[governance] IGF and Enhanced Cooperation
Avri Doria
avri at acm.org
Tue Jul 3 09:49:53 EDT 2012
Hi,
Thanks for bringing this back up. Some comment inset.
On 20 Jun 2012, at 01:52, parminder wrote:
> Norbert
>
> A relatively old email that I should have responded to, but was awaiting responses to your proposal for "EC Task Force" from others.
>
> My comments are inline.
>
> On Friday 01 June 2012 02:41 PM, Norbert Bollow wrote:
>> parminder <parminder at itforchange.net>
>> wrote:
>>
>>
>>
>>> Both your initial framing of questions and the way to go forward, and
>>> the new responses to Marilia's email, are very valid, and thought
>>> provoking. Our proposal to look at the institutional mapping and the way
>>> forward separately for CIT/ tech standards on one side and
>>> social-eco-cultural policy issues on the other (not that the division is
>>> absolutely neat) is that there are different actors involved and actors
>>> have different roles, on the two sides.
>>>
>>>
>> Ok, so if this description is accurate, and the way forward is looked
>> at separately for the two areas, I would expect that that will lead to
>> Enhanced Cooperation going forward separately, or not, in each of the
>> two areas.
>>
>>
>
> The reason for such separation is that the needs, context of ecology of technical decision making can be very different from that for larger political decision-making. 'Technical' refers to areas where there is relatively not much difference and possible conflict of interests, and thus the accent is on finding the best 'solution' which more or less should be equally good for all.
I think this is an essentially a false premise. The intricate interconnection of science/technology with policy/governance has been shown time and time again. Stating the technology can be discussed as a separate thing is really not a tenable hypothesis. And it certainly cannot be the basis for a theory of a governance system.
Technology does not exist without a social context.
Governance of technological systems must occur within a social context.
i.e. a political context.
> Processes like consensus building, letting all participate equally, without going into questions of legitimacy and representativity, emphasis on competence, knowledge of the subject matter, giving directions without legal/ binding force, and so on, work well, and are most appropriate for, technical decision making.
I see no basis for this argument. technical debate is political debate just about the specific subject of tech and thus demands understanding of tech. but all political discusourse is discourse about some specific subject requiring knowledge of the subject; e.g economics, welfare of the people etc.
> 'Political' refers to areas where there is a greater occurrence of clearly differential interests, contexts and situations ,and so on, of the affected parties.
Same proceses are at work in technological processes.
You should try it sometime.
I know you think you understand what is going in theory, but a little participation might show you different it is in practice.
> While the distinction between technical and political cannot be an absolute binary, there is enough meaning and substance to these concepts that by and large decision making structures in these two realms are mostly structured in different ways. There are of course always ways to connect these structures as well (quite in keeping with your tripartite framing towards the end of your email).
I do not see it and have never seen an argument that made sense for the separation of the issue of technology and policy in the Internet cannot be dirempted this way. And while different subject area might require a different sort of multistakeholder conversation, I do not see a substantive difference.
>
>> My vision for Enhanced Cooperation is to put both areas together,
>> jointly, under a single institutional "Enhanced Cooperation Task
>> Force" framework, modeled to some extent on the IETF, and a single set
>> of process principles
I think this is a reasonable approach worth talking about
>>
>
> The problem with your 'solution' is that you want to put such processes that have worked well for technical decision-making in service of both the tech and political realms of IG. I am not sure this will work. For me such conflation, in many actors mind, may be 'the original problem'. And pursuant to identification of this 'problem' did i suggest looking at two different, parallel, but at some point connected, processes to look respectively into the technical side and political (or larger public issues) side of enhanced cooperation.
That is an essential problem, what for you is a problematic conflation is for others, like me, the appropriate and essential structure.
>
>> that are designed to operate as closely as
>> possible to what Daniel Kalchev calls "the 'common sense' law that
>> every human being on this planet knows unconditionally".
>>
>
> "Common sense" is easier spoken of then being able to arrive at what is common sense in any particular case. This is especially so, and this goes to my point of separating technical and political sides of the problem, when there are differential and perhaps conflicting interests, contexts etc among the involved parties. Common sense is often just another name for 'hegemony' in the Gramscian sense.
In this I almost agree with you Parminder. Common sense is many things to many different people and as such mean very little more than "this seem seems reasonable to me.". To you its Gramsci hegemony, to me it is the grab bag of un-reflective thought especially by those with no real life experience in the subject matter.
>
>
>> The output
>> of this "Enhanced Cooperation Task Force" would be Request For Action
>> (RFA) documents, which analogously to RFCs would not have direct
>> legal force,
>>
> This is more or less exactly what was meant by trying to give greater output and recommendatory orientation to the multistakeholder IGF, an effort that failed because, inter alia, the technical community, did not agree with it.
Maybe at this point they are ready to consider doing so. the IGF of 2012 is not Nitin's IGF of 2006
> Can you tell me how what you are suggesting now is different from the proposal to give IGF power or role to give clear recs, and these be authoritatively conveyed to different IG bodies, and for this purpose also to strengthen the MAG, and make it internally differentiated, policy theme wise, into working groups. One of such working groups could have been a 'working group on the enhanced cooperation issue', and I can see us arrive at almost exactly the same arrangement as you suggest. Is it not so? Only difference perhaps is, that the IGF proposal is made in general political and participation terms that have been used historically and are understood by 'normal people', and even more importantly, that proposal is carefully placed in a clear institutional context, which has been carefuly nurtured for the purpose, and has the various needed historical and institutional continutities. Absent these, a proposal like yours for a 'EC task force' based on nothing but evocation of 'common sense' may look very good on paper, but in any attempt to operationalise it may immidiately get captured by powerful actors.
While I do not agree with common sense, I do beleive in an emergent sense that comes from multistakeholder processes. And whether it is a task force or some other sort of multistakeholder modeled work on EC.
>
> Therefore, before one accepts this new proposal, those who so solidly stood in the way of giving bigger and better role to the IGF for a similar purpose would need to explain themselves. Otherwise, I cant see why this new proposal would has a better chance.
As I mentioned when we talked in person. In the IGF when it was just starting, there was no ability to move into EC. And with the ambiguities in the text and the GA thwarting the original meaning, it was impossible to move forward. Things have changed, and this may make all the difference. Perhaps you have given up on the IGF, just when its time to do something has become possible.
The IGF is stronger now, and has moved beyond its UN initiation. It has a structure of national and regionals IGFs that make it self sustaining.
>
>> but they'd be informative and persuasive and maybe
>> eventually any government that doesn't follow the recommendations of
>> the RFAs without giving really good reasons for choosing differently
>> will get voted out of office quickly.
>>
>> So if I agree to a bipartition framing, I fear that I might thereby
>> kill my vision, and I don't want to do that.
>>
>>
>
> I do appreciate your commitment, and despite my comments above, would want you to carry forward your vision.
>
> parminder
>> But I'd agree to a tripartition framing along the lines of
>>
>> (a) What are the current institutions in the "CIR + tech standards"
>> area, and how might an Enhanced Cooperation process be established
>> that addresses this area specifically?
>>
>> (b) What are the current institutions in the "social-eco-cultural policy"
>> area, and how might an Enhanced Cooperation process be established
>> that addresses this area specifically?
>>
>> (c) What are the concerns and challenges which are common to both of
>> these areas, and how might an Enhanced Cooperation process be
>> established that addresses both of these areas jointly?
>>
>> Greetings,
>> Norbert
>>
>>
>>
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