[governance] [WSIS CS-Plenary] Post mortem and next steps on IG

[William Drake]

Hi Jeanette,

> -----Original Message-----
> From: governance-bounces at lists.cpsr.org
> [mailto:governance-bounces at lists.cpsr.org]On Behalf Of Jeanette Hofmann

> >>For example: why don't we formally put together a "civil society
> >>delegation", composed by a few people (3-5) entrusted by this Plenary,
> >>and send a letter to Karklins saying that we would like such delegation
> >>to be formally included in the open ended negotiations? After all, the
>
> If they are open ended, every government can attend. Why would we want
> to limit ourselves to a few people?

This was v's suggestion, just to keep the threads straight.

> > You're welcome to try, but it won't work.  Karklins and all others are
> > undoubtedly fully aware that we are deeply unhappy with the
> approach taken,
> > and they have taken it anyway.  I would think that decision is final.
>
> It might still be worth to express our opinion on this issue.

Go for it

> > I remain skeptical that we could come quickly to a shared
> position in the
> > caucus, much less CS more generally, on the oversight question due to
> > varying views on the proper roles of governments.
>
> I agree with Victorio. As far as our diverging positions are concerned,
> we just do it like the governments. We become vague or refer to general
> principles were we disagree. I think the one aspect we probably all
> subscribe to in the context of political oversight is the need of
> accountability. Who or whatever will be in charge of names and numbers
> should be embedded in in some form of check and balances. What we
> disagree about is how tight this structure should be and whether or not
> governments should play a role in it. Would you agree?
>

I don't think when there's specific proposals on the table---evolution
toward a Council vs continuing reform within the extant ICANN
structure---being vague really cuts it. There can be no illusions that
what we say will in any way be decisive on this matter, but if we support
or at least come closer to what one bloc of governments is saying vs
another bloc, the former might cite this as support for its view.  So if I
were a government person, I wouldn't be too moved if CS came back and said
whatever you do has to be accountable, that's like saying we are for good
things rather than bad things.  I'd think they'd want to know where do we
stand, which of the two main options under discussion do we favor, or if
we have an alternative, what is it.  And at this level, there are clearly
differences of view within the caucus, with some people being more
favorable to or critical of ICANN and correspondingly less or more
inclined to see greater government involvement.  If you can quickly
engineer a dialogue that sorts this out and reaches strong consensus
great, go for it.  But it hasn't happened yet, and I just wouldn't want to
have another situation where we think something's agreed and go off and
make a statement and then someone comes back and says hey I strongly
dissent, etc.  Best to make sure everyone's on board.

> The Internet Governance caucus had a short meeting with the EU Troika to
> discuss the EU proposal. Towards the end we discussed two options of
> moving forward from the present unilateral regime. Control by one
> government could be replaced by a many-governments model or by a private
> non-governments model. When we asked Martin Boyle from the UK about the
> reasons why the EU chose the first, he asked back: Do you REALLY believe
> it would be possible to run the Internet without any government
> involvement? (this is non verbatim, I don't recall his exact words) I
> left this meeting with the impression that the EU is much more serious
> about their proposal than I thought. This was more than a mere strategic
> intervention as some of us suggested.

Interesting to know.  I'd heard from others that the UK was probably not
supporting this but just couldn't push the point as chair, and it has also
bee suggested that it was sort of a rushed and maybe not entirely worked
through, settled decision.  Would be important to clarify just how firmly
united on the now semi-detailed proposal the EU is, which will have a big
impact on the bargaining going forward.  I'd expect the US will at least
try to pick off some friends and loosen things up, if not undermine it. 
If you hear anything more in Berlin or elsewhere do let us know...

> At least in Germany, there is nobody above the members of the delegation
> who would instruct them. Internet Governance used to be a rather
> irrelevant policy field that didn't get much attention outside the
> ministerial units directly involved.
>  From what I heard the EU has at present no intention to change its
> proposal. This could well change of course :-)

:-)  Right, this will not change, except it could.  Antinomic as ever.

Best,

Bill

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