[governance] Roles and Responsibilities - CSTD working group on enhanced cooperation

[Avri Doria]

On 02-May-14 16:19, Suresh Ramasubramanian wrote:
> I hope the other civil society representatives on the WG immediately
> reiterated their opposition to paragraph 35?


I do not think anyone in the room doubted my opinion on the issue.  I
have been arguing this case since the WGIG days when I was informed that
it was already agreed language and sacred.  It was my first experience
in 2004 with the phenomena of unchangeable language.

One of the things that has amazed me is the complete unwillingness of
most governments to discuss this.  Though this time the Swedish
representative did show a lot of flexibility, it is the first time I
have seen that and was very impressed and pleased.  I think other
governments were willing to accept language like "acknowledging that
different stakeholders have different roles and responsibilities
depending on the issue and other circumstances" thus moving away from
the sacred language while still allowing that of course governments have
some roles and responsibilities that were specifically gov't roles - for
example legislation, treaties or putting people in jail for infringing
the rights of others.  Thogh even in these I insist that CS has a seat
at the table and must be consulted and allow to discuss the issues - it
is just that unless there is a direct democracy or referendum system the
decision rests with representatives or monarchs.

And that is a funny clue, that interesting enough Richard Hill helped me
understand, it seems that some of the gov'ts may think that we argue
against this because we don't accept their sovereign right to make laws
withing their geographical designations, as opposed to being because
they put everybody in a box of gov't choosing without consulting us and
limited the role of CS to local affairs.  I have tried to make clear
that personally I think that the sovereign rights of a  country are the
problem (except for when they go against HR) of the people living in the
country.  E.G. some of them are happy with monarchies because it makes
them feel safe and protected, and that is not my problem unless the
attack other countries or violate the human rights of their subjects or
others.

Rambled enough on this topic.

avri

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