[governance] informal consultation with EU

[William Drake]

Hi v,

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

> While we might want to ask for clarifications on the EU proposal (which is
> what the LikeMindedGroup is doing now, before negotiating), I doubt that
> that would be terribly useful, since I would guess that the only thing
> that the EU can say is the text that was agreed yesterday among the member
> states, and nothing more. I think it would rather be better to use the
> time to make some of our points clear and ask the EU to adopt/support them
> if possible.

I disagree.  The EU has put forward a proposal that is extremely vague and
is yet asking people to support it as a bargaining solution to a heatedly
divided issue. When I've pressed EC and national govt people on this
they've tried to present it as a clever tactic: don't scare the US with
specifics, just get agreement on principles by Tunis and then negotiate
later to get the new oversight body they want to replace GAC.  (I think
you're right that it's probably more a reflection of the fact that they've
not yet reached any consensus internally, most notably between the UK and
key continentals.  That's their problem.  WSIS has been going on for three
years; if they haven't gotten it together by now, how do they expect to
bargain with the US etc?)

It might be that when the like minded countries wake up to the fact that
pushing their council is pointless in terms of outcomes (as opposed to
scoring political points, mobilizing discontent that can be leveraged
elsewhere, etc) they'll swing behind the EU formulation, who knows. 
Nevertheless, the US has been clear that it will not sign onto general
principles without having any indication where they could lead toward. 
Having said that, I'd be surprised if they then backtracked and accepted
anything like the EU language.  I doubt business would either.

Nor should we.  How can we back something they refuse to explain,
particularly when their end game seems contrary to the caucus statement
agreed yesterday, and they've been specifically unclear on the role of CS
in their formulation.  So I don't see what's wrong with asking them where
they are trying to go and how they see the role of CS in it.  If you get
the usual blah blah in response, fine, that's clarification enough.

> The first and foremost one, in my opinion, is that we would like to see
> some clear text in the Forum paragraph that ensures us that the forum
> works like the open WGIG consultations, and not like the WSIS PrepCom. Or,
> at least (as a fallback), that CS and PS would be considered as two
> "delegations" that can participate to drafting groups and plenaries on a
> peer basis with the delegation of one country. If this is too detailed, we
> might fall back onto some more generic, but still clear, wording.

We're on record since the first SubCom meeting that we want peer level
interaction, but sure reiterate it.

> In general, the more I read it, the more I like the Canadian proposal (tnx
> Robert for forwarding it). I'm not sure about asking the EU to drop their
> proposed Forum paragraph and support the Canadian one instead, but we
> might consider doing this.

Canadian is definitely clearer and better.

> Also, if we want, we might make a more general request that the EU
> formally supports our protest and asks for us to be allowed to participate
> in drafting groups, or at least discusses it; and to try to keep us in the
> loop, or at least regularly ask for reactions. I know many EU delegations
> would support this request, but as I understand until now, as the week
> evolved, it never came so high on the list of their priorities for any of
> them (included mine) to actually raise it in the Coordination meeting.

A little late for this, no?

> About oversight, I really doubt that CS/PS can have a real impact on this.
> This will be hardly fought among governments and I doubt they will have
> the willingness and patience to take into account yet more views. In any
> case, we definitely want to restate our views.

Agreed.

Best,

Bill


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