[governance] Re: [bestbits] Three NETmundial submissions launched for endorsement at bestbits.net

Suresh Ramasubramanian suresh at hserus.net
Wed Mar 5 23:17:36 EST 2014 

It is rare to meet a politician who is not financially self interested, or 
so my morning paper assures me every time I read the front page. So let us 
not split that hair too much :)


On 6 March 2014 9:38:50 AM "michael gurstein" <gurstein at gmail.com> wrote:

> Yes, I agree… (only to add Essentially a winner take all political (or 
> financially self-interested) process.
>
>
>
> M
>
>
>
> From: Suresh Ramasubramanian [mailto:srs at savitr.info] Sent: Wednesday, 
> March 05, 2014 7:35 PM
> To: governance at lists.igcaucus.org; michael gurstein
> Cc: Andrew Puddephatt; Jeremy Malcolm; parminder
> Subject: Re: [governance] Re: [bestbits] Three NETmundial submissions 
> launched for endorsement at bestbits.net
>
>
>
> Mike, I have seen multistakeholder processes get real but only where there 
> are operational goals involved .. In such cases active cooperation takes 
> place regardless of whether the person you cooperate with works for a 
> competitor or not.
>
>
> In the processes where it does break down it does so because of more than 
> one stakeholder being focused on power and control rather than on achieving 
> results. Essentially a winner take all political process.
>
> --srs (iPad)
>
>
> On 06-Mar-2014, at 8:27, "michael gurstein" <gurstein at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> Andrew (and Suresh…
>
>
>
> Those are quite legitimate points/questions and very much worthy of serious 
> discussion and debate.
>
>
> However, evoking (over and over and over…) the undefined, undescribed, 
> undetailed multistakeholderist mantra doesn’t get us any closer…
>
>
> The continuous shapeshifting by the proponents of the MS meme whenever they 
> are challenged to get real --well this isn’t quite “MSism”, it isn’t true 
> MSism, it will be better next time MSism, doesn’t do anyone a service 
> (except the “wizards” behind the curtains).
>
>
> From my own experience, whenever MSism “gets real” it falls apart—either it 
> doesn’t have any operational processes or related significant structures of 
> accountability so it can’t handle even the most insignificant of challenges 
> without some form of full on offensive/defensive onslaught or it simply 
> ignores the issue and moves on. Nor can it handle even the most 
> inconsequential of divergences/diversities of opinion—the drive towards 
> convergence/consensus (and the associated processes of marginalization and 
> exclusion) are terrifying to me if there were any real chance of scaling.  
> In the last century we had a lot of experience (and several names) for 
> political systems that couldn’t deal with challenge, divergence, conflict 
> and insisted on a managed consensus and forced choices “or else…
>
>
> Democracy and multi-lateralism both have many many flaws but they have both 
> taken us a considerable distance down roads that allow us to be where we 
> are now and thinking about significant and desirable ways forward into much 
> more complex decision environments. Moreover we now have (the possibility 
> of using) new tools to support the extending of democratic capabilities, 
> the broader inclusion of diversities, the extension of opportunities for 
> effective participation to previously marginalized populations.
>
>
>
> I see absolutely no reason for civil society to be uncritically supporting 
> MSism as is obviously currently the case. To my mind this goes against 
> everything that CS has traditionally stood for—the broadening and deepening 
> of accountability in support of the public good, the strengthening of 
> democracy including through its extension to the poor and marginalized, the 
> developing of public processes and methods to control the unaccountable use 
> of private power in opposition to the public interest.
>
>
> MSism is in its essence a form of privatization of power—shifting of power 
> from the hands of people (however flawed that might be) to the hands of 
> those who for the most part are unaccountable and non-transparent in their 
> actions, their internal operations and in their structures.
>
>
>
> I would love to see some demonstration that I am wrong or that I’ve missed 
> something but another round of “trust them/us” is not going to cut it.
>
>
>
> Mike
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> From: Andrew Puddephatt [mailto:Andrew at gp-digital.org] Sent: Wednesday, 
> March 05, 2014 6:14 PM
> To: michael gurstein; governance at lists.igcaucus.org; 'Jeremy Malcolm'; 
> 'parminder'
> Cc: bestbits at lists.bestbits.net
> Subject: Re: [governance] Re: [bestbits] Three NETmundial submissions 
> launched for endorsement at bestbits.net
>
>
>
> Michael
>
>
>
> Those of us less clever than you are trying to figure out how to make 
> governance of a global system more equitable and transparent and 
> accountable.  Clearly we failed.
>
>
>
> Can you explain to me how an international inter state process is 
> democratic, assuming that is what you believe (and if not what is your 
> democratic alternative to the submissions on BB?).  How are my interests 
> represented by inter state discussions, or those of Chinese or Russian 
> citizens, or women in Saudi Arabia or Canadian academics?
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> From: michael gurstein <gurstein at gmail.com>
> Reply-To: michael gurstein <gurstein at gmail.com>
> Date: Wednesday, 5 March 2014 23:57
> To: "governance at lists.igcaucus.org" <governance at lists.igcaucus.org>, Jeremy 
> Malcolm <Jeremy at Malcolm.id.au>, "parminder at itforchange.net" 
> <parminder at itforchange.net>
> Cc: "<bestbits at lists. net <mailto:bestbits at lists.%20net> >" 
> <bestbits at lists.bestbits.net>
> Subject: RE: [governance] Re: [bestbits] Three NETmundial submissions 
> launched for endorsement at bestbits.net
>
>
>
> I see, so in your world democracy (however flawed), is to be replaced by 
> Multistakeholderism where there is no (evident) transparency (T) or 
> accountability (A) for the inputs into the stakeholder processes, no 
> (evident) T or A for the outputs of the stakeholder processes  and the 
> stakeholders themselves are subject to no effective T or A since they are 
> some sort of (interglalactic?) shapeshifters errr… those with “role 
> flexibilities”.
>
>
>
> Have I missed something here?
>
>
>
> This may work for a Wizard of Oz space like 1Net where even as the curtain 
> gets repeatedly bunched up revealing the (“non-existent”—we have it on the 
> highest possible authority—trust us) wizard pulling the strings and T & A 
> appears to consist of repeated choruses of “trust them it will get better” 
> by a fawning self-selected “Steering Committee”, but surely in our world we 
> might expect something with a slightly higher reality component.
>
>
>
> M
>
>
>
> From: governance-request at lists.igcaucus.org 
> [mailto:governance-request at lists.igcaucus.org] On Behalf Of Jeremy Malcolm
> Sent: Wednesday, March 05, 2014 4:21 AM
> To: governance at lists.igcaucus.org; parminder
> Cc: &lt,bestbits at lists.bestbits.net <mailto:bestbits at lists.bestbits.net&gt> 
> &gt,
> Subject: Re: [governance] Re: [bestbits] Three NETmundial submissions 
> launched for endorsement at bestbits.net
>
>
>
> On 5 Mar 2014, at 7:49 pm, parminder <parminder at itforchange.net> wrote:
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> So, request a clear response - do you mean parity in decision making about 
> public policies between gov and non gov actors.... And this is not a petty 
> point... Half of the time ostyle='color:black'>So, request a clear response 
> - do you mean parity in decision making about public policies between gov 
> and non gov actors.... And this is not a petty point... Half of the time of 
> the WGEC got taken on this kind of discussion. This is the single most 
> important point today, if we can clarify nd possibly agree on this point - 
> rest is not too difficult... Lets accept what is the key point, and not 
> skirt it...
>
>
>
> Different people who contributed to the submission, even if they all 
> endorse the final result, will probably give you different answers to that 
> question.  I'm not sure that anyone is interested in what my personal 
> answer is because I'm just an individual, but I would say no I do not 
> accept as a general proposition that parity in decision making is 
> appropriate, which is why I personally objected to that language being used.
>
>
>
> For some issues, it will be appropriate that the stakeholders act as equals 
> in the decision making process (to the extent that there is a "decision" at 
> all).  In other areas, it won't be appropriate and may be more appropriate 
> that although all stakeholders are involved, one of them will legitimately 
> take a bigger role than the others.  For example governments may take a 
> leading role in transnational human rights disputes, the technical 
> community may do so in developing spam filtering standards, civil society 
> may do so in developing human rights based principles for judging 
> government surveillance practices, and even the private sector may do so, 
> say in setting prices for the trading of IPv4 addresses.
>
>
>
> This also implies that the appropriate mechanism of governance may differ 
> in each case, eg. laws, standards, markets.  The above all follows 
> naturally if you accept that there are no fixed stakeholder roles, because 
> the appropriate roles will differ depending on the circumstances.
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> BTW, the German government has the following to say in its submission to 
> NetMundial
>
> ...
>
> Do you for instance agree to the above formulation, or NOT...
>
>
>
> Nope, don't agree with the German government's formulation because it 
> maintains the fallacy of fixed stakeholder roles.
>
>
>
> --
>
> Jeremy Malcolm PhD LLB (Hons) B Com
>
> Internet lawyer, ICT policy advocate, geek
>
> host -t NAPTR 5.9.8.5.2.8.2.2.1.0.6.e164.org|awk -F! '{print $3}'
>
>
>
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>
>
>
> bsp;
>
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