[governance] ICANN/USG Affirmation of Commitments

[Avri Doria]

On 5 Oct 2009, at 11:55, McTim wrote:

>>
>> I expect that no one will directly attack my argument for democracy,
>
> I will, see above.
>
>
>> because they would self-define themselvse as undemocratic,
>
> or more democractic, as I do.
>


I think you make a lot of sense McTim.

Democracy has a goal of expressing the will of the people.  But there  
are more ways of discovering and expressing this will then just mass  
elections, held frequently under the pressures of propaganda, mass  
illusion, fear and fraud.

Democracy is an ideal that can be approached in many ways.

Most national type elections i have seen in my life have not  
approached it very closely. Though elections on a more local basis  
seems to be pretty good, large scale elections seem to have more  
problems.

Whereas i think that that the Nomcom formulations that you find in the  
IETF and ICANN are often decent ways of rendering a democratic  
decision especially when you cannot name, count or reach all of the  
affected demos.

And there are probably other ways - but a one man one vote scheme is  
rarely the only way, or even necessarily the best way.

Additionally comparing ICANN to an aristocracy seems to be nonsense to  
me. Aristocracy means one is born into ones position.  I cannot name a  
single person who was born into their ICANN role.  Someone might make  
an argument for meritocracy or even for oligarchy in Internet  
governance but certainly not aristocracy.

So even though I think elections sometimes have their place in  
democracy, I do not believe they are the be all and end all of  
democracy and do not believe they are identical with democracy which  
sometimes must be achieved in other ways, like direct participation or  
other methods.

a.
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