[governance] Need to work towards improving the charter (was Re: Procedural rules for amendment of the charter)

[ian.peter at ianpeter.com]

Totally agree with you Norbert as regards problems with the charter. 
However I think in a context where we dont have coordinator elections up 
to date, and we dont have a website available (let alone no appeals 
team, and probably no refresh of cscg for some time) it might be a less 
urgent task. But happy to engage on this when we get our basic structure 
back together again!

Ian



------ Original Message ------
From: "Norbert Bollow" <nb at bollow.ch>
To: governance at lists.riseup.net
Sent: 20/07/2019 9:26:56 PM
Subject: [governance] Need to work towards improving the charter (was 
Re: Procedural rules for amendment of the charter)

>On Fri, 19 Jul 2019 20:04:19 +0000
>"ian.peter at ianpeter.com" <ian.peter at ianpeter.com> wrote:
>
>>  Thanks for making that all clear Norbert. In fact I believe the last
>>  attempted charter amendments failed, despite a 70 for, 4 against vote
>>  - because the number of voters did not equate with the requisite 2/3
>>  percentage of "members" . So that area is difficult and best left to
>>  one side for now.
>
>I agree that charter amendments are difficult.
>
>They may however be less difficult than what the above-cited experience
>might indicate: If I remember correctly, the amendment proposal in that
>failed attempt was for a relatively minor change. There wasn't much
>opposition, but it also wasn't seen as a vitally needed, important
>change. I think that the situation might be different for a charter
>amendment proposal where for at least some of the proposed changes, it
>is broadly agreed that the changes are absolutely needed for important
>reasons. Such a proposal would in my view have a much better chance of
>passing the threshold of 2/3 positive votes.
>
>In any case I don't agree that the difficulty of charter amendments
>implies that it would therefore be wise to avoid thinking about
>amending the charter.
>
>If we want a large umbrella caucus where all civil society voices on
>Internet governance are welcome, and where on that basis constructive
>consensus-seeking discourse takes place, then I believe something needs
>to be done to effectively address the problem of the dysfunctional
>patterns of interaction which have plagued this community in the past.
>
>When I was a co-coordinator some time ago, I tried to do this on the
>basis of the principles and mechanisms and procedures which are
>defined in the current charter. That failed pretty dramatically, in
>that it actually caused those dysfunctional patterns of interaction to
>become worse. Other co-coordinators have largely ignored what the
>Charter says on those matters. In that way, they have at least been
>able to avoid those counterintentional effects. But the problem remains
>unsolved, and I don't think that it can be solved in IGC without
>amending its charter.
>
>Greetings,
>Norbert
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