[governance] conflict of interests and multistakeholderism

Mon Jun 7 17:23:22 EDT 2010

I think looking for "conflict" here is not that helpful. But insofar as it is I venture to say:
I write this without reference to previous work. It is meant as a more fresh view of what we non-yen & yang folks call a conflict. We should keep in mind this is a fairly modern western notion and does not fit with many views of harmonic interrelations. 
The easiest place to find some helpful distinctions between real and seeming conflicts is in the concept of waiver. Who can waive and why and when do you need it. And that is very easy.  A catholic cannot waive the trinity in order to work with a Jewish person. The Trinity remains regardless of an agreement.  It cannot be altered or the catholic is no longer catholic, end of conflict. Then there is no need for waiver.  So if you sit on two boards that have direction, policy and purpose that are opposite you simply cannot waive that concept.  The conflict is real. However, as much as we warn against it, a man may serve two masters.  If the purpose, goals and desires are similar why not double dip?
So most can see where this leads us. Open Transparent disclosure of all relevant facts involved in a potential appearance of impropriety.  While two boxers may compete and certainly conflict, they can easily agree on the queensbury rules and hence engage in “healthy” competition, while waiving the potential conflict regarding which rules favor either side.  So now a Judge(jury, BoD member, CEO) can referee the fight fairly, even though his daughter is one of the boxers – so long as he enforces the rule fairly. So in fact no conflict exists for the father. Because the mediator is not interested in the parties but the application of rules to a contest or standard. 
ITU, ICANN, EU, ASEAN, NAFTA, UN, DoC all have interests that are similar in some regards and dissimilar in some regards. For conflicts to arize between any two or three regarding the internet is really not a proper use of the term. Who gets what contract, whos’ people are in charge, who claims authorship, who owns best of breed. Not Conflicts.* 
However as our Avri points out following Parminders' logic. If interested parties are not given a seat at the table and there is failure to disclose a synergy of interests on behalf of a player -- then that just sucks! But alas we would need to change the header here from "conflict of interests" to "dirty cheating selfdealing bastards."  I suggest a review of Mexico and Vietnam for what appear to be conflicts that are not. And how even if the system is not pristine the A2K ratio is awesome. And Multi-stakeholderism is non-existent.

* WHO is rife with this stuff. Not conflicts -- just cheating and kickbacks and big Pharma payoffs and cost benefit analysis of life and patents blocking fair use and allocation deciept and crooked gov. misdirections and warlord hoarding. Yuk. but not conflicts of interests, just self interests.

--- On Mon, 6/7/10, Avri Doria <avri at psg.com> wrote:

From: Avri Doria <avri at psg.com>
Subject: Re: [governance] conflict of interests and multistakeholderism
To: "IGC" <governance at lists.cpsr.org>
Date: Monday, June 7, 2010, 5:30 PM

Hi,

I think the conflict of interest comes in when there isn't full stakeholder representation (including those individuals who define themselves as being outside all stakeholder groups).

i think that when any and all stakeholders - including the absolute individuals -  can be represented at the table then what is a conflict of interest elsewhere becomes a statement or declaration of interest.

Since the WHO does not seem to be committed to the multistakeholder model, it would appear to be conflict of interest.

a.

On 7 Jun 2010, at 11:56, parminder wrote:

> 
> A news like " Possible WHO-Industry Conflict of Interest on Pandemic Flu Under Investigation"
> 
> (see http://www.ip-watch.org/weblog/2010/06/07/possible-who-industry-conflict-on-pandemic-flu-under-investigation/ )
> 
>  looks to be an anachronism from an old bygone era for those in the brave new world of information society discourse. 
> 
> One wonders why should there be so much uproar about the simple fact of industry players with clear vested interest in policy outcomes being involved in giving policy advice.... Is that not what multistakeholderism is all about. 
> 
> "A report by the BMJ with the Bureau of Investigative Journalism found that WHO guidelines for handling a pandemic originally drawn up in 1999 were prepared in collaboration with the European Scientific Working Group (ESWI), funded by Roche and other drug manufacturers and staffed by scientists who had participated in creating marketing material for Roche and also in trials testing the efficacy of a Roche-owned influenza treatment."
> Apart from actual participation of interested actors in policy advice, why would anyone bother with anything as innocuous as who funds what.... After all, even the IGF is funded by private players. UN - GAID has actually made announcements which more or less ties advisory positions in GAID with contributing funds. There has been considerable talk of multistakeholder funding (read, private sector funding) of policy forums/ bodies, in this (civil society) list, in some recent official government statements etc... 
> 
> 
>  It is not important whether the allegations in the above WHO related news item are true or not. It is about the discourse (and normative frameworks) of public interest and public policies. See how WHO defends itself against the allegations. Its spokesperson asserted that 
> 
> "WHO has all of its expert advisers complete a declaration of interest and if necessary recuse themselves from discussions."
> 
> What a stupid idea really!! How would it work in a multistakeholder (MS) system, I wonder.  Would it not be so impolite to ask all the private sector players sitting on a policy advice body to declare their interests, and opt out if they have any.... So terribly old fashioned !! Isnt MSism actually about having interest in a policy decision; so what is all this ruckus about.
> 
> Apologies for the ironic tone, but i do think it is really quite ironic how the contemporary discourse in global health policy arena should be so much bothered with issues that in another arena - which, unfortunately, may be the pointer to the future - are considered simply meaningless, and perhaps absurd. 
> 
> Maybe, it is time, before it gets too late, to give some thought to what the new 'governance think' in IG, and perhaps all of information society arena, means to the long cherished ideals of public life - to democracy, equity, rights etc.....
> 
> Parminder 
> 
> 
> 
> ____________________________________________________________
> You received this message as a subscriber on the list:
>     governance at lists.cpsr.org
> To be removed from the list, send any message to:
>     governance-unsubscribe at lists.cpsr.org
> 
> For all list information and functions, see:
>     http://lists.cpsr.org/lists/info/governance
> 
> Translate this email: http://translate.google.com/translate_t

____________________________________________________________
You received this message as a subscriber on the list:
     governance at lists.cpsr.org
To be removed from the list, send any message to:
     governance-unsubscribe at lists.cpsr.org

For all list information and functions, see:
     http://lists.cpsr.org/lists/info/governance

Translate this email: http://translate.google.com/translate_t
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.igcaucus.org/pipermail/governance/attachments/20100607/0c86014a/attachment.htm>
-------------- next part --------------
____________________________________________________________
You received this message as a subscriber on the list:
     governance at lists.cpsr.org
To be removed from the list, send any message to:
     governance-unsubscribe at lists.cpsr.org

For all list information and functions, see:
     http://lists.cpsr.org/lists/info/governance

Translate this email: http://translate.google.com/translate_t