Charter's ambiguities [WAS Re: [governance] Fwd: IGC Membership list]

[Meryem Marzouki]

Hi all,

Le 28 juin 08 à 09:19, Avri Doria a écrit :

> On 28 Jun 2008, at 09:10, Parminder wrote:
>
>>
>> We are working within this definition of membership and not  
>> outside the
>> charter as you seem to imply.
>
> And that seems to be a matter of opinion.

It seems that the current charter leads to a great deal of matter of  
opinion, of various interpretations, etc. This, in itself, is the  
sign of too many ambiguities for a charter.
One of its main ambiguities is the one you stated in a previous message:

> Le 27 juin 08 à 18:23, Avri Doria a écrit :
>>

>> I think the problem we are having is 2 (or probably more)  
>> different ideas of membership.

Exactly, and we should all agree, whatever is one's idea of  
membership, that there is a big issue here that needs to be sorted out..

>> One is that that for all intents and purpose all those on the list  
>> are full members in everything but voting.  For voting one must  
>> hold to charter in order to vote.    I..e they can particpate in  
>> consensus discussions and everything else - except a vote.

Yes. But at this point, one might question the validity and soundness  
of a process that doesn't require to agree with a charter defining  
almost all activities conducted by a group (we very seldom vote).  
Currently, we have to follow a charter that we don't even need to  
agree upon, in order to conduct the main activities of this group.

I confess that I hardly understand why we need so strong criteria for  
the voting process, when this voting process is not used for our most  
important activities.

Instead of wasting our time and energy on such issues, wouldn't it be  
simpler, and more appropriate, to revise our charter. One of the  
proposed revision would be to consider as members of this caucus  
anyone who subscribed to this list after having declared agreement to  
the charter. I don't even see the point in setting some subscribing  
time period before taking part in any vote, given that we only vote  
on caucus coordinator elections, which is far less important than  
other caucus activities like decisions on statements, participation  
to nomcoms, etc. If we are to vote on other issues in the future  
(after charter revision), then it would make sense. But as for now,  
it doesn't.

Meryem

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