[governance] Main session proposals on DA and WSIS Principles

[William Drake]

Hi,

Per Parminder¹s request, I¹ve drafted some language on two possible main
session topics.  In both cases, I took note of the Swiss statement.  One
could argue either way the politics of doing that, but ultimately I thought
it¹s sensible to clearly make the linkage so the proposals are framed in
subsequent discussion as a MS intervention rather than just some CS thing.
If OfCom¹s not shy about supporting our proposals, why should we be shy
about doing the same?  Also, on the WSIS principles piece, I suggest
narrowing the focus this time in a way that makes the issues and politics
more manageable.  Several years of experience raising this with IGF
leadership and at ITU and OECD meetings, etc. lead me to believe that the
camel¹s nose would be more less unwelcome in the tent if it looks like
transparency and inclusion rather than ³everything should be multilateral²
or ³let¹s rehash WSIS² etc.

Thoughts, suggestions, corrections of my false consciousness and running dog
lackey ways, etc? 

BTW re: one other point raised prior, I would suggest that we not propose a
main session on the IGF mandate, but rather hold off for another IGC
workshop instead---second in a branded series, the first having gone well
and not led the sky to fall etc.  I can¹t imagine key players welcoming the
possibility of a main session hullabaloo on that.

Cheers,

Bill


A Development Agenda for Internet Governance

Development is a key focus of the Tunis Agenda and its mandate for the IGF.
Development also was listed as a cross-cutting theme of the Athens and Rio
conferences, but neither featured a main session that devoted significant,
focused attention to the linkages between Internet governance mechanisms and
development.  However, at Rio a workshop was organized by civil society
actors in collaboration with the Swiss Office of Communications and other
partners from all stakeholder groupings on, ³Toward a Development Agenda for
Internet Governance.²  The workshop considered the options for establishing
a holistic program of analysis and action that would help mainstream
development considerations into Internet governance decision making
processes. Attendees at this workshop expressed strong interest in further
work on the topic being pursued in the IGF.  Hence, we believe the
Development Agenda concept should be taken up in a main session at New
Delhi, and that this would be of keen interest to a great many participants
there.  We also support the Swiss OfCom¹s proposal to consider establishing
a multi-stakeholder Working Group that could develop recommendations to the
IGF on a development agenda.


Transparency and Inclusive Participation in Internet Governance

The WSIS principles hold that Internet governance processes ³should be
multilateral, transparent and democratic, with the full involvement of
governments, the private sector, civil society and international
organizations.² Governments invoked these principles throughout the WSIS
process, and in the Tunis Agenda mandated the IGF to, ³promote and assess,
on an ongoing basis, the embodiment of WSIS principles in Internet
Governance processes.²  Nevertheless, the IGF has not held any follow-up
discussion on how to pursue this key element of its mandate.  The Internet
Governance Caucus has consistently advocated programmatic activity in this
arena, and hence welcomes the Swiss OfCom¹s statement that implementation of
the WSIS principles should be added as a cross-cutting issue at the core of
all IGF discussions.  To help kick-start that cross-cutting consideration,
we propose that a main session in New Delhi concentrate on two WSIS
principles of general applicability for which progress in implementation can
be most readily assessed: transparency, and inclusive participation.  The
session could consider patterns of practice across Internet governance
mechanisms, and identify generalizable lessons concerning good or best
practices. 


***********************************************************
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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