[governance] Re: IGF survey, was: Where are we with IGC workshops?

[Meryem Marzouki]

Hi Jeanette,

I understand this position from the MAG and/or the secretariat.  
Actually, as (boring) academics know very well, any survey is  
subjective and oriented (biased), even without any willing to  
manipulate anyone or anything. The bias starts with the decision to  
make a survey, is reinforced by the design of the survey, and further  
by the way answers are collected, and is finally completed by the way  
results are presented. As Pierre Bourdieu perfectly - and funnily -  
once argued:

"Given that one may ask anyone anything and that anyone has almost  
always enough good will to answer at least anything to any question,  
even the most irrealistic one, the questioner who, in absence of a  
questionnaire theory,
doesn't ask the question of the specific meaning of his questions,  
takes the risk of easily finding the guarantee of realism of his  
questions in the reality of the answers they receive".

Beware of the headache:) This was my (probably not so good)  
translation of Bourdieu's original quote in French, reproduced below:

« Etant donné, que l’on peut demander n’importe quoi à n’importe qui  
et que n’importe qui a presque toujours assez de bonne volonté pour  
répondre au moins n’importe quoi à n’importe quelle question même la  
plus irréelle, le questionneur qui, faute d’une théorie du  
questionnaire, ne pose pas la question de la signification spécifique  
de ses questions, risque de trouver aisément la garantie du réalisme  
de ses questions dans la réalité des réponses qu’elles reçoivent ».  
[unfortunately, I don't remember the exact reference for this  
monument of Bourdieusian's style :)]

That said, the IGC is neither the MAG nor the secretariat, thus it  
has more freedom to decide to invite as a speaker to its workshop on  
"IGF past, present and future" anyone (academic, consultant,  
journalist..) who already conducted such a survey for his/her own  
purposes, with all due caution with regards to the survey itself and  
its results, just as an introduction to the workshop discussion.

That would be a good solution, which wouldn't require to dedicate too  
much resources on this (a serious survey may take a year of work),  
since the survey is supposed to already exist. We've already had a  
proposal from Janna Anderson (Pew Internet & American Life Project),  
and I'm sure there are also many academics who has conducted such  
surveys.

Best,
Meryem

Le 14 avr. 08 à 11:49, Jeanette Hofmann a écrit :

> Hi, the idea of a survey has been discussed several times in the  
> MAG. While some members were enthusiastic about it and saw a survey  
> as a good opportunities for MAG members to "reach out" and actively  
> engage with attendees, others were more sceptical or even opposed  
> to the idea. Arguments against a survey were:
> * it is difficult to design a good one
> * the secretariat has no capacity to actually evaluate the feedback
> * a survey could provide opportunities to manipulate the outcome
>
> Personally I am in favor of a survey but taking the potential  
> drawbacks into account we need to be clear what we are asking for  
> and how to organize it in a way that we can cope with the work and  
> provide high quality results.
> jeanette
>
> Michael Leibrandt wrote:
>> Adam,
>> Thanks. Wasn`t it Orwell who said that controlling the past means  
>> controlling the future? Seriously, the idea of a survey/ 
>> questionaire (or even interviews?) is very helpful. That would  
>> give us at least a chance to find out what people actualy think  
>> about the IGF exercise. Maybe IŽm completely wrong, but I have the  
>> feeling that beyond those nice Sunday speaches we always hear  
>> during consultations the real attitude is much more sceptical,  
>> especially regarding the cost/benefit ratio.
>> Michael  
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