[governance] Re: IG questions that are not ICANN [was: Irony]

[William Drake]

Hi Milton,

On 12/11/07 8:27 PM, "Milton L Mueller" <mueller at syr.edu> wrote:

> From: William Drake [mailto:drake at hei.unige.ch]
>  
>> > I have, as you know, written quite a bit over the years
>> > about the historical evolution and contemporary decline
>> > of the telecom regime, so I not only get the marginalization
>> > argument, but have made it.
>  
>You are getting all defensive and prickly again, which doesn't accomplish
anything. 

Tee hee, this is you talking?  Thanks for the giggle. But the statement was
neither. I just said that I get the marginalization point so you don¹t need
to be pedantic about it, it¹s not a new thought; and that when stated as a
sweeping generalization rather than made precise based on the actual
empirics of different issue-areas, it¹s also counterfactual.
 
>It seems to me that you are making a very strong argument that Bill Drake
>believes in the importance of, and wants to get more involved in, ITU
>discussions of security. If that is the case, great. Do it! And if
>you can convince others to get involved, that's fine. My point is
>not to tell others not to do anything they think should be done,
>and I apologize if you took it that way.
 
No, I was making an argument that governments and industry from around the
world that can and do take actions of consequence plainly believe in the
importance of and get involved in ITU, which seems a parsimonious
explanation of why they spend a great deal of time and resources
participating. This was in response to your totalizing pronouncement that
nobody cares and nothing done there matters; I was saying, in keeping with
the thrust of the thread Alex prompted some time ago, that there is in fact
a world of global ICT decision making beyond ICANN, even if you don¹t happen
to follow it.  And I said nothing about me personally wanting to be more
involved, but rather that it would be nice if CS had at least something to
say about the topic of CS inclusion at a time when a few friendly
governments are trying to push that boulder up the hill.

>My debate was about whether this particular grouping of civil society
>has the resources and expertise to become deeply involved as a collectivity.

In fact, I said explicitly I didn¹t expect much in this regard, and didn¹t
think much more was needed beyond a simple sign on letter supporting the
initiative.  Wouldn¹t want to distract from the all consuming pleasures of
the ICANN pissing matches that have consumed the list of late (although one
wonders just how many listservs are needed for this).

>My impression was that this was an internet governance group, focused on the
IGF, 
>not a general ICT policy or telecom policy group. This collection of civil
society actors 
>has its strengths, but it is barely able to maintain a coordinated presence in
the IGF, 
>and is really only tangentially connected to the nitty-gritty policy work of
ICANN 
>(despite your constant "if it's not ICANN who cares"? comments, I don't see any
>but a handful of these people -- except for the employees -- at ICANN meetings
>or workgroups). So if you are proposing to add ITU committees and processes
>to the group, I am simply questioning whether it can be feasible. I do _not_
question 
>whether you personally can do it, and do not question that someone ought to be
in there.
 
I take your point about the state and focus of the IGC.  But I understood
the thread Alex started to be on ³IG questions that are not ICANN,² at least
that¹s the subject line, so when security came up, I pointed out that one of
the places where a lot of activity related to Internet security is happening
is in Sauron¹s tower here in multilateral Modor.  And I noted that depending
on how this activity is configured and implemented by governments and
industry, some of it may indeed constitute IG.  Where and when this may be
true is again an empirical question, so sweeping dismissals that none of it
can matter by definition just seem ideological.

>What happens when they open the door and no one enters?
>It's irresponsible not to ask those questions.
 
I don¹t actually believe they¹ll open the door much, so probably it¹s moot.
But it¹s still worth making the point as a matter of principle that they
shouldn¹t be closed and out of synch with the rest of the UN agencies, if
for no other reason than to potentially temper their exuberance a bit in
designing policies and standards for NGN, security, mobile net, etc. that
can be contrary to the public interest, raise hackles in the noncommercial
sector, and generate post hoc opposition.

That said, the question of participation needs to be differentiated.  For
the ongoing sector work, right, probably not a lot of CS groups would have
the resources or motivation to go through the extant membership process and
then come to Geneva four times a year for two weeks at a time (although I
assume ISOC could, and probably on ITU issues there¹d be sufficient
agreement with many of us).  Of more interest probably would be other less
regular meetings, and observer status, rather than actual sector membership.

>Would it be a great victory for democracy for one guy from this group

Again, a misconstruction of what I was saying.  A couple people responded to
the thread in this manner, but I said nothing about me personally wanting to
participate.  I¹m addressing institutional rules and the need for
transparency and inclusion as a matter of principle.  I¹ve said the same
things at a couple of OECD meetings, to as little effect, being just one
person.  When there¹s no expressed demand from a constituency, those inside
who might agree are left without a case and drop it.

>Is ITU really waiting for our word?

ITU is not a single entity controlled by a wizard behind the screen, it¹s an
agglomeration of 191 countries and if memory serves > 700
corporate/organizational members plus secretariat etc.  Probably most actors
don¹t give a damn about CS but some seem to feel differently.  At a minimum,
I suspect the Swiss and Argentine governments wouldn¹t mind if CS were to
mumble a little support for their initiative on our behalf.

>What follows is a long detailed list of highly technical - policy -economic
issues. 
>Which is precisely my point. Who in this group is ready to go toe to toe with
full-time, 
>paid, telephone company  engineers and government ministry reps on "network
security 
>assessment/guidelines based on ITU-T recommendation X.805? Etc.

Yes, but it wasn¹t my point.  I provided that list in response to your
sweeping assertion that the ITU is marginalized and irrelevant.  I¹m saying
there may be stuff going on worth monitoring and knowing about, from both CS
advocacy and scholarly standpoints, rather than just assuming it away. The
question of whether CS could and should actively participate in all aspects
of this work on an ongoing basis is a different matter, and per above I
wasn¹t suggesting this.

Cheers,

Bill

***********************************************************
William J. Drake  drake at hei.unige.ch
Director, Project on the Information
  Revolution and Global Governance/PSIO
  Graduate Institute for International Studies
  Geneva, Switzerland
http://hei.unige.ch/psio/researchprojects/Drake.html
***********************************************************


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