[governance] IGF review

[Garth Graham]

On 25-May-09, at 1:05 PM, Milton L Mueller wrote:

> Michael. I can caricature people with the best of them. So you may  
> as well try to engage with different viewpoints seriously, rather  
> than dismissively, if only for self-protection  
> purposes.  ..................  Services and infrastructures COST  
> MONEY to deliver, Michael, and unless you have some new method of  
> generating the financial, physical and human resources to build  
> them, you aren't helping much.

The first statement is definitely supported by the second, thus  
demonstrating how difficult it is to find the right balance in  
admonition (see: John, Chapter 8, Verse 7).  Perhaps Ginger Paque's  
gentle questions are a better approach than tit for tat?

> On 25-May-09, at 7:20 PM, Ginger Paque wrote:
>>  I wonder if it is possible to bring the focus back to whether or  
>> how the IGF process can or should affect this whole situation. Is  
>> this possible? Has the IGF process helped? How could it? Do we  
>> have something concrete to say about the IGF process? Is there a  
>> way to evaluate (or review) the IGF?


Actually, I don't see how noting that actions COST MONEY is all that  
helpful either.  Maybe it's a more useful starting point to assume  
there's always some money somewhere.  So what's really at issue in  
decision-making is the set of assumptions about how it will be  
spent.  I too am not convinced that the business sector is the sole  
source of value, even of economic value.  I am convinced that an  
individual who connects in a context of mutual understanding  
generates value, even economic value.

Here  are some things I've learned about shaping development  
assumptions and "generating the financial, physical and human  
resources" to "build infrastructure," ... and some thoughts on how  
they might connect to an IGF evaluation process.

First:
There is a chicken and egg relationship between cultural shifts and  
specific actions based on awareness of the new potentials for  
development they unleash.  An example of a significant cultural shift  
with feedback development implications is what we now know about  
educating women: "We believe that long-term cultural shifts are  
important in bringing greater equality between men and women, but  
that both basic investment in human development in poorer nations,  
and structural policy reforms designed to reduce sex discrimination  
and expand opportunities for woman, can accelerate the pace of change  
in the lives of men and women."  (Ingelhart and Norris. Rising tide:  
gender equality and cultural change around the world. Cambridge  
University Press, 2003. 163).  I also like Hans Rosling's use of data  
to show that social change comes before economic change, for example  
that development works much faster if you are healthy first than if  
you are wealthy first (see Hans Rosling: Debunking third-world myths  
with the best stats you've ever seen. TED, posted June 2006.   http:// 
www.ted.com/index.php/talks/view/id/92). Rosling states that, if we  
are to avoid pre-conceived ideas of what's happening, "The  
improvement of the world must be highly contexturalized."

IGF evaluation implication:  Given that the Internet is a symptom of  
a cultural shift towards ontologies of autonomy and self- 
organization, we could ask - Has the IGF been an effective forum for  
dialogue about how that particular cultural shift supports positive  
impacts on development?

Second:
Although capacity is an emergent property and therefore the relation  
of cause and effect is illusive, it is better to focus on capacity to  
change behaviour than on the creation of wealth.  Capacity is defined  
as, "that emergent combination of individual competencies and  
collective capabilities that enables a human system to create  
value."  (Heather Baser and Peter Morgan. Capacity, Change and  
Performance. Study Report. European Centre for Development Policy  
Management, Discussion Paper No 59B, April 2008. 34).

IGF evaluation implication:  The elements of capacity identified by  
Baser and Morgan are entirely relevant to an assessment of IGF's  
effectiveness and they include the capability to:
  - commit and engage
  - carry out technical, service delivery and logistical tasks
  - relate and attract
  - adapt and self-renew
  - balance diversity and coherence

But for me, the particular "human system" that should be central to  
IGF's dialogue and its capacity to engage and to learn and to change  
behaviour would be governance stated as e-governance.  I define e- 
governance as "the uses of ICTs in the exercise of power by various  
levels of government so that all people, particularly the poor and  
marginalized, can influence policy, improve their livelihoods and  
gain a greater voice in the public decision making process.  E- 
governance changes behavior in relation to power in the direction of  
open and collaborative communities of interaction."  We should ask -  
Has the IGF process (and WSIS for that matter) advanced the  
definition and therefore awareness of what e-governance and the  
information society actually is?

Third:
Economies self-organize around beliefs about their components.  Their  
"realities" are situational and unpredictable.  For example: “An  
economy is not made of molecules whose behaviour is subject to the  
laws of physics, but rather of human beings who are themselves  
thinking about the future and whose behaviour may be influenced by  
the forecasts that they or others make.” Ben Bernanke, Board Chief,  
US Federal Reserve.  Speech to graduating class, Boston College Law  
School, May 22/09

IGF evaluation implication:  I'm going to leave that one open for  
others to think about, and finish with an anecdote.  Years ago when  
Canada's national debt was enormous, I once (only once) went to a  
dinner party where the participants included six economists.  After  
dinner, I asked a question out of my own ignorance - Given that 75%  
of Canada's national debt was then owned by Canadians, from a macro- 
economic point of view was that a liability or and asset?  When my  
wife and I left the party about an hour later, the economists were  
still screaming at each other!

GG____________________________________________________________
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