[governance] Caucus meeting notes -- Friday Nov 18 Tunis

[Adam Peake (ajp@glocom.ac.jp)]

Again, many thanks to Jeremy for taking minutes of the meeting.  Key
proposal made by Avri about the creation of an Internet Governance
Forum Working Group.

Adam



CS IG Caucus Summit Phase II: Meeting 2

Avri- started working on charter for a working group on IGF, as a
focused working group. It starts out saying:

I agree:

-There should be an IGF forum
- CS should play an important role

Votes etc,

Jeremy- If we do votes, we need to resolve representation, people who
come from groups as opposed to individuals should they get more votes?
Also, we should add consist participation as a element that won't
allow people to contribute nothing and then block the occasional vote
they don't agree with.

Adam- there is nothing to suggest that people can prove they have the
endorsement of 10 000 group members, we need to keep that in mind.
Also, we need to be sure we are not duplicating here.

Milton- need to clearly define what CS is and restrict to that definition

Bertrand- Fully agree and focus on what should be the forum. It avoids
the bootstrapping problem, because the Caucus can create the group.
Principles of participating create a clear definition for bringing in
new participants.

G- The risk that we will take is how can we actually capture civil
society voices. We should have a process by which all other CS caucus
have a representative here because IG issues are so broad. Also,
participation can be passive, we need to be careful in balancing
between exclusivity and exclusivity. We need to figure out ways to
reach out to other civil society movements that are not in the WSIS
processes, especially outside of the OECD and in developing
countries..

Victoria- Scope- process of the forum of structure of the forum. Are
we a  neutral clearing house of civil society perspective or are we a
group of like  minded individuals. I think membership should be a
group a of individuals. We should only exclude people if they have a
clear conflict of interest. How does the voting work? Full consensus
or rough consensus? Leadership? Do we want a facilitator or do we want
strong leadership (ie someone with the ability to speak on the group's
behalf)

Izumi-  Whether we choose a very open rough method or something more
formal, we should really clarify that with a clear charter. We may
need working groups inside this, I agree that it is best to have other
caucuses sending stuff in, but I don't think that we should mandate
it. We need not only leadership, but other things including logistics
and secretariat.

Avri- clarification- the formation of and IGF working group. I am not
sure if this a subgroup of the caucus, or if this is something
different. How is this different from the caucus? It is completely
open, it has no membership constraint but….we can't focus and get
particular pieces of work done and there is no mechanism for adopting,
there is has to be leadership to say we have reached rough consensus
and an process of appealing that decision. I think that restriction
would hurt the Caucus but is necessary going forward, in other words,
I don't want to see the caucus ruined because of these needs. In terms
of being active, we can't hold emails against people, but, if we have
a voting structure, then we can say "3 no votes, you are deactivated,
you can be re-activated but your first vote back doesn't count".
Neutrality, I think that we should keep a diversity of opinion but we
have to stay on topic. Membership, I think someone saying I am civil
society is enough. Model of consensus: I was thinking of 2/3 majority.
Leadership, I would like to see laid back but can speak on our behalf
etc., but a process by which they can be replaced if necessary.

Jeanette- I think this would kill the civil society list. There are
two competing perspectives. We need to form a group of experts to
impact the forum, vs open. I would like to avoid a hybrid that does
none of the two. I think this proposal will do that.

Adam- I think that the idea is very good, but I think we should
transition the caucus into something new. I would like to see as
little voting.

Ronda- I think this caucus has the power to do something really
special to change everything that didn't happen in WSIS, its not a
question of voting, but you figure out what is critical. The
governance caucus was primarily used when there was  a document
needed. The gift of civil society is to bring the online discussion
into the forum. Online discussion is special and newsgroups and
mailboxes would provide so much. The principals of this group should
be what is learned from online. If you are cut off from participating.

Jay- I do not feel attracted to something that considers itself a body
of experts. I don't what these different perspectives say, maybe this
suggests we don't have an identity. I think this all creates new
problems rather than building on what was there.

Milton- Based on what I have heard, I am withdrawing my objections and
I am supporting this idea. If it destroys the list, then that isn't a
bad thing because we should be trying to refocus WSIS energies into
the Forum. Instead of a chair etc, we should have leadership by
regional representation.  The other model that I see is the expert
group, but the expert group would have to go out independently and
come back to the group to the caucus.

Bertrand- The issue of IG is expanding, what I support about Avri's
proposal is that it is establishes ways to focus on the new
environment.

Jay- I have a hard sense that the IG caucus wants to become something
difference.

Avri- there are so many thing that the IG caucus still needs to
discuss that are not in the mandate of this new group, SPAM etc, is
out of the scope of the working group that will focus on the
modalities of the IGF. I want to see the caucus grow, but I also feel
the need to have a space where we have very precise rules.

Izumi- We should ask the current leaders should stay on an interim
basis until we have a new structure.

This will go the list for approval

Jeanette and Adam- will agree to stay on only on an interim basis,
preferably for as short a period as necessary if approved requested by
list to do so,.


END

_______________________________________________
governance mailing list
governance at lists.cpsr.org
https://ssl.cpsr.org/mailman/listinfo/governance