[governance] Draft report on IGC Rio workshop on Fulfilling the Mandate of the IGF

[William Drake]

Hi,

Adam mentioned a few weeks ago that the MAG wants all the Rio workshop
organizers that didn’t submit reports on their events to do so.  Having
moderated and been involved in framing and organizing the IGC’s workshop, I
said I’d draft a report.  Parminder then suggested I post it to the list
before sending it to the secretariat, so voila, here’s a draft.  Almost
everyone involved as a co-sponsor or speaker is here, so if my
contemporaneous notes were inaccurate in some way that matters and should be
corrected, please be in touch.  Of course, if someone else has
comments/suggestions feel free to share, bearing in mind this is just a
brief workshop report and not a negotiated position statement meriting
extended debate.  While I vaguely recall a mention of there being a template
for these things I couldn’t find it, so I followed a format used in several
of the workshop reports already posted at
http://www.intgovforum.org/rio_reports/rio_reports.html, presumably those
are conforming to something.

Best,

Bill



Internet Governance Forum 2007
Workshop Report
(draft version 09.04.08)

Fulfilling the Mandate of the IGF

Organizers 

＊    The Internet Governance Caucus
＊    The Government of Jamaica
＊    The Global Telecentre Alliance

Panelists

William J. Drake (moderator)
Director, Project on the Information Revolution and Global Governance
Graduate Institute for International Studies, Geneva

Karen Banks
Network Development Manager for the Association for Progressive
Communications

Ayesha Hassan
Senior Policy Manager, E-Business, IT and Telecoms and Executive in charge
of ICT policy, the International Chamber of Commerce

Everton Frask Lucero
Head of the Science and Technology Division of the Ministry of Foreign
Affairs, Government of Brazil

Matthew Shears 
Director of Public Policy, the Internet Society

Parminder Jeet Singh
Executive Director, IT for Change

Nicholas Thorne 
United Kingdom’s Ambassador and Permanent Representative to the UN and other
International Organisations, Geneva


Summary of the Discussion

The Tunis Agenda for the Information Society gave the IGF a mandate to
perform twelve important functions.  While the IGF has succeeded in
performing some of these, others have proven to be more difficult to carry
out within the confines of annual meetings.  Accordingly, the civil society
Internet Governance Caucus (IGC) organized this workshop to foster
multistakeholder dialogue on ways to fulfill the mandate in light of two
years of experience.  Its objectives were to review the thinking behind the
mandate’s formulation; identify any mandated functions that would be
particularly value-adding but are not being performed sufficiently in the
IGF or elsewhere; suggest operationally practical steps that the IGF
community could pursue in order to facilitate their performance; and assess
related trends and challenges in the IGF.

The workshop began with some discussion of the need for transparent and
inclusive debate on the mandate, especially given the stakeholder
expectations that had been raised by the Tunis Agenda and the WSIS
preparatory process.  It was suggested that because some of the specific
functions agreed to in Tunis cannot easily be performed solely by annual
main sessions, it could make sense to decentralize the effort and pursue
them in thematic workshops, dynamic coalitions, and perhaps even working
groups.  Were this approach to be followed, there would be a need for a
transmission path through which ideas and information could percolate from
the bottom up and be considered by the broader IGF community, e.g. allowing
rapporteurs from these collaborations to participate in main session panels
in order to present their key findings and outcomes.

In broad terms, one set of panelists expressed satisfaction with what has
been achieved to date but wanted the IGF to expand and deepen its work on
the mandated functions, while another set of panelists expressed caution
about adopting overly constraining interpretations of the mandate and overly
ambitious objectives for its implementation.  For example, one panelist
stressed that the Tunis Agenda mandate means what it says and embodies a
negotiated consensus that cannot be set aside.  Nevertheless, he argued, at
least six of the mandated functions---such as promoting the WSIS principles
and making non-binding recommendations---are not being performed, and there
are issues with the preparatory process for meetings that affect the IGF’s
ability to redress this situation.  Two other panelists expressed related
views, averring that the IGF needs the institutional mechanisms and
resources to perform the functions and help build consensus on key
developmental objectives like promoting access and the Internet’s public
goods character.  In contrast, another panelist cautioned against a
formulaic “check the box” evaluation of the IGF’s performance, particularly
absent any clear criteria for what constitutes success in this setting.
Insofar as some stakeholders are already tackling the issues, it would be
better to enhance their ability to share information on their efforts than
to expect the IGF per se to take on demanding responsibilities.  In a
similar vein, another panelist maintained that it was too early to judge the
IGF according to a checklist of functions because participants are still
feeling their way with the multistakeholder process, learning to accept
different perspectives, and building trust.  A final panelist concurred,
citing Rio’s nonconfrontational main session on critical Internet resources
as evidence of the progress toward mutual understanding that can be achieved
with patience and multistakeholder dialogue.  Nurturing and building upon
that progress will require avoiding intergovernmental-style negotiations of
recommendations or other outcome texts.

The subsequent discussion with the large audience in attendance was robust
and interactive. Audience members made a variety of interventions on such
points as: the adequacy, or inadequacy, of current IGF efforts to implement
the mandate; the need to view the mandate’s functions in relation to each
IGF activity, rather than as segmented streams of new activity, and to
establish working methods on this basis; governmental participants’ desire
for recommendations or other conference conclusions that they can take back
to their national capitals and use in making the case for continuing
participation; the apparent lack of consensus on the mandate’s vision within
the current MAG; the importance of engaging a broader range of stakeholders
and organizations in the IGF; the insufficiency of uncoordinated stakeholder
initiatives as an alternative to concerted mandate implementation within the
IGF; and the needs to replace the MAG with a tripartite bureau structure,
adopt nonbinding recommendations, set new substantive foci for the main
sessions, and establish working groups with competence for specific and
pressing issues that cannot be tackled effectively by panel discussions of
whatever kind.  Despite the diversity of opinions expressed on these and
related matters, one point did appear to garner rough consensus and was
subsequently reported to the main session on Taking Stock and the Way
Forward.  This was the abovementioned notion that designated rapporteurs for
workshops and coalitions on thematic issues should be included in
appropriate main session panels in order to report on their activities.


Relevant Organizations and ways of communicating with them

The workshop was relevant to all the intergovernmental, private sector, and
multistakeholder bodies participating in the IGF.  Communication with them
in the context of the IGF is the best option.

Possible follow-up

Most participants expressed interest in further multistakeholder discussions
about how the IGF can best fulfill its mandate.  Accordingly, the IGC will
propose to organize a follow-up workshop in Hyderabad that will delve more
deeply into selected aspects of this topic. In addition, per the above, it
would be useful if a workshop rapporteur were allowed to participate in the
main session on Taking Stock and the Way Forward in order to bring to the
wider IGF community the main points arising in the workshop.


***********************************************************
William J. Drake  
Director, Project on the Information
  Revolution and Global Governance/PSIO
Graduate Institute of International and
  Development Studies
Geneva, Switzerland
william.drake at graduateinstitute.ch
***********************************************************


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