[governance] Reconstituting MAG (Tech/admin language)

[McTim]

On Fri, Feb 22, 2008 at 2:09 AM, Milton L Mueller <mueller at syr.edu> wrote:
>
>  > -----Original Message-----
>  > From: Adam Peake [mailto:ajp at glocom.ac.jp]
>  >
>
> > Civil society has been under represented in the multistakeholder
>  > advisory groups appointed in 2006 and 2007, this anomaly should be
>  > corrected in this round of rotation and a fair balance of members
>  > between all stakeholders assured. (I'd be happy to add: At least one
>  > quarter of the MAG membership must be drawn from Civil Society.)
>
>
> One quarter, eh? See below.
>
>  > I disagree. I think it is progress to see the emergence of a new
>  > stakeholder group in the IGF.
>
>  Bollocks. How is it progress for one particular group to secede from business and civil society (all the while claiming that it is part of both, just to hedge its bet) and gain privileged representation for itself?

Can you send evidence/links that show there is a monolithic "claim" here?

 Does this mean that it would also be progress for any other new
stakeholder group to make enough noise to get considered as a special
group? Where does it end?
>
>
>  > I have no problem with the
>  > technical/admin Internet organizations being a separate group in the
>  > IGF. I just do not want them to continue to be over represented.
>

If you limit to 3 SH groups, you run into the problem that reps of I*
orgs CAN take seats from all 3 SH groupings, and then you get the
over-representation AND a reduction of seats for "broader CS".


>  The whole point of claiming to be a separate group in this case is to be over-represented. You prove it yourself above: You're willing to give parity in representation to a group that is, for the most part, a small subset of private sector or civil society, merely by virtue of the fact that they claim to be a distinct category of actor. So if I could somehow establish "Full Professors in snowy climes " as a new category they would get one fifth of the positions?
>

If an only if "Full Professors in snowy climes " did the heavy lifting
of EC3 that is currently done by the hundreds of orgs that do these
tasks now.

This is a red herring, an amusing one, but still a "rood haring",
jongen, jongen, jongen.  (How's your Dutch coming along?)


>  This is a political game. Obviously. The claim that TC is "special" and apart from CS and PS was simply a way for incumbent I* governance organizations to maxmimize their voice and influence in the IGF. If recognition as a special group translated into _less_ representation,

If we don't recognise them (which is the status quo AFAICS), they
could theoretically take MORE seats than they currently have now.  I
have argued that this outcome would not be good for what you folks
call CS.

>the same folks would suddenly claim not to be a distinct group and
don the camouflage of civil society or private sector. They've got you
covered either way, as McTim's none-too-subtle machinations on the
list show.
>

If by machinations, you mean "firmly held beliefs based on years of
personal observation and participation", then I am guilty as charged
Senator.  I am a card-carrying member of the Internet Technical
community (many technical communities actually), and proud of it!

>  But, let's not forget the validity of Jeanette's comment that numbers on the MAG don't necessarily translate into influence, and not get hung up on qutoas. In our statement let's be principled and stick to Biz, Gov and CS (.com, .gov and .org) as the categories, let's recognize that individuals who work for Internet admin bodies can fall in any of those categories, let's not be naïve about the obvious self-interest these orgs may have in populating an IGF advisory body, and let's tell the truth about it.

The interest is in fulfilling the EC aspects of the TA.

I don't understand this at all, first y'all say "where is the EC", and
while we are discussing what is clearly EC by these orgs, you say
"they are overrepresented.  You can't blame folks for wholeheartedly
embracing EC, can you??

I agree with the majority, Jeannette, Suresh, Adam, Ian, Bill, et. al,
let's not mention numbers or make a statement that pushes away any
folk.  Let's just say that we would like more CS representation.

-- 
Cheers,

McTim
$ whois -h whois.afrinic.net mctim
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