointed to multistakeholder Internet
governance processes should be selected through open, democratic, and
transparent processes. Different stakeholder groups should self - manage
their processes based on inclusive, publicly known, well defined and
accountable mechanisms."

In accordance with this principle, CSCG has established its own internal
selection processes, which can be found at
http://www.internetgov-cs.org/procedures. These are transparent processes, accepted and adopted by a wide range of civil society organisations, and used effectively in the past for selection of civil society representatives for e.g. IGF’s Multistakeholder Advisory Group, Speakers for IGF Opening and Closing ceremonies, The Netmundial meeting, and various other UN and international events where CS speakers and representatives have been required. These procedures take into account gender and geographic balance as a central matter of our determinations.

Since some deadlines are quite close with respect to the currently announced
process, we request your urgent intervention in this regard. Our proposal is
that each stakeholder group choose its own speaker representatives and put
these forward.

We do realise that increasing - both as widening and as deepening - civil
society engagement with the UN is a challenging and complex process, and we
salute your pioneering efforts in this regard. The Internet Governance Civil
Society Co-ordination Group (CSCG) remains available to assist you in this
matter.


Sincerely

Ian Peter
Independent Chair, Internet Governance Civil Society Coordination Group

Endorsed by CSCG Members:

Chat Garcia Ramilo, Association for Progressive Communications
Jeremy Malcolm, Best Bits Coalition
Deirdre Williams and Analia Apsis, Internet Governance Caucus,
Norbert Bollow, Just Net Coalition
Robin Gross, Non Commercial Stakeholders Group of ICANN
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.igcaucus.org/pipermail/bestbits/attachments/20151106/6c92b645/attachment.htm>


More information about the Bestbits mailing list