[governance] MAG meeting - proposal for a non gov screening body for non gov MAG members

[parminder]

The second important element to report from the MAG meeting has to do 
with the process of selection of MAG members.

It was agreed early in the meeting that governments have their 
established ways to select members to UN kind of bodies, and thus the 
discussion here is only about selection of non-gov members.

The MAG did discuss the need for more openness, transparency etc. The 
general discontent with what is called the 'blackbox' approach was 
discussed. While general observations were made about increasing 
openness, transparency etc, which are all very welcome, the main 
'possible' operational improvement that got discussed, and I understand 
will be recorded in the outcomes from the MAG meeting that will be 
conveyed to the UN SG, is as follows:

It relates to a body of non gov stakeholder persons, including ex MAG 
members (the intention seems to be that it will largely if not 
exclusively be ex MAG members), who will 'look at' recommendations from 
various stakeholder groups, and apparently finalize the list, which then 
(apparently) will be rubber stamped by the concerned UN authority, with 
a possible last check by the concerned authority.

On the surface it look all very good, but I have a great problem - in 
fact a non-negotiable one - with CS nominations being checked and 
decided on by private sector and technical community. We all know what 
will happen. I kept opposing this proposal as being completely 
unacceptable to most in civil society. Though I was 'assured' that this 
will not operate as a possible veto by private sector and technical 
community on possible CS members, and that the 'finalisation' of the 
list will 'only' be as per express criteria, chiefly, geographic 
balance, I am quite sure that this will operate in a manner that will 
systematically exclude CS nominees that are 'perceived' as 'extreme' (I 
can give examples of how such systematic exclusions already work in IGF 
space when such "MS" bodies  make 'persons' related decisions). We have 
enough people in CS outside IG realm wondering about the degree of 
co-optation of CS in this area for us to submit to processes that will 
further round us up nicely into.... well, i wont use the adjectives that 
come to my mind fearing people may take things personally :)

Most CS members in the MAG list joined me in opposing this proposal. 
However it is still there as the only new proposal for selecting non-gov 
MAG members and it worries me a lot. Those supporting the proposal did 
go to great lengths to try to convince us that it was not at all what we 
take it to be, but I really could not understand the difference. (Others 
at the MAG meeting can help me here, if they could make out the 
difference.) And of course a lot got mentioned about mutual trust among 
(nongov) multistakeholders etc which seemed to make those of us opposed 
to the new  proposal look so morally weak and perhaps of a loathsome 
suspicious nature.

If the new improvement is really in that the stakeholder lists coming 
bottom-up will not be 'interfered' with except for transparent 
application of clear criteria - chiefly geographic balance - I would 
prefer this is done by the secretariat, in active consultation with the 
concerned stakeholder group, whereby any change necessitated by the 
application of the 'express criteria' is referred back to the group 
making the recommendation for making necessary changes, including if 
necessary new names. I would not want a group dominated by private 
sector and technical community reps doing this.

We did suggest let a CS rep group do the work of getting the balance 
right (the term 'triage' was used in the text for this process) and 
other stakeholders do it respectively for their respective groups, and 
the response was that three parallel process will simply not be able to 
do a 'collective' or ' across the groups' balancing, which may be a 
valid point.

(BTW, while the proposal of this MS group doing the selection or triage 
is still there, we were able to add something to the effect that they 
will work 'in active consultation with concerned stakeholder group' to 
the text. But as mentioned above I do not agree with the proposed MS 
body doing this activity.)

IGC may want to take a specific position on this issue.

Parminder




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