AW: [governance] Internet G8 meeting

[Norbert Bollow]

Parminder,

just to be totally clear, I am absolutely and fully in agreement with
you that any attempt of circumventing proper decision-making (which in
many contexts including in particular governance of states has to be
democratic in order to be proper) is totally unacceptable. I was just
trying to point out that proper decision-making in contexts with many
diverse stakeholders is not easy, and I think that we should
understand that one of the motivations that powerful stakeholders have
for trying to take unacceptable short-cuts is the desire to avoid
these difficulties, as well as the associated perceived risk of
failure to reach any acceptable decision. In fact, I believe that the
effectiveness of demands for proper inclusion of all relevant
stakeholders will be limited until true multistakeholder fora like the
IGF have proved themselves capable of creating the kind of outputs
that are necessary for guiding the way forward.

This is not an argument against drafting the kind of IGC statement
that you have proposed. I'm fully in favor of IGC speaking out as
have proposed.

Greetings,
Norbert



> On Thursday 05 May 2011 08:56 PM, Norbert Bollow wrote:
> > parminder<parminder at itforchange.net>  wrote:
> >
> >> our communication should clearly make the point that in any discussion
> >> on the kind of issues that the G8 meeting is taking up, all countries
> >> must be included on an equal footing.
> > I strongly agree with this principle, as part of the even broader
> > principle that *all* legitimate concerns (including concerns that
> > are not particularly on the agenda of any government) must be
> > appropriately taken under consideration.
> >
> > The challenge is of course that the more diverse the participants
> > in any discussion are, the more difficult it will be to arrive at
> > a conclusion that presents a viable way forward from all viewpoints
> > of the various participants.
> 
> Norbert,
> 
> Sorry if I sound sarcastic, also since we have mostly agreed on most 
> things, but I need to make my point clearly; what you say is one of the 
> most ingenious arguments against democracy. (Also a bit funny, why the 
> same argument cant be used against multistakeholderism ???) And I am a 
> great supporter of democracy, almost my primary passion. And my distinct 
> impression is that democratic insitutions world wide have been able to 
> take more effective decisions than  plutocratic ones. We need to believe 
> in democracy, including global democracy, at more than at level of 
> principle, we need to take practical measures to press for it. Again, if 
> civil society wont do this i dont know who will. 'Multistakeholderism, 
> yes, democracy, no', is not at all acceptable, This was also the main 
> point of my presentation at the recent CoE on Internet principles 
> meeting as well.
> 
> Parminder
> 
> > I suspect that this probably why the
> > G8 find the idea appealing to try to decide things simply among
> > themselves.
> >
> > Greetings,
> > Norbert
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