[governance] Re: [bestbits] Input needed - criteria for CS Coordination Group

Mon Dec 30 04:56:06 EST 2013

Some of the challenges I see with a larger representation group is the
emergence of internal politics within such a group if it was beyond
the traditional remit. Similarly the voluntary and non-profit nature
of some groups is so diversified that they are either very large and
strong within the global context in the sense of their outreach and
membership or are small loosely connect online/offline community
groups working in the context of only their country, region or smaller
town/district/village.

The balance cannot be achieved at all and there is an evident
possibility that the coordination group can be taken over by different
people from different non-profits but members of the same larger or
global civil society group so this is a double edged issue.

Personally speaking I would only explore a model where we had one rep
from each continent and more based on its size and on a yearly
rotating basis so that any larger coordination group would never fall
pray to groupings though this is impossible. For example, we would
need atleast 3 reps for Asia, one from ME, one from SA and one from
AP, two from Australasia, 3 from Africa, 2 from EU/EE, 4 from Africa,
2 from Latin America, 2 from North America and Canada etc. with risk
that It really would turn into another IGF group within the IGC.

Consensus maybe achieved but then IGC would not be IGC anymore. The
relevant and prevalent problems at the moment are that there are never
seen hardliners and there are people that want to contribute but
fierceness and irrelevance of issues to the developing context provoke
us to keep silent and observant while continuing to ready to play our
role and share our contributions when the need arises.

Saying this, it might actually turn into a bad idea.

On Mon, Dec 30, 2013 at 2:34 PM, Nnenna Nwakanma <nnenna75 at gmail.com> wrote:
> Hi Ian
>
> Dunno how many of our folks are still doing mails this late in the
> year.  My original understanding was that networks = organisations or
> platforms that are actually a gathering of other organisations.. are
> the ones to be repped in the group.  My understanding was therefore,
> that there reps will help disseminate information  in those networks
> and network members will take the calls further down.
>
> There is the Web We Want  group, which has hit membership in the
> hundreds, of organisations in about 2 years. They are basically
> organisations that advocate for online freedoms, openness of the
> Internet and certain human rights.   Does WWW qualify? Maybe yes,
> maybe no, but some WWW members can easily take any "call for
> nomination" and forward to the list.  Does WWW necessarily need to be
> in the Coordinating group to do that? I think "No".
>
> I'm not sure about having "substantial current involvement" but I will
> definitely say  having "broad-based and historic involvement" in an
> issue, where the perspectives of such an organization will provide
> knowledge in areas of IG that current group reps are not very
> knowledgeable about... will be welcome.
>
> Best regards
>
> Nnenna
>
> On 12/30/13, Ian Peter <ian.peter at ianpeter.com> wrote:
>> Sorry to initiate a  process discussion but I think it is important we move
>> on on this particular issue.
>>
>>
>>
>> I’m starting this discussion to get wider input into how civil society
>> people think it would be appropriate to expand the current co ordination
>> group. To date, this debate has largely been about people thinking they
>> should be included rather than any formal criteria to ensure that the group
>> is representative while still staying at a reasonable size.
>>
>> The group came into existence out of a need for civil society groups to work
>> together to nominate representatives for various forums; originally for 1net
>> and Brazil events, but certainly with thoughts of IGF MAG as well in the
>> future. Currently included (in no particular order) are the Association for
>> Progressive Communications (APC), Diplo Foundation, Best Bits, the
>> Non-Commercial Stakeholder Group of ICANN (NCSG), and (pending new
>> coordinator elections) the Civil Society Internet Governance Caucus (IGC).
>>
>> Remember, these are criteria for a co-ordination group concerned with
>> internet governance matters. Optimal membership levels may be about 9, I
>> think, but certainly well less than 20.
>>
>>
>>
>> So how do we choose?
>>
>>
>>
>> Criteria discussed so far include:
>>
>>
>>
>> 1.       Is a coalition which is globally representative - all regions
>> covered?
>>
>>
>>
>> 2.       Is it non-commercial and public interest oriented (as opposed to
>> business)?
>>
>>
>> 3.  Would it more properly fit under technical community, academic, business
>> or government in its categorization?
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> 4.  Is a large part of this coalition's members already covered by one of
>> the existing  members?
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> 5. The internal governance of the coalition is adequately transparent and
>> accountable to its members.
>>
>>
>>
>> Other suggestions have been discussed from time to time and I invite others
>> to make up for any omissions here.
>>
>>
>>
>> An additional criteria that might be useful would be a reference to having a
>> substantial current involvement in and knowledge of internet governance
>> debates. That however might not be acceptable to all – but for me, the
>> criteria as they stand would be open to approaches from YWCA, Medicin sans
>> Frontieres, Pirate Parties International, Red Cross, Amnesty International,
>> CONGO, Creative Commons, International Commission of Jurists,etc. All good
>> groups, and it would be great to see them involved here, but the question is
>> whether the presence of all of them would be useful for a small working
>> co-ordination group on matters specific to internet governance. This along
>> with other suggestions should be discussed.
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> Interested in any thoughts relevant to refining this into a workable set of
>> criteria for expanding a small co-ordination group, the members of which
>> will be different coalitions of civil society organisations who will want to
>> maintain their independence while working together. One thought that has
>> been raised is to look at rotation of members, or perhaps a combination of
>> permanent and rotating members.
>>
>>
>>
>> So I am just opening this up for conversation to see what people think.
>> Please this is a discussion about criteria, not about individual groups and
>> their cases to be involved.
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> Ian Peter
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>
>
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-- 
Regards.
--------------------------
Fouad Bajwa
ICT4D and Internet Governance Advisor
My Blog: Internet's Governance: http://internetsgovernance.blogspot.com/
Follow my Tweets: http://twitter.com/fouadbajwa

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