[governance] Provisional suggestion – on the structure of IGF (meeting)

[Jeremy Malcolm]

On Wed, 2011-02-23 at 11:33 +0000, Roland Perry wrote:
> In message 
> <AANLkTikVZdRVZAWBOj=BH-c44an9vMCzRnhTRxcRwy3Z at mail.gmail.com>, at 
> 19:17:31 on Wed, 23 Feb 2011, Izumi AIZU <iza at anr.org> writes
> >Some of CS members feel that IGF should not be an annual event ending
> >at the last day of its meeting – but rather a continuum process – and
> >we like to see some innovation in this regard.
> 
> Wasn't that the role of Dynamic Coalitions? Do you think that concept 
> failed, and if so why? What would be different, if a new type of ongoing 
> process was introduced?

It failed because the Dynamic Coalitions were left too loose to be
effective, because [elements of] the MAG feared institutionalising them
too strongly or (shock!) creating working groups.  They therefore
because a mish-mash of advocacy cells, contact groups for people who
organised or attended a workshop, or vanity groups.  None of them (save
maybe one) were really the focussed multi-stakeholder working groups of
the IGF that it needs.  In one of my personal submissions, I wrote:

"Under whatever name, the IGF requires formal subcommittees in which
intensive democratic deliberation can take place, both in person and
online, and which have a clearly defined process by which their outputs
are presented to the IGF's plenary body for approval by consensus as
assessed by its bureau."

Also see my blog post "The Underpants Gnomes of the IGF" at
http://igfwatch.org/discussion-board/the-underpants-gnomes-of-the-igf.
It's worth reading just for the title alone.  If the server is down
(that happens, sorry), it's also in Google Cache.

-- 
Dr Jeremy Malcolm
Project Coordinator
Consumers International
Kuala Lumpur Office for Asia-Pacific and the Middle East
Lot 5-1 Wisma WIM, 7 Jalan Abang Haji Openg, TTDI, 60000 Kuala Lumpur,
Malaysia
Tel: +60 3 7726 1599

Consumers for Fair Financial Services
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Join the global consumer movement in demanding access to safe, fair and
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