[governance] Re: Nomcom and conflict of interest

Tue Jun 3 11:50:11 EDT 2008

George

I will do nothing much more than to cut-paste the UN's recent press release
on MAG's rotation to show that your description of the situation is very
one-sided. "Serves in personal' capacity is a part-corrective term over
normal UN forums/ meetings where countries and organizations get
represented, and anyone can come in on the behalf of these organizations.
It doesn't not completely take away the representative, and stakeholder
group, basis of MAG selection as is obvious from the statement below. In
fact, as pointed out in a discussion on this issue on this list a while
back, UN SG's statements have progressively underlined the representative /
stakeholder group basis of the MAG membership more and more since its
formation. This is precisely to check against the over-simplified
implication of the term 'personal capacity' which some people have tried to
draw. 

Thanks. Parminder 

MANDATE OF ADVISORY GROUP OF INTERNET GOVERNANCE FORUM EXTENDED

The mandate of the Multistakeholder Advisory Group of the Internet
Governance Forum has been extended.  The Special Adviser for Internet
Governance to the Secretary-General, Nitin Desai, has been asked to continue
as the Chairman of the Advisory Group, which will meet again on 13 to 15 May
in Geneva before handing over to a renewed group to prepare the next
Internet Governance Forum meeting in Hyderabad, India, on 3 to 6 December.

The Advisory Group will renew up to one third of its members within each
stakeholder group.  All relevant stakeholder groups, representing
Governments, private sector and civil society, including the academic and
technical communities will submit names to the Internet Governance Forum
Secretariat.  All members serve in their personal capacity, but are expected
to have extensive linkages with relevant stakeholder groups.  Members need
to be willing to reach out and ensure continuous flow of information to and
from interested groups and to participate actively and constructively in the
Group's work.  More details are available on the Internet Governance Forum
website:  www.intgovforum.org <http://www.intgovforum.org/> .

The Internet Governance Forum is an outcome of the Tunis phase of the World
Summit on the Information Society, which took place in 2005.  In the Tunis
Agenda for the Information Society, Governments asked the Secretary-General
to convene a "new forum for policy dialogue" to discuss issues related to
key elements of Internet governance and set out the Forum's mandate.

The Forum's first two meetings took place in Athens in November 2006 and in
Rio de Janeiro in November 2007.  A stock-taking session in Geneva on 26
February 2008 showed broad support for a continuation of the
multi-stakeholder preparatory process.

  _____  

From: George Sadowsky [mailto:george.sadowsky at attglobal.net] 
Sent: Monday, June 02, 2008 7:11 PM
To: governance at lists.cpsr.org; Milton L Mueller; Robert Guerra
Subject: RE: [governance] Re: Nomcom and conflict of interest

Milton,

When you say below, "Who represents us on the MAG," I have to point out that
all MAG members serve in their individual capacity and do not represent any
external group.  That point has been made repeatedly by Nitin Desai and
Markus Kummer.

I suspect that you are aware of this and that the phrasing below was just
not well thought out.  But others may not, and it's a crucial distinction to
be remembered.  The group is not selecting its representatives; rather it is
selecting those people in whom they have confidence will distinguish
themselves if selected as effective MAG members in the public interest,
according to the rules of the MAG.

I know that it must be frustrating not to be able to draw your own
conclusions from direct observation, but it is my opinion that the majority
of MAG members, when speaking in MAG meetings, do try to represent a general
and public interest, admittedly each through their individual lenses, rather
than being explicitly channeled by narrower interests dictated by their
background or the organization from which they come.

George

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

At 12:53 PM -0400 6/2/08, Milton L Mueller wrote:

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  _____  

From: Robert Guerra [mailto:lists at privaterra.info]

2. In my view - RIRs should be included as a full member in our IGC
discussions.

Robert,

I think you have missed the target in this increasingly tiresome discussion.
No one - not me, not Parminder, not anyone else - has ever proposed to
exclude RIR representatives from our discussions. Indeed, I have urged
people here to get involved in RIR policy discussion lists, and vice-versa.
No one disputes that RIRs play an important role in global IG, either. As
has been said repeatedly, the real issue is: who represents us on the MAG -
"us" being the IGC - when we discuss RIR policy in the context of the IGF?
Do you want an RIR staff person or an independent voice? Same goes for
ICANN, ITU, WIPO, etc. Is there not a problem if our "representative" in
discussions of ICANN is someone who works for ICANN? No one has ever said
that ICANN or an RIR should not be able to participate in the broader
discussions of their role in global internet governance. The issue is who
represents _us_ in that discussion.  

As I said earlier,

RIR's membership is predominantly, though not exclusively, composed of
commercial hosting companies and ISPs -- the most common consumers of IP
address blocks. But there are also govt agencies and CS groups. RIRs are
better thought of as multi-stakeholder regulatory organizations, not as CS,
business or govt. Within the framework of IGF and the Tunis Agenda, they fit
squarely in the category of "international organizations" along with ICANN.
So of course RIRs and ICANN, like other international governance
organizations such as OECD or ITU, will be and absolutely should be
represented in the MAG and in panels, etc. -- as IOs.

As governance entities RIRs are accountable to _their own members_ not to us
(IGC). As governors, RIR leaders should be accountable to and listen to what
the different sectors of society have to say about IG policy. They are
welcome on our list, they are welcome in our dialogue. But they are not our
representatives. They are representatives of their own memberships. I don't
see how anyone can deny this simple observation. IG organizations should not
have a dual, contradictory role. And since RIRs are extremely well-resourced
organizations that are well-represented in every conceivable IG Forum, it is
hard to understand this manufactured complaint about their somehow being
excluded and powerless in these dialogues. It is getting a bit silly, is it
not?

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