[governance] ICANN stumbling on a hornet nest

Tue Sep 4 17:13:29 EDT 2012

Please excuse the typos and grammatical errors,  " are a mechanisms" should
read "are mechanisms"....been up the entire night reviewing policy and
making submissions...yes ALAC work. ;)

On Wed, Sep 5, 2012 at 9:11 AM, Salanieta T. Tamanikaiwaimaro <
salanieta.tamanikaiwaimaro at gmail.com> wrote:

> Disclosure:  I am a member of the ALAC by virtue of being elected within
> the Asian Australasian Pacific Regional At Large Organisation to the ALAC.
>
> I will respond as always in my individual capacity and not as an ALAC
> member. I have always held the view that dialogue is important in
> understanding perspectives.
>
> Snip
>
>
>  The ALAC and RALOs are jokes, with mostly dead mailing lists dominated in
> discussion by a handful of people, perhaps a dozen at most.
>
> I would say that the ALAC and RALOs are a mechanisms that enable
> participation into policy processes in an organised manner. The like ALAC
> like other Advisory Committees and Supporting Organisations continue to
> work towards expanding their base to enable others to participate. As you
> can imagine the Policy work within ICANN is mainly technical so building
> capacity within At Large Structures its members is critical to enable
> meaningful participation within these policy processes. I am also mindful
> that aside from capacity there are regions around the world who also
> struggle with internet connectivity (aside from cost - access there is also
> avalabiity - access) and as such participation is challenging.
>
> I would not call the ALAC and RALO jokes but I would say that there is
> always room for improvement and expansion of a critical mass. I am open to
> suggestions as I am also preparing a capacity building and outreach paper
> to follow the one that I published on the Wiki after Dakar last year.
>
> There are some very good individuals in ALAC and in RALOs, who contribute
> greatly to policy making and to ICANN, but their participation could just
> as easily be channeled into ICANN the way the GNSO does it, through working
> groups.
>
> I hear what you are saying but my views are that the fundamental
> difference is that GNSO who have a stake in the pie. The ALAC are kind of
> like the Levites or priests, they stand in representation of the people but
> don't own land or have vested interests. If they do have vested interests
> then they are duty bound to declare those interests. As people who do not
> have vested interests but for volunteering to ensure that global public
> interest is protected in the best way that they can, it is hard and
> extremely challenging to get volunteers to engage in robust discussion on a
> wide range of policy and administration matters consistently at an average
> of 5 hours per day and staying on calls at weird hours like 2am for some
> consistently and to do this out of the spirit of volunteerism and in the
> name of global public interest. To ridicule this effort is a choice but I
> will differ with you on this and say that I stand in admiration of man,
> woman and child who in the name of volunteerism have given up sleep, lost a
> bit of comfort for the sake of the many. Yes, often times they will go
> unappreciated, misunderstood but they are in it because they believe that
> people can make a difference.
>
>>
>> What At Large is NOT is an accountability mechanism - which is what the
>> whole ICANN members/voting system was supposed to be.
>
>
> At Large in itself is not an accountability mechanism it is all of the
> global community within ICANN that exists to add to the potpourri and
> balance each other's voices. I know you would have looked at the Bylaws and
> they are very clear in terms of the mechanisms available to make the system
> accountable.
>
>
>> When creating ICANN, everyone involved (except, of course, for the people
>> who were helicoptered onto the interim Board) thought it was absolutely
>> crazy to create a powerful global institution without a membership to which
>> the organization could be held accountable.
>>
>
>
>>
>>
>> The idea that At large is a form of global participation and (more
>> importantly) global accountability is just not defensible; many of the
>> people in ALAC, far from holding the Board accountable, are trying very
>> hard to get onto the board and are very interested in ingratiating
>> themselves to the Board and to GAC. Their incentives are to rise up the
>> organizational ladder, not to keep ICANN accountable.
>>
> I believe that the ALAC does its best to hold the Board accountable. As
> members of the community, we liaise with all stakeholders within ICANN and
> we may disagree on issues but that does not mean we can't leave shaking
> hands.  I know no ALAC member whose incentive it is to rise up the
> organisational ladder, in fact quite the contrary.
>
>
>
>>
>>
>>
>> > -----Original Message-----
>> > From: apeake at gmail.com [mailto:apeake at gmail.com] On Behalf Of Adam
>> > Peake
>> > Sent: Tuesday, September 04, 2012 2:40 AM
>> > To: governance at lists.igcaucus.org
>> > Subject: Re: [governance] ICANN stumbling on a hornet nest
>> >
>> > Anyone interested in some history of the at large election might look
>> here:
>> >
>> > A one page summary
>> > <http://web.archive.org/web/20030627132419/http://www.naisproject.org/
>> > report/final/010907abstract.shtml>
>> >
>> > and reports:
>> >
>> > http://web.archive.org/web/20030621172016/http://www.naisproject.org/r
>> > eport/final/execsummaryA4.pdf
>> >
>> > http://web.archive.org/web/20030621172016/http://www.naisproject.org/r
>> > eport/final/naisreportUSLetter.pdf
>> >
>> > At the time, I thought the problems were fixable and ICANN should have
>> > tried a second round, a lot of the problems would not have been hard
>> > to fix.  Now I'm much less sure, I think an annual election would be a
>> > massive distraction for the organization and volunteers who already
>> > have too little time.  But should not be discounted.  A new study as a
>> > new ATRT round starts might be useful.
>> >
>> > Adam
>>
>>
>>
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>
>
> --
> Salanieta Tamanikaiwaimaro aka Sala
> P.O. Box 17862
> Suva
> Fiji
>
> Twitter: @SalanietaT
> Skype:Salanieta.Tamanikaiwaimaro
> Fiji Cell: +679 998 2851
>
>
>
>
>

-- 
Salanieta Tamanikaiwaimaro aka Sala
P.O. Box 17862
Suva
Fiji

Twitter: @SalanietaT
Skype:Salanieta.Tamanikaiwaimaro
Fiji Cell: +679 998 2851
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