[governance] CSTD WG on Enhanced Cooperation : Update

Wed Mar 13 11:53:26 EDT 2013

Dear all

*Update from the CS focal point for the convening of the CSTD WG on
Enhanced Cooperation*

*Background*
I was asked by the chair of the CSTD (Ambassador Miguel Julian Palomino
de la Gala from Peru) to be the focal point for selecting civil society
participants. My task was to come up with 3 names from developing
countries, and 3 from developed countries/ From these 6 names the final
5 would be selected by Ambassador de la Gala.

To help me with this task, and to make it more inclusive I approached 7
individuals that are active in internet-related civil society spaces
and/or organisations. We were not meant to be the perfect group or a
formal 'nomcom'. Nevertheless they are all individuals that I personally
trust and respect and whom believe are trusted by those in civil society
that know them and that have worked with them.

I tried to make the group regionally diverse by having one person each
from Asia, Africa, Europe, North America and South America. In
recognition of the IGC's role in our sector, and and because both of
them are such committed facilitators of civil society participation, I
invited two past Internet Governance Caucus (IGC) coordinators.

The composition of the selection group was as follows:

Nnenna Nwakanma, FOSSFA - Africa
Anja Kovacs, Internet Democracy - Asia
Robin Gross, IP Justice - North America
Fatima Cambronero,  AGEIA DENSI - Latin America
Wolf Ludwig, Communica-CH/EuroDIG - Europe
Ginger Paque - past-IGC coordinator
Ian Peter - past-IGC coordinator
Anriette Esterhuysen, APC - CSTD appointed civil society focal point and
convenor of the group.

I was assisted by my colleague Emilar Vushe as I was travelling for much
of the period that we had to do our work.

To avoid conflict of interest I deliberately did not invite anyone from
APC (members or staff) to be on the selection group. I also withdrew
from the internal APC process of selection of nominees, and, as a
further measure to prevent conflict of interest and to create
opportunities for others, I decided not to make myself available for
nomination for the group. I had served on the previous CSTD Working
Group on IGF Improvements and felt it was good to give others a chance.

*Nominees*
To make the call as wide as possible, within the extremely short
timeframe I posted to the several lists and encouraged people to spread
the call. In the text of my message I encouraged people from outside the
narrow internet governance community to participate. We received 20
nominations. One withdrew, leaving us with 19 to review. I am happy to
disclose the names of all the nominees but I want to check with them
first in case they have any objection to this.

*'Endorsed' or pre-selected nominations*
Some nominations were submitted by the and some by civil society
networks or organisations. Some of the nominations were also 'endorsed'
or supported by other individuals or organisations.

To recognise the effort that has gone into these pre-selection processes
and endorsements I pre-assigned a score of 1 to these candidates. I felt
that any higher number would not be fair, as it was not mentioned as a
requirement in the call for nominations.

*Scoring process*
Scoring was done using a score sheet with criteria based on my
understanding of what will be involved in the work of the working group.
The selection group assigned a score of 1 to 5 to each candidate against
each of the criteria with the lowest score being 1 and the highest 5.
The selection group was encouraged, to be as fair as possible, to score
candidates on the basis of the information in their nomination forms.

The criteria were as follows:

   * Experience and expertise in public-interest oriented policy processes.

   * Experience and expertise in EC in relation to WSIS and IG

   * Ablity and commitment to put in the work and travel

   * Ability to work collaboratively and confidently in multi-stakeholder
     processes that involves both consensus building and dealing with
     conflicting interests.

*Shortlist*
Based on the initial scoring I compiled a short list of 12 people. I
then asked to selection group to review the short list, and rank them in
order of their suitability for the WG and to give consideration to
regional and gender balance.

*Submission to CSTD Chair*
After the second round of reviewing by the selection group I came up
with a list of 8 names (the required 6 -- who were the most highly
ranked by the selection group - with two more names from the top 12 whom
I felt would bring particular expertise to the group) which I submitted
to the CSTD for the Chair's final review and selection. I am not sure 
yet when the composition of the WG will be announced but I know that the 
CSTD will do this as quickly as possible.

Thank you to everyone who made themselves available for nomination.
There was huge interest in this Working Group, and the quality of the
candidates made selection (particularly in some regions) extremely
difficult. As I don't know the outcome of the CSTD Chair's decision, and
as I have not communicated directly with nominees, I would rather not
disclose the names of those that I recommended at this stage.

I do want to point out to all who were nominated or nominated themselves 
that even if you do not make it onto the Working Group, there will still 
be opportunities to participate in its work through participating in 
whatever processes it establishes to get input from the broader internet 
community.

My sincere thanks to the members of the selection group. Firstly, every
person I asked said yes! I was impressed and grateful.

Then they proceeded to work very hard, in a very short timeframe. They
undertook the work with the seriousness it deserves. I would not have
been able to do this without their input. In fact, this process
confirmed my belief in the value of the 'small crowd' and in civil
society's ability to deal with the complexity of such selection
processes with good judgement and as much fairness as possible.

Anriette Esterhuysen

-- 
------------------------------------------------------
anriette esterhuysen anriette at apc.org
executive director, association for progressive communications
www.apc.org
po box 29755, melville 2109
south africa
tel/fax +27 11 726 1692

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