[At-Large] GNSO Council Motion on Cross-Community Working Groups

[Avri Doria]

Hi Bill, 

Thanks for asking.

I recommend a vote against for several reasons

- Proposed in the GNSO without consultation with others.   Certainly does not show a willingness to work with others in an open environment - only willing when it is in an environment that it controls with a veto.  That isn't cooperation.  The GNSO really needs to learn how to work nicely with others.  If anything, having come up with a draft, they should be vetting it with their possible partners.

- Misunderstands  GNSO's own WG methodology.  All WGs are already open to all community members already.  The only difference about a CCWG is that  it has more than 1 chartering organization.  Each chartering organization should be able to get what it wants out of the joint work.  The ALAC may want to give advice, the GAC may want to give by-laws qualified advice, the GNSO may want to propose policy and the ccNSO may just want to share information.  What is the problem with this?  

- The GNSO's. or anyone else's, position on the outcomes from a CCWG should not be limited by any other SO or AC.    Yes, if several groups can come to a general SOAC consensus, that is wonderful and should be a goal whenever possible.  But it must not be a requirement.

- Each group should be able to do what it wants with the results of a CWG.  The Board is clever enough to be able to weigh the information it gets and know what it means.

- Nothing that calls itself cross-community should be structured in a way that allows any one of the sub-groups a veto.  In my view makes cooperation impossible.

This reads like a practice for subordinating any group that the GNSO decides to interact with.  And that, to me, seems inappropriate behavior by one stakeholder in a multi-stakeholder organization.


thanks

avri


On 17 Jan 2012, at 15:57, William Drake wrote:

> Hi
> 
> Any views from NCSG would be most helpful…
> 
> Bill
> 
> Begin forwarded message:
> 
>> From: William Drake <william.drake at uzh.ch>
>> Date: January 17, 2012 9:23:15 PM GMT+01:00
>> To: ALAC List Internal <alac-internal at atlarge-lists.icann.org>
>> Cc: At Large Worldwide <at-large at atlarge-lists.icann.org>
>> Subject: [At-Large] GNSO Council Motion on Cross-Community Working Groups
>> Reply-To: At-Large Worldwide <at-large at atlarge-lists.icann.org>
>> 
>> Hi,
>> 
>> As NCUC liaison to At Large I thought I should bring the following to your attention.
>> 
>> Some here may recall that there was quite a bit of controversy and debate in the GNSO Council last year about the formation and operation of cross community working groups.  This arose in particular with regard to the JAS process, various aspects of which stimulated a range of concerns across the three industry SGs.  Without reliving all the back and forth, these included perceptions that the GNSO's role in policy development was being usurped or at least nibbled at, concerns about the channels and procedures through which JAS progress was reported out and the board responded, the extent to which the chartering organizations should operate in synch, and so on. In consequence, there has been a widespread desire among these SGs to lay down clear rules of the road to regulate how CWGs function.   In Council discussions NCUC members argued for maintaining some flexibility and subsidiarity to avoid tying hands too much, and noted inter alia that if we'd followed a strictly regula!
>> tory approach ALAC would not have been able to help move the JAS process along when the GNSO was, well, moving slower.  It would be fair to say that we were pretty much alone in these views.
>> 
>> In October, the Council launched a drafting team to propose guiding principles for CWGs going forward that would respond to the various concerns.  That team has now completed its work and a motion to approve its Principles is on the agenda of our 19 January meeting. https://community.icann.org/display/gnsocouncilmeetings/Motions+19+January+2012
>> 
>> People may wish to have a look at the Principles http://gnso.icann.org/drafts/draft-principles-for-cwgs-23dec11-en.pdf, which specify that all SO/ACs involved should adopt and follow a single joint charter for CWGs, that CWGs outputs do not express community consensus per se, and so on.
>> 
>> If there are any views that people would like to have noted in the Council discussion and vote, please let me know asap.
>> 
>> Thanks,
>> 
>> Bill
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> ***************************************************
>> William J. Drake
>> International Fellow & Lecturer
>> Media Change & Innovation Division, IPMZ
>> University of Zurich, Switzerland
>> william.drake at uzh.ch
>> www.mediachange.ch/people/william-j-drake
>> www.williamdrake.org
>> ****************************************************
>> 
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