[governance] Fwd: [Internet Policy] Fadi Chehadé: Affirmation of Commitments needs to become contract between 'ICANN and you'

[Milton L Mueller]

The idea that the Affirmation of Commitments should be a contract between ICANN and the people raises very interesting questions.

As some have suggested, this could just be rhetorical blather: another way in which ICANN tells us that we can use our voices and express ourselves, but which gives people no hard accountability.

On the other hand, the idea of a contract between "ICANN and you" could be interpreted as a revival of the notion of _membership_, which was supposed to be the original method of making ICANN democratic and accountable. Members of an organization have specific rights (as well as specific eligibility criteria) and in a California nonprofit the corporate bylaws spelling out those rights/obligations/eligibility could be considered an enforcable contract between the organization and "you."

I hope civil society will be savvy enough to revive the notion of membership as an accountability tool, especially when ICANN's own CEO seems to be inviting us to do that.



________________________________
-------- Original Message --------
Subject:        [Internet Policy] Fadi Chehadé: Affirmation of Commitments needs to become contract between 'ICANN and you'
Date:   Thu, 17 Oct 2013 20:16:00 +0530
From:   Vinay Kesari <vinay.kesari at gmail.com><mailto:vinay.kesari at gmail.com>
To:     internetpolicy at elists.isoc.org<mailto:internetpolicy at elists.isoc.org>


Dear all,

Fadi Chehadé, the CEO of ICANN, spoke this evening at the Internet, Mobile & Digital Economy Conference (IMDEC) 2013<http://www.ficci.com/events-page.asp?evid=21654> in New Delhi, and made some very interesting statements, including the following (which I paraphrase):

  *   The Affirmation of Commitments needs to change from being a contract between ICANN and the US Government, to a contract between 'ICANN and you'.
  *   The handling of the IANA function needs to be structured in keeping with the idea that it is the 'root of the world' rather than of any one country.
  *   ICANN headquarters would be split between Los Angeles, Istanbul and Singapore, and hiring in Los Angeles is to be frozen.

I will post links to the video from the event as soon as it is up, as well as a more detailed report on his other remarks, including on Brazil, the role of industry, and multilateralism.

Regards,

Vinay Kesari

https://twitter.com/vinaykesari


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