GNSO Improvements - Bd Gov Committee Report

[Robin Gross]

NCUC'rs:

The Board Governance Committee working group has published its Report  
of recommendations for GNSO Improvements (see below).  It is largely  
good news for non-commercial users, and not much different than the  
earlier draft report.

In particular, the report recommends the restructuring of  
constituencies into 4 broad stake-holder groups: registrars (4  
votes), registries (4 votes), commercial users (4 votes) and non- 
commercial users (4 votes).  The GNSO Council would additionally have  
the 3 NomCom reps, making a council of 19.  There is a minority view  
that commercial users should have 5 votes and non-commercial users  
should be given only 3 votes.  Surely there will a massive campaign  
from industry to supply comments to ICANN that it deserves more votes  
than non-commercial users, so it important for those concerned about  
the rights of non-commercial users to also submit comments on this  
issue.

The full board still must vote on the recommendations, so it is not a  
done-deal yet, but it looks promising.

Best,
Robin



GNSO Improvements
Summary of the Report of the Board Governance Committee GNSO Review  
Working Group on GNSO Improvements, 3 February 2008 [PDF, 16K]
Report of the Board Governance Committee GNSO Review Working Group on  
GNSO Improvements, 3 February 2008 [PDF, 195K]
Report Annexes
On 30 March 2007, the Board created a working group of the Board  
Governance Committee (“BGC”), comprising current and former Board  
members, to oversee improvements to the Generic Supporting Names  
Organization (GNSO). [Its members are Roberto Gaetano (Chair), Rita  
Rodin, Vanda Scartezini, Tricia Drakes, Raimundo Beca, Susan  
Crawford, and Vittorio Bertola.] The purpose of the "BGC GNSO Review  
Working Group" ("BGC WG") is to consider the independent reviews  
conducted by the London School of Economics Public Policy Group and  
others to determine whether, in general, the GNSO has a continuing  
purpose in the ICANN structure and, if so, whether any change in  
structure or operations is desirable to improve its effectiveness.  
The Board charged the BGC WG with recommending a comprehensive  
proposal to improve the effectiveness of the GNSO, including its  
policy activities, structure, operations and communications.

This effort is part of ICANN's ongoing commitment to its evolution  
and improvement, which includes a comprehensive schedule for  
independent review of ICANN's structures, as well as of the Board.  
The reviews are intended to ensure an independent examination of the  
role and operation of key elements of ICANN. These reviews are  
conducted in an objective manner by independent evaluators, under  
guidance from the Board on each review's terms of reference, and with  
the opportunity for public comment on the results of the reviews.

The GNSO Improvements Report (Report) linked here [PDF, 195K] and  
summarized below reflects the BGC WG's examination of many aspects of  
the GNSO's functioning, including the use of working groups and the  
overall policy development process (PDP), and the structure of the  
GNSO Council and its constituencies. The Working Group has been  
guided by several key objectives, including:

Maximizing the ability for all interested stakeholders to participate  
in the GNSO's processes;
Ensuring recommendations can be developed on gTLD "consensus  
policies" for Board review, and that the subject matter of "consensus  
policies" is clearly defined;
Ensuring policy development processes are based on thoroughly- 
researched, well-scoped objectives, and are run in a predictable  
manner that yields results that can be implemented effectively; and
Improving communications and administrative support for GNSO objectives.
Above all, the Working Group has sought ways to improve inclusiveness  
and representativeness in the GNSO's work, while increasing its  
effectiveness and efficiency. The BGC WG's deliberations have  
achieved consensus on a comprehensive set of recommendations that  
addresses five main areas outlined below.

Summary of GNSO Improvements Report

Adopting a Working Group Model: A working group model should become  
the focal point for policy development and enhance the policy  
development process by making it more inclusive and representative,  
and – ultimately – more effective and efficient. This approach can be  
a more constructive way of establishing areas of agreement than task  
forces, where membership is limited and discussion can become  
polarized along constituency lines. It also enables key parties to  
become involved in the beginning and work together to address complex  
or controversial issues. Appointing skilled chairs and drafters, as  
well as proper scoping of the WG’s objectives, will be integral parts  
of development of a successful model. Steps should be taken  
immediately to move to a working group model for future policy  
development work, developing appropriate operating principles, rules  
and procedures that can draw upon expertise gained from policy  
development in the IETF, W3C, RIRs and other organizations.

Revising the PDP: The PDP needs to be revised to make it more  
effective and responsive to ICANN’s policy development needs. It  
should be brought in-line with the time and effort actually required  
to develop policy, and made consistent with ICANN’s existing  
contracts (including, but not limited to, clarifying the appropriate  
scope of GNSO “consensus policy” development). While the procedure  
for developing “consensus policies” will need to continue to be  
established by the Bylaws as long as required by ICANN’s contracts,  
the GNSO Council and Staff should propose new PDP rules for the  
Board’s consideration and approval that contain more flexibility. The  
new rules should emphasize the importance of the preparation that  
must be done before launch of a working group or other activity, such  
as public discussion, fact-finding, and expert research in order to  
define properly the scope, objective and schedule for a specific  
policy development goal, and the development of metrics for measuring  
success.

Restructuring the GNSO Council: The Council should move away from  
being a legislative body concerned primarily with voting towards  
becoming a smaller, more focused strategic entity, composed of four  
broad stakeholder groups, with strengthened management and oversight  
of the policy development process, term limits for members of the  
Council, the elimination of weighted voting and a training and  
development curriculum for Council members. The BGC WG deliberated  
extensively as to the most appropriate way to restructure  
constituency representation on the Council. We recommend a 19-person  
Council consisting of 16 elected members, four from each of four  
stakeholder groups, with two of these groups representing those  
parties “under contract” with ICANN, namely registries (4 seats) and  
registrars (4 seats). These we refer to as “ICANN contracted  
parties.” The other two stakeholder groups will represent those who  
are “affected by the contracts” (“ICANN non-contracted parties”),  
including commercial registrants (4 seats) and non-commercial  
registrants (4 seats). In addition, three Councilors would be  
appointed by the Nominating Committee (pending conclusion of the  
NomCom Improvement process). In addition, as the Council moves from  
being a legislative body to a strategic manager overseeing policy  
development, the current emphasis on formal voting should be  
significantly reduced.

A minority of Working Group members suggests explicitly recommending  
that "ICANN non-contracted parties" be apportioned into 5 seats for  
commercial registrants and 3 seats for non-commercial registrants.

An additional minority view suggests -- as stated in the Working  
Group's previous report -- that the GNSO Council should have the  
flexibility to propose an alternative configuration of the  
stakeholder groups that comprise the "ICANN non-contracted parties"  
side, provided that such alternative is submitted with sufficient  
notice to permit the Board to vote on the proposal at the Paris ICANN  
meeting in June 2008. Conversely, if no alternative proposal is  
forwarded to the Board within this timeframe, the configuration  
proposed above should be implemented.

Enhancing Constituencies: Constituency procedures and operations  
should become more transparent, accountable and accessible. The Board  
should ask the GNSO constituencies to work with staff to develop  
participation rules and operating procedures for all constituencies  
that set certain minimum standards regarding the importance of  
transparency and accountability. The criteria for participation in  
any ICANN constituency should be objective, standardized and clearly  
stated. In addition, Staff should work with each of the  
constituencies to develop global, targeted outreach programs aimed at  
increasing participation and interest in the GNSO policy process,  
including information on the option to self-form new constituencies.

Improving Communication and Coordination with ICANN Structures: There  
should be more frequent contact and communication between the GNSO  
Council, GNSO constituencies and the members the Council elects to  
the Board, and among the Chairs of the GNSO, other Supporting  
Organizations (SOs) and Advisory Committees (ACs), especially in  
advance of each ICANN Meeting. The Council and the GNSO  
constituencies should consider additional ways in which the GNSO can  
further improve communication, cooperation and coordination with  
other ICANN structures.

The Report describes our recommendations and rationale in detail. We  
believe there is broad and strong support for changes in the  
functioning of the GNSO, based on input from GNSO participants and  
other members of the ICANN community. While the need to update and  
improve the GNSO is not disputed, there is no magical set of  
proposals that could be received without controversy or opposition.  
We have therefore balanced, as best we can, different – and sometimes  
competing – interests in order to formulate recommendations on the  
basis of what we believe can benefit the ICANN community as a whole.  
The GNSO improvements process is evolutionary and is intended to  
reflect the importance of the GNSO to ICANN and to build upon the  
GNSO’s successes to-date.

Next Steps:

This report has been submitted to the full Board Governance Committee  
(BGC) for its consideration, and is being posted for public  
information. If approved by the BGC, this report will be submitted  
for Board action after a public comment period. If approved by the  
Board, staff will be directed to develop an implementation plan in  
consultation with the community.

As the community and the Board consider the proposals outlined in the  
Report, it is important to keep in mind that this is an evolutionary  
process intended to reflect the importance of the GNSO to ICANN and  
to build upon the GNSO’s successes to date.

Background Documents

LSE Recommendations (2006)
Summary of Public Comments on LSE Recommendations
Sharry Recommendations (2004) (“Appendix 5: Summary of recommendations”)
GNSO Self Review Recommendations (2004) (“Section 10. Summary and  
recommendations,” in Annex 3 of Sharry Review)
BGC WG Board Resolution
BGC GNSO Review Working Group’s June 2007 Working Draft on GNSO  
Improvements
Summary
Working Draft
25 June 2007 Public Forum on GNSO Improvements
Summary
Transcripts
BGC GNSO Review Working Group’s October 2007 Draft Report on GNSO  
Improvements
Draft Report
Summary of Public Comments on Draft Document
29 October 2007 Public Forum on GNSO Improvements
Summary of Comments
Transcripts
Summary of On-line Public Comments




IP JUSTICE
Robin Gross, Executive Director
1192 Haight Street, San Francisco, CA  94117  USA
p: +1-415-553-6261    f: +1-415-462-6451
w: http://www.ipjustice.org     e: robin at ipjustice.org



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