[governance] Civil Society (was Re: caucus contribution, consultation and MAG meeting)

[McTim]

On Wed, Feb 13, 2013 at 10:25 AM, Norbert Bollow <nb at bollow.ch> wrote:
> Dear Nick,
>
> in order to perhaps explain better where I'm coming from... what we're
> doing in developing an IGC "written contribution", especially during
> the consensus process phase, is part of what the IGC mission statement
> calls "representation of civil society contributions in Internet
> governance processes"... I would suggest that if you want to be part of
> a group representing civil society in any topic area, you need to be
> deeply immersed in civil society thinking

Please define this "civil society thinking".

 in that topic area. Of course
> it is possible to achieve this kind of immersion while having a
> different (typically, non civil society) day job during which one works
> in a different topic area. I don't believe that it is possible to be in
> such a way immersed in civil society thinking in a topic area while at
> the same time representing business interests in the same topic area.


What if the business interests exactly coincide with CS interests in
that topic area.


> (So, for example if a professional industry interests representative
> in the area of Internet governance, like yourself, wants to gain
> experience at being also a civil society representative, that would
> be achieved by engaging as a civil society person in a totally
> unrelated subject area, e.g. cyclists' rights.)
>
> In any case, your recent response to Parminder was to my ears very much
> an expression of an industry perspective.
>
> That is not a contradiction with your claim that you're "an advocate
> for actual people". In fact, isn't it in a way the whole point of
> industry is that it exists to meet needs of actual people? Any company
> which doesn't do that is likely to go bankrupt quickly!
>
> Also I think that it is great when industry representatives take pro
> civil society positions. (With that I mean that if there is a good
> civil society position, which is convincing on the merits of its
> arguments, and then industry representatives decide to support that
> position, that's great!) Conversely it also sometimes happens that
> civil society representatives support some positions developed by
> industry representatives.
>
> We civil society people however need to be careful to maintain our
> independence, and identity as civil society, and that we don't allow the
> positions that are appropriate for civil society to take to be watered
> down etc.
>
> In fact civil society in the Internet governance area is in my opinion
> to a significant extent in an identity crisis, in the sense that the
> practical meaning of the term "civil society", and what the associated
> value systems are, is today much less clear than it used to be say ten
> years ago. That is in fact a significant part of the reason why I
> jumped at this opportunity to establish at least some kind of boundary
> marker.


I don't think that is up to you (as a co-co).


-- 
Cheers,

McTim
"A name indicates what we seek. An address indicates where it is. A
route indicates how we get there."  Jon Postel

-------------- next part --------------
____________________________________________________________
You received this message as a subscriber on the list:
     governance at lists.igcaucus.org
To be removed from the list, visit:
     http://www.igcaucus.org/unsubscribing

For all other list information and functions, see:
     http://lists.igcaucus.org/info/governance
To edit your profile and to find the IGC's charter, see:
     http://www.igcaucus.org/

Translate this email: http://translate.google.com/translate_t