[governance] [Members] One view of what happened at the UNESCO conference

[Michael Gurstein]

Richard doesn't subscribe to either of these lists so I'm passing this along
on his behalf.

Please note that the issue of the suppression of the terminology of
"democracy" in the UNESCO statement is not simply about words.  It is more
directly about the attempt to suppress or replace democratic practice with
multistakeholderism initially in areas of Internet Governance but (based on
published USG documents) in a wide range of global (and presumably other)
decision making processes.  Thus the "red line" that was crossed by various
parties (presumably by some, without thinking through its significance) in
agreeing to or supporting this suppression process is of much deeper and
wider ranging significance than one isolated document in a flurry of other
documents. 

I would expect, given this and the below that various individuals and
organizations particularly but not exclusively in civil society might wish
to disavow themselves of the Outcome Statement and thus disassociate
themselves from this blatant attempt at shifting the global decision making
paradigm from one that is based on a foundation of democratic norms and
aspirations to one anchored in elite based multi-stakeholder decision
processes.

M

-----Original Message-----
From: Members [mailto:members-bounces at justnetcoalition.org] On Behalf Of
Richard Hill
Sent: March 6, 2015 12:53 PM
To: members at justnetcoalition.org
Subject: [Members] One view of what happened at the UNESCO conference

Dear all,

Here is the chronological account of what I experienced happened at the
UNESCO Connecting the Dots Conference. I have the various E-Mails referred
to below, in case anybody wants to see them.  I also have a record of the
amendments that I proposed verbally.

I only kept careful track of my interventions and comments regarding my
interventions, so I focus on that here. But other JNC members made
interventions. So they may wish to add to this record of what happened.

3 March, 18h30: during the drafting group session, I proposed text changes
to ensure that the references to human rights referred to all human rights,
not just some, and to include the word democracy. There was no opposition to
my proposals regarding human rights. Jeremy Malcolm objected to the
inclusion of democracy on the grounds that it brought in baggage. The US
supported Jeremy's objection.

I had informal conversations with Jeremy and the US after the session.
Jeremy listened but didn't say much. The US said that they could not accept
inclusion of democracy because it could refer to multi-lateral. I asked them
to provide alternate language. They said they were not prepared to do that.

3 March, 19h15: E-mail from R. Hill suggesting that the preamble of the
outcome statement refer to all human rights, not just some. Exact text was
proposed.

3 March, 20h15: E-mail from R. Hill stating that democracy is a fundamental
right and so should be reflected in the outcome statement. I suggested two
possible formulations.

4 March, 08h05: E-Mail from R. Hill again stating that democracy is
fundamental and proposing an alternative way of incorporating the concept.

4 March, 08h10: E-Mail from R. Hill confirming the previous proposal to
reword to reflect that all human rights must be respected, not just some.

4 March, 11h15: during breakout session 16, Options for Future Action-2, I
brought up the democracy issue, stating that it is a fundamental right and
that it should be included in the outcome statement. There were no
objections and the chairman agreed to present this to the last plenary
session.

4 March, 13h00: during the drafting group session, I presented the proposals
regarding human rights and democracy. There were no objections to my
proposals regarding human rights. There was one statement of support for my
proposal regarding democracy, and only one objection. Sweden objected to its
inclusion stating that the term "is ill-defined and adds a lot of baggage".
Much later, towards the end of the session, the US stated that it supported
Sweden regarding not including democracy.

At this session, there were numerous interventions from civil society to
improve the language regarding privacy, intermediary liability, and other
topics; and to add network neutrality. I supported the suggestions to
strengthen the language regarding privacy. New Zealand and the US objected
to making changes regarding privacy. There were objections regarding network
neutrality. I don't recall that any opposition was expressed regarding the
other changes. I was operating under the assumption that silence implied
consent so, given the short amount of time allocated to the session, I
didn't make interventions to support proposals for which there were no
objections.

After the session, I informed Anriette that including democracy was a
red-line issue for JNC. She said that not including it was a red-line issue
for many member states. They had sent their comments by E-Mail to the
secretariat, so they were not public.

4 March, 14h00: at the plenary session, the chairman of breakout session 16
did not mention the democracy issue in his summary of the session. I took
the floor to state that the topic had been discussed and that the session
had agreed to present it to plenary, with a recommendation that "democracy"
be included in the outcome statement. The chairman confirmed that this was
correct. There were no objections or comments from the floor. In my view,
consequently, the plenary had accepted inclusion of democracy in the outcome
statement.

After the session, I informed the secretariat that inclusion of democracy
was a red-line issue for JNC and suggested that we try to find compromise
language. The secretariat said that they would see what they could do, but
never got back to me.

4 March 15h40: the final draft became available. Democracy was not included,
nor were any of the other changes requested by me and JNC, nor were many of
the changes proposed by civil society. The proposed changes to avoid "cherry
picking" of human rights were not included, even though no opposition to
those changes had been expressed in the drafting sessions.

I again informed the secretariat that the non-inclusion of democracy was not
acceptable for JNC, so that we would be forced to make a statement of formal
opposition. The secretariat attempted to convince me not do to that. I said
that I had no choice.

4 March 16h00: at the final plenary, the chairman introduced the outcome
statement. I raised my hand. The chairman and secretariat must have seen it,
but the chairman proposed to proceed directly to approval. I was forced to
speak up to ask for the floor. The chairman gave me the floor and I made my
statement of opposition. After that, the chairman declared that the outcome
statement had been approved by consensus.







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