[governance] Enhanced Cooperation (was Re: reality check on economics)

[Andrea Glorioso]

Dear Avri, dear all,

On Tue, May 22, 2012 at 5:01 PM, Avri Doria <avri at acm.org> wrote:

> Hi,
>
> I also do not have an analysis, but from 20+ years participation would say
> the primary reason that capture does not happen is because people would not
> stand for it.  Over time there have been a few occasions when one large
> company or other tried to ram its favorite solutions through the process.
>  But by the time the various WG and review process had been gone through it
> it was no longer the solution that the large company tried to ram through.
>   And that is because people review seriously, do a bit of implementation
> testing, and argue their issues freely.
>

<joking> Actually, that may also be interpreted as collusion between large
companies </joking>


> Another possible reason it works is genuineness in regards to ones
> opinion.  I have often seen the people from the same company arguing with
> each other in the midst of a public WG meeting over the better path.  Just
> try to imagine two people from a single country or a single organization
> getting up in a meeting and disagreeing with each other? And yet, that
> would be a healthy sign in my view of having achieved a bit of maturity in
> the multistakeholder model
>

As a matter of fact, it is my experience (which I do not claim is
scientific, of course) that *as long as there is no official position of a
country/organisation* (I imagine you refer to public organisations)
discussions, sometimes even in the open, are quite normal. It is true that
public administrations tend to conduct these discussions more in-house; but
even then, many people would be surprised by the "roughness" of internal
exchanges within, for example, the European Commission.

One reason for conducting these discussions mostly in-house may be that -
again in my non-scientific experience - too many people fail to understand
the difference between an official position of the organisation as a whole,
official positions of parts of an organisation, professional opinions of a
civil servant in the course of a discussion that will lead to an official
position, and purely personal positions of a civil servant. I have been
bitten myself several times by this lack of understanding, to the extent
that I am extremely careful to express my position or my differences with
colleagues in public, while I have no problem to do so in an environment
where the "rules of the game" are clearer for everyone.

[...]

The main difference I find between the policy arena and the technical area
> is the consistency of people's opinions.  In technology, for the most part,
> people beleive in the same technical solutions even after they change jobs.
>  In the policy area, people's views often change when they change jobs.  In
> tech people argue what they personally beleive while in policy people seem
> to often argue what they are paid to beleive in.  In the tech area, one
> rarely gets a job because they picked one technical solution over another,
> while in policy who you agree with determines who you work for and for many
> people this means conforming their views to their potential employers.
>

I have strong reservations of your characterisation of "policy people" as
"arguing what they are paid to believe in". Of course, civil servants
follow instructions coming from the decision-makers (again, people often
confuse the two). That does not mean that civil servants are some kind of
mercenaries (not to use worse words) or that they only get hired if they
agree with the position of the organisation - as a matter of fact, it is my
(non scientific) experience that in the European Commission you are often
valued when you tell the decision-makers what they need to hear, not what
they want to hear.

I also find it very difficult to believe that "technology people" would
take a technical position, whether in the IETF or elsewhere, that ran
directly counter to the instructions they receive from those who foot the
bill.

I do not want to infer too much from written exchanges - emails are a
notorious difficult medium for this kind of exchanges - but let me point
out that this kind of characterisation, which I consciouly over-simplify as
the "geek heroes who always speak their mind in defence of Internet
openness and freedoms" v the "sneaky bureaucratic mercenaries who will sell
the Internet to the highest bidder", is (a) simplistic and (b) exactly what
makes those civil servants who would be willing to cooperate with the
"geeks" - and, having been called one for a long part of my life and
dealing with the category rather frequently, is not the most interesting
task you may get as a civil servant, believe me - rather cautious in doing
so.

Best,

Andrea

--
I speak only for myself. Sometimes I do not even agree with myself. Keep it
in mind.
Twitter: @andreaglorioso
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/andrea.glorioso
LinkedIn: http://www.linkedin.com/profile/view?id=1749288&trk=tab_pro
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