[governance] FYI:HR Caucus Membership - Was Re: IGC Participation

[Meryem Marzouki]

Hi Avri and all,

You're right, HR Caucus membership is composed by organizations, or  
groups (i.e. loose groups, coalitions, etc.). But the situation was  
special, Re: Tunisian governerment issues: as most of you may  
remember, the HR Caucus have experienced many problems, with its  
public events systematically disrupted and the tentative meetings of  
caucus members during prepcoms almost prevented.
To face this situation, right after what happened during Hammamet  
Prepcom in Tunisia (June 2004), the caucus decided that "only  
organizations, not individuals, may join, and that the caucus  
membership implies the agreement to the goal of protecting and  
promoting human rights standards in the WSIS process and in all  
countries of the world, not least the host country of the Summit.",  
as mentioned on its website at http://www.iris.sgdg.org/actions/smsi/ 
hr-wsis/#3. This may change now, it has to be discussed by the members.
In any case, the mailing list archives are public (http:// 
www.iris.sgdg.org/actions/smsi/hr-wsis/list/), and the number of  
representatives from member organizations are not limited.

That said, Bill's suggestion wasn't referring to this feature of HR  
caucus membership, but rather to the fact that its membership is  
indeed made public (http://www.iris.sgdg.org/actions/smsi/hr-wsis/ 
#6). However, what is normal and well accepted for organizations may  
not be that obvious when the membership is mainly composed by  
individuals. I think they should be asked before having their name  
publicly listed as members of the IGC.

Alternatively, since this process may become heavy when there are  
many members, it could be added to the IGC charter that the members  
names will be made public. But I don't think it's acceptable to  
"force" people this way (or to prevent them from becoming members  
when they don't want this publicity). This is closely related to the  
IGC very specificity: it's easier to reach consensus in the HR  
caucus, as anyone can imagine, since members start from well  
established background and a common vision. If I simply remember the  
discussions we had on the IGC list about, e.g. the right to  
development, this would be harder to reach in this caucus. Not to  
mention discussions on more specifically Internet governance related  
issues, and more generally speaking what we use to describe as "IGC  
diversity", i.e. almost as many different IG visions as the size of  
IGC membership: when you're publicly listed as a member of a  
coalition, external people generally understand that you support, in  
some way or another, the coalition's positions. Providing a list of  
reservations in any IGC document would be a nightmare, and in any  
case longer than the document itself:)

In any case, I'm afraid Jeanette's proposal ("to keep the list as it  
is right now and restrict voting rights to those who regard  
themselves as members (as opposed to observers) and thus register as  
voting members") is hardly workable: we would very soon reach a state  
where people on the list (not to mention IGC coordinators) wont know  
whether list subscrivers are observers or members, and we would end  
with a difficult situation. Finally, I would add that problems may  
arise well before, or even without, any vote to consider: it's  
extremely easy to create a complete mess, on purpose or not, by  
discussing endlessly and diluting any issue or decision to make.  
Thus, the problem isn't restricted to voting periods.

Best,
Meryem

PS. Regarding your own case, Avri, I dont remember that you have ever  
been on the HR caucus mailing list (CPSR representatives have been  
Bill McIver and Katitza Rodriguez), and I'll add you right now.  
Another explanation may be that the list management software we use  
automatically removes addresses after too many bounces.


Le 22 avr. 06 à 17:53, Avri Doria a écrit :

>> On 21 apr 2006, at 19.42, William Drake wrote:
>>
>>> 1.  Charter.  I've supported this before and still do.  However, I
>>> would still
>>> go beyond it, and suggest that we can't have properly functioning
>>> consensus
>>> building/voting on anything procedural or substantive, or indeed
>>> democratic
>>> legitimacy and accountability, if we don't have any idea who the
>>> electorate/constituency is.   Hence, once a charter has been
>>> assembled, I would
>>> like to see people opt in and publicly become listed members of
>>> the caucus, in
>>> the same manner as the Human Rights Caucus,
>
> I though the HRC was composed of individuals from various
> organizations and that the organizations were the members.  I don't
> really know.  i think i was on the HRC caucus list for a while based
> on CPSR membership, but seem to have fallen off.  So I am not sure
> how they are organized or how membership works.  Maybe somebody from
> the HRC can explain.

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