[governance] Supporting something other than democracy because change is too hard.

Thu Oct 25 21:10:19 EDT 2012

On Thu, Oct 25, 2012 at 7:17 PM, Suresh Ramasubramanian
<suresh at hserus.net>wrote:

> And most civil society in India would rather not find themselves in a
> position where everything moved to the UN and decision making became a
> largely, or is it solely, intergovernmental process.
>

If it is a decision with global impacts, there's no legitmate way around
having a global intergovernmental process (other than a global referendum,
and how do we do that right now?)

The problem, in a nutshell:

If you really care about an issue and have tried to pursue democratic
change, then you know:

1. To change one's small town or village politically is *relatively* easy
(compared to what follows).
2. To change one's local state, province or territory is much harder, there
are many more people to persuade and distance to overcome...
3. To change one's nation politically is harder yet: to do it alone often
reminds one of Hercules.
4. To move more than one nation?  Forbid the thought! This may require
superhero status.  :)
5. To move all the world's nations to action, via direct popular appeal or
via a UN "intergovernmental process"?  The difficulty nearly staggers the
mind.

In light of the difficulty of just changing one nation, former US President
George W. Bush joked that things "would be so much easier if I were a
dictator."  Indeed, they would be.

In light of the extreme difficulties of moving the entire world via the
United Nations, one is highly tempted to favor lesser hurdles, like that of
moving a smaller multi-stakeholder process provided one has good access to
it or a vote on it.

The desire to support multi-stakeholder process, all too often motivated by
revulsion for the task of moving the world's governments, is quite
understandable, but it is at the same time of the same general species as
wishing one were a dictator so as to avoid the great difficulties of
politics, especially democratic politics.  These motivations implicate
efficiency, often allege greater wisdom and expertise on the part of the
dictatorship, aristocracy or oligarchy that is created.  But they have
those unavoidable democracy-deficits.

People who legitimately care greatly about issues and are otherwise quite
democratic-minded are sorely, sorely tempted to support processes that are
something more "efficient" than democracy. But efficiency, expertise and
manageable size do not create legitimacy in governance or the right to
govern those left without even the pretense of a vote or say but who are
nevertheless controlled by the decisions and rules made.

Paul Lehto, J.D.

>
> --srs (iPad)
>
> On 26-Oct-2012, at 1:47, Milton L Mueller <mueller at syr.edu> wrote:
>
> > While it is obvious that the Daily Mail article was _not_ an impartial
> and sober assessment of the situation, it does seem to unearth background
> documents indicating that the CIRP proposal came from IT4Change, i.e., from
> Parminder, not from a groundswell of support from "the global South." And
> it calls into question the degree to which the Rio conference agreed on the
> proposal, indicating instead that Parminder found it easier to gain the
> assent of a few governmental officials behind the scenes, than to get
> broad, democratic support from civil society, the IGF, or other
> stakeholders.
> >
> > It is also interesting how quickly Indian ministers, not to mention
> Brazil and So. Africa., backed down when the proposal was challenged. Since
> it wasn't their idea, they were unable to defend it.
> >
> > A lot of things can be attributed to the power of industry and the U.S.,
> but the lack of support for CIRP is not one of them. There just is no
> popular support for greater UN involvement in Internet governance. My
> understanding from various civil society organizations I have met from
> India is that the CIRP proposal was not popular there, either.  It is all
> in keeping with my general take on Parminder's ideas, which seek to replay
> 1970s-era battles between U.S. hegemony and third world sovereignty, with
> sovereign nation-states being confused with "democracy," at a time when
> sovereignty is either irrelevant to, or a regressive overlay on, global
> Internet governance.
> >
> > As for the assertion that the CIRP proposal had nothing to do with
> ICANN, it is all on record, it called for domain name registration taxes to
> fund the thing and contained a statement that it would "coordinate and
> oversee the bodies responsible for technical and operational functioning of
> the Internet, including global standards setting."
> >
> > An accurate description and analysis of the CIRP proposal can be found
> here.
> http://www.internetgovernance.org/2011/10/29/a-united-nations-committee-for-internet-related-policies-a-fair-assessment/
> >
> > Milton L. Mueller
> > Professor, Syracuse University School of Information Studies
> > Internet Governance Project
> > http://blog.internetgovernance.org
> >
> >
> >
> >> -----Original Message-----
> >> From: governance-request at lists.igcaucus.org [mailto:governance-
> >> request at lists.igcaucus.org] On Behalf Of McTim
> >> Sent: Thursday, October 25, 2012 12:12 PM
> >> To: governance at lists.igcaucus.org; parminder
> >> Subject: Re: [governance] U.S. - Japan Policy Cooperation Dialogue on
> the
> >> Internet Economy
> >>
> >> Parminder,
> >>
> >> On Mon, Oct 22, 2012 at 3:44 AM, parminder <parminder at itforchange.net>
> >> wrote:
> >>
> >> <snip>
> >>
> >>> Does anyone here have answers why they remain silent with regard to the
> >>> active work of rich countries to develop 'global' Internet policy
> >>> principles, and react so rabidly to any effort at democratising global
> >>> Internet policy making.
> >>
> >> My reaction is that CIRP was NOT an effort to make policy principles,
> >> rather an effort
> >> to make IG LESS democratic (in a top-down gov only style).
> >>
> >> It's clear we see the world differently.
> >>
> >> --
> >> Cheers,
> >>
> >> McTim
> >> "A name indicates what we seek. An address indicates where it is. A
> >> route indicates how we get there."  Jon Postel
> >
> >
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>
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-- 
Paul R Lehto, J.D.
P.O. Box 1
Ishpeming, MI  49849
lehto.paul at gmail.com
906-204-4965 (cell)
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