[governance] How to address political economy issues? (was Re: Internet as a commons/public good)

[parminder]

On Saturday 04 May 2013 12:50 AM, Norbert Bollow wrote:
> Parminder <parminder at itforchange.net> wrote:
>
>> Second, it is perhaps now established that this group is clearly
>> unable to articulate any advocacy view which has political economy
>> implications, or touches positive rights
> [..]
>
>> This is very disappointing, and would IMHO compromise the legitimacy
>> of IGC as a premier global civil society group.
> It seems to be the case that the overall body of people who choose to
> engage in Internet governance under a "civil society" banner is very
> far from having consensus in this topic area. In this situation, it
> would undermine the legitimacy of IGC's claim of being representative
> of the broad spectrum of civil society in Internet governance to
> articulate a substantive advocacy view that does not actually represent
> at least a rough consensus.

Norbert, I am pointing to a dis-balance - a serious dis-balance against 
issues of social and economic justice in the manner the IGC is able to 
output positions. Claim of lack of consensus is a legitimate factor in 
dealing with specific issues, but when it becomes structural, resulting 
in systematic and permanent blocking of certain kinds of issues  - which 
may be more pertinent to certain classes of people and generally to 
certain geographies, the phenomenon becomes open to being  questioned.

I point to this larger structural feature. I am not seeking that any 
particular position be articulated and adopted by the caucus.

Today, not only the IGC, but several other platforms and groups are 
available to articulate and push views around FoE, which is very good 
and useful. There is a connected strong bulwark against any governmental 
claim over the internet, including the legitimate ones which are 
required to develop and enforce a large range of very much needed pulbic 
policies and laws (net neutrality being just one of them). On the other 
hand, there seems to be almost no platform to articulate and advocate 
issues of social and economic justice. Is it anyone's case here that the 
Internet and its governance do not throw up a host of very serious 
issues of this kind. How do these issues get dealt? Does it not indicate 
a serious political economy dis-balance whereby the claimed premier 
civil society group systematically serves issues that seem dear to 
certain classes and general geographies and not other kinds of issues 
that are specifically important, and even urgent, to other classes and 
geographies. Claiming absence of consensus does not cover up this deep 
structural problem, although it may be  a good, and even appropriate, 
response for a co-co to give in this particular case,

<snip>
> Talking and articulating positions can be done here, even if the
> resulting statements do not reach consensus or rough consensus.
>
> If there is a desire for IGC to set up an infrastructure for developing
> advocacy statements beyond what IGC is able to agree on by consensus
> or rough consensus (I'm thinking of sign-on statements that would
> have the support of some subset of the IGC members), I don't see any
> reason why that couldn't be done. In fact this might be the best
> possible interpretation of what the IGC mission statement says about
> providing a forum for advocacy.
It is fine if this is the interpretation of what IGC is, not much of an 
advocacy group but a kind of an open platform or forum for civil society 
groups. And I am increasingly inclined or maybe resigned to this 
perspective. But that still begs an organised constituency and group at 
the global level that can systematically deal with Internet governance 
issues pertaining to social and economic justice. This is the gap that I 
spoke about in my previous email.

parminder



>
> Greetings,
> Norbert
>


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