[governance] Towards an Internet Social Forum

Thu Feb 5 13:06:37 EST 2015

Good observation David... the issue is that when we were drafting the Delhi
Declaration it never occurred to any of us that there would be the
full-throated attack on democracy that is now evident as the underlying
basis and intent of multi-stakeholderism.  Certainly not one that would come
from within Civil Society.  

So it never occurred to us that we needed to spell out what seemed to us to
be the quite self-evident principle that democracy was the basis of all
sovereignty, that national sovereignty derived its legitimacy from it being
based on popular democracy and the absence of popular democracy doesn't mean
that the principle fails it simply means that it hasn't as yet been (fully)
realized. 

In the real world of course, where decisions are being made, the question
becomes as you are posing it--do we abandon the democratic principle even
though it is not fully realized and is in many cases only aspirational or do
we accept that ultimately global decision making will be a mix of democratic
values, the national articulation of democratic values and aspirations and
national representations of national interests many or most of (the latter
of) which pay only nominal attention to the democratic aspirations of their
people.  That is do we abandon democracy in favour of governance by elites?

There are to my knowledge no countries on earth which do not have some form
of democratic and representative structures in place.  The degree to which
these are truly democratic and representative (and transparent and
accountable) varies of course enormously but in many instances they are all
that is available and they do provide the on-going opportunity for realizing
the aspirations for popular sovereignty in these countries as others.

The intent that you seem to be arguing for is to abandon "democratic"
structures and aspirations in favour of self-directed governance by elites
with no effective measures for representivity, transparency or
accountability in that governance structure.

It seems to me that it is you who should be providing an explanation and
rationale for the principles of non-democracy and the anti-democratic
aspirations and values of multi-stakeholder decision making which go against
several thousand years of human history and the values and aspirations of
the vast and overwhelming majority of the global population.

Finally, I fail to see how the organizational form of the JNC as a free
association of its members and supporters or of its individual or
organizational supporters is of any relevance in this or any similar
discussion.  If folks of like mind choose to get together to advocate for a
particular set of norms and values how does that differ from any other free
association in a democratic structure.

M

-----Original Message-----
From: David Cake [mailto:dave at difference.com.au] 
Sent: Thursday, February 05, 2015 7:12 AM
To: governance at lists.igcaucus.org; michael gurstein
Cc: Avri Doria
Subject: Re: [governance] Towards an Internet Social Forum

On 5 Feb 2015, at 1:54 pm, michael gurstein <gurstein at gmail.com> wrote:

> Ahh David, I think you have got it wrong certainly for me and I would
guess for the JNC.
>  
> I, at least, believe in the sovereign right of the people not of 
> nations (or governments or states

	The JNC position at WGEC was to retain article 35 of the Tunis
Agenda, which states
	 Policy authority for Internet-related public policy issues is the
sovereign right of States. They have rights and responsibilities for
international Internet-related public policy issues
	And as far as I am aware nothing has changed. 

	Now, Michael, I have absolutely no issue with you dissenting from
the JNC position, but the JNC position certainly appears to be that they
support the sovereign right of states over internet policy. 

> In some instances this sovereign right is able to be exercised through
the democratic processes governing the actions of nations in other
instances (dictatorships, autocracies, oligarchies, etc.) this is not
possible.  This latter case doesnt remove the sovereign right of the people
nor is it transferred in these instances to the nation, rather these
sovereign rights await appropriate means/modalities for a democratic
execution.

	Which is a reasonable position (though I feel it translates very
poorly to any sort of intergovernmental process), it just does not appear to
be the JNC position. The JNC position as of WGEC was to support the
sovereign right of states regardless of their democratic status. And JNC
explicitly took this position without support from other civil society
participants, but with the support of Saudi Arabia and Iran. 

> And, now that I think about it, with the formation of the NMI one can 
> start talking simply about elites as the governing structures of 
> these multi-stakeholder processes 

	Do you think the civil society representatives on NMI are elites? In
what sense? 

> Of course, these folks are self-selected in their governance role while
their being elites derives from their position of power in various
economic, political and social structures or as courtiers to those who do.

	It is odd indeed how much JNC representatives accuse everyone else
of being self-selected as a criticism. JNC seems to have their share of
members who represent organisations with a very small membership that exist
for no purpose other than to be vehicles for Internet governance
participation. 	

	Regards

		Davids

> M
>  
> From: David Cake [mailto:dave at difference.com.au]
> Sent: Wednesday, February 04, 2015 5:50 PM
> To: governance at lists.igcaucus.org; michael gurstein
> Cc: Avri Doria
> Subject: Re: [governance] Towards an Internet Social Forum
>  
>  
> On 2 Feb 2015, at 9:07 pm, michael gurstein <gurstein at gmail.com> wrote:
> 
> 
> Errr
 yes, there is a fundamental difference between those who believe in
and the democratic governance of the Internet and those who believe in the
governance of the Internet by a self-appointed (multistakeholder) elite.
>  
>  
>             JNC supports the sovereign special rights of undemocratic
nations too, as you are well aware Michael. Until JNC addresses that, all
this talk of democracy raises more questions than it answers. 
>  
>             And of course, we now understand self appointed elite to be
JNC speak for those who choose to show up to open fora. The JNC attitude,
given the number of decisions it makes without even consulting with civil
society colleagues, would seem to be that they should do the appointing. I
make no apology for not being very keen on that. 
>            
>             David
> 
> 
> M
>  
> From: governance-request at lists.igcaucus.org 
> [mailto:governance-request at lists.igcaucus.org] On Behalf Of Avri Doria
> Sent: Monday, February 02, 2015 1:50 AM
> To: governance at lists.igcaucus.org
> Subject: Re: [governance] Towards an Internet Social Forum
>  
> Hi,
> 
> While i think it would be lovely if Civil society could speak with one
voice, given the fundamental differences between those who support
multistakeholder distributed mechanisms on Internet policy issues and those
who support sovereign special rights on international Internet public policy
issues, it seems highly unlikely.
> 
> On some ancillary issues we may reach a consensus, but on the most
fundamental, that is unlikely.  I think IGC should focus on those other
issues, such as modality for open participation etc where we made indeed be
able to speak in a common voice and perhaps able to influence things in a
direction the various camps can all accept.  While I accept using the IGC as
a discussion place for the larger issues, I do not think we should expect to
reach consensus on these issues.
> 
> avri
> 
> 
> 
> On 01-Feb-15 13:01, "Kleinwächter, Wolfgang" wrote:
> Hi
>  
> thx. for the discussion.
>  
> The "speak with one voice" question can be easily answered: It is the
outcome of a process where different CS groups participate in a bottom up
open, transparent and inclusive drafting process and agree on common languge
around a number of issues. This has been possible in the past from the CS
WSIS 2003 declaration via numerous statements in CSTD, IGF, UNESCO, ITU/WTPF
and others.  This was workable on the basis of a principle which was
inspired by Jon Postels RFC 793."Be conservative in what you send, be
liberal in what you accept". 
>  
> If the various CS Groups return to RFC 793, there is a good chance to
reach rough consensus among the various groups so that we can speak
seriously with "one" voice in the WSIS 10+  process, knowing that this "one
voice" is based on a broad variety of different nuances but is united around
basic values as human rights, equality , justice, access, knowledge,
brdiging the digital divide etc. ..
>  
> Wolfgang
>  
>  
>  
> -----Ursprüngliche Nachricht-----
> Von: governance-request at lists.igcaucus.org im Auftrag von Mawaki 
> Chango
> Gesendet: So 01.02.2015 10:24
> An: Internet Governance; Norbert Bollow
> Betreff: Re: [governance] Towards an Internet Social Forum
>  
> On Sun, Feb 1, 2015 at 7:34 AM, Norbert Bollow <nb at bollow.ch> wrote:
>  
> ...
>  WK is
> calling for civil society to "speak with one voice".
>  
> So I find it natural to ask how it would be determined what this "one 
> voice" says concretely!
>  
>  
> I find this question one of the most critical questions we are faced with.
> It pertains to the same problem and observation that previously led me 
> to state that IGC does not have just ONE voice. Interesting enough, 
> you
> (Norbert) replied the following which I don't disagree with but just 
> wasn't the issue implied by my statement.
>  
> On Mon, Jan 26, 2015 at 3:48 PM, Norbert Bollow <nb at bollow.ch> wrote:
>  
>  
> On Mon, 26 Jan 2015 12:03:20 +0000
> Mawaki Chango <kichango at gmail.com> wrote:
>  
> In other words, IGC which is also a CSCG member is certainly not one 
> voice.
>  
> In fact, despite all its shortcomings (which include the fact that 
> what the Charter says about enforcing the posting rules is not being 
> done, and may in fact be impossible to do) IGC. i.e. this list, right 
> now is still the best place to go to when desiring a broad discussion 
> inclusive of the whole variety of civil society viewpoints.
>  
>  
> So the question is How and When can IGC have a unique/common/united 
> voice (you choose your preferred adjective)?
> Part of it is the representation-accountability dimension which seems 
> to be what you're concerned with here (and yes, while mentioning the 
> non-enforcement of posting rules in passing.) But the other big part 
> is
> this: What will it take for members to accept that their views, no 
> matter how strong they feel about them, may not carry the day (and 
> they certainly cannot always
> do)
> and still allow the group to make a decision while keeping peace and 
> trust among us? This applies to all sides of our worldview spectrum.
>  
> In my opinion, this question cluster is the million dollars knot for 
> IGC to untie (solve) in order to be functional again.
>  
> Mawaki
>  
>  
> In particular, some kind of credible plan would be needed to prevent 
> such a determination from being made on behalf of civil society as a 
> whole in a way that in reality might be significantly less inclusive 
> than it would claim to be.
>  
> Greetings,
> Norbert
>  
>  
>  
>  
> 
> 
> 
> 
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