[governance] Civil Society participants statement on Funding support

[Izumi AIZU]

Dear all,

Here follows and attached is the statement I read this morning on the
lack of travel support for CSTD WG participation.

We will discuss this issue further when we reach the issue of IGF
funding, tomorrow.

izumi

----

Statement from civil society participants in the CSTD working group on
IGF improvements - Submitted to the 4th meeting of the working group,
11 January 2012

On behalf of the civil society participants in this process we want to
draw your attention to a concern which we believe could have an impact
on whether this group succeeds or fails in achieving the goals
mandated to it by ECOSOC.

On December 21 2011 civil society participants in the working group
were informed that the CSTD would not be able to provide financial
support towards the participation of civil society representatives
from developing countries in the working group's fourth meeting. After
seeking clarification from the Secretariat we were informed by Mr.
Mongi Hamdi that the CSTD fund for civil society participation can
only be utilised by participants from Least Developed Countries.
Currently developing country participants in the working group are
from Brazil, India and South Africa and therefore none of them qualify
for support. Mr. Hamdi did clarify that this restriction is imposed by
the donor and not by the CSTD itself.

We believe that his lack of support will have a negative impact on the
participation of civil society during this crucial last leg of the
process. Moreover, we want to emphasise that our concern extends
beyond just the participation of civil society; it raises fundamental
questions about the CSTD's commitment to and capacity to sustain
multistakeholder participation in all its processes.

Deepening democracy and multistakeholder participation in governance
requires the inclusion of groups and people who have a stake in the
issues under discussion but who are frequently   excluded or
marginalized. As has been stated in several submissions to the working
group, it is not enough to grant the right to participate to these
stakeholders; provisions must be made to ensure that they can exercise
this right in full.

Civil society and other groups with limited resources, such as
associations or networks of small businesses, need support to
participate in Internet Governance processes. Such support has been
inconsistent – not just in the case of the working group, but also in
the case of other important fora such as MAG meetings. This
consistently hampers full multistakeholder participation and restricts
the overall evolution - and results - of these processes. If the rules
and mechanisms of participation in IG processes privileges groups that
already have power and resources this 'imbalance' will be reflected in
the outcomes of these processes. We believe this is contrary to what
we have all been trying to achieve through the IGF since the Tunis
Summit in 2005.

Thus far the work of this CSTD working group could be well-synthesized
by the words “diversity” and “openness”. In our discussion we have
always relied on a plurality of views to achieve synergy and to push
us forward. We want to commend all working group members,
participants, and chairpersons, for their commitment to this inclusive
and open style of work.
We also want to to acknowledge and express our appreciation for the
support from donors who have made multistakeholder participation in
the working group possible up to this point. But at the same time we
want to call attention to the fact that such donations tend to be
unpredictable. Civil society participation in the IGF process (and
indeed the participation of all other stakeholders from developing
countries who lack the necessary resources) cannot remain dependent on
unpredictable funding. We urge this group to discuss the funding of
the IGF in depth, including the financial support needed for diverse
and inclusive participation.

Ensuring multistakeholder participation in the context of the WSIS
principles and the Tunis Agenda is not just about adhering to
commitments which many governments agreed to.  The ultimate goal is to
generate better and more sustainable policy outcomes that reflect the
diversity of voices, ideas, concerns and needs of all relevant
stakeholders.

----


-- 
                        >> Izumi Aizu <<
          Institute for InfoSocionomics, Tama University, Tokyo
           Institute for HyperNetwork Society, Oita,
                                  Japan
                                 * * * * *
                              www.anr.org
____________________________________________________________
You received this message as a subscriber on the list:
     governance at lists.cpsr.org
To be removed from the list, visit:
     http://www.igcaucus.org/unsubscribing

For all other list information and functions, see:
     http://lists.cpsr.org/lists/info/governance
To edit your profile and to find the IGC's charter, see:
     http://www.igcaucus.org/

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

-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: Statement from civil society participants in the CSTD IGF WG Jan 11 .docx
Type: application/vnd.openxmlformats-officedocument.wordprocessingml.document
Size: 158678 bytes
Desc: not available
URL: <http://lists.igcaucus.org/pipermail/governance/attachments/20120112/816857b3/attachment.docx>