Evan I agree with you re the elections. I've written a lot about it already, so won't review it all here. Just to say - elections worked well for some people - but not for MOST people who did not participate, know about it, know why it was important, get involved. Having the outreach programme was great and important and one of the main things I got involved in ICANN for. I am quite disappointed about the effective ending of it. I also agree with you about the ExCom - so you are not alone! To me, the solution to ALAC's organisational problems is not to form a small elite group to get things done but rather to look at ways to involve all members and RALOs. Of course time is an issue - if ALAC finds out about something with a very short timeframe, it is impossible to get full participation, but that's better solved by information - finding out what is likely to come up in the future and start working on it before the 45 or 30 or 21 day comment period begins! With regard to the lack of individual user participation in other RALOs - in LAC it was put to a vote of all the people who were invited to the formation meetings and those of us espousing the individual user participation lost. That's democracy at work. I still disagree and think that individual user participation would be great in LACRALO, but that is not the majority view. Evan Leibovitch wrote:
Karl Auerbach wrote:
Yes, it may be a romantic notion (and I certainly don't mind being called a romantic), but it does not seem to me to be all that far fetched. My main objection to direct elections is that it misrepresents the public interest through over-representation by "squeaky wheels", both candidates and voters, who exploit the general-public's boredom and lack of comprehension in ICANN functions almost as much as the vested interests do.
I -- and many other people who I believe to be useful, active participants in today's At-Large -- are only here because we were actively recruited by ICANN. Once upon a time there were excellent outreach programs -- the "on the edges" resources I believe Karl spoke of -- that sought points of view outside of the usual circle of self-selected activitists and ISOC chapters. They looked for a diverse range of people who did not have ICANN policy as a primary focus, yet still understood what it means to the well-being of Internet users. This seems especially of value outside North America and Europe and native English speakers -- ICANN does have a global mandate, yet it's nowhere near that. Even now At-Large has nobody involved from Russia; does that mean that Russians aren't interested in ICANN issues?
People like me are not fulltime ICANN policy wonks, and we could never afford to participate if not for the money ICANN spends on At-Large. In aggregate the ALS policy has partially worked, though it has certainly not realized its potential. It has done a far better job -- so far as I can see -- in energizing the otherwise-disinterested corners of the end-user community in a manner that direct elections did not -- and IMO cannot -- do.
Our year 2000 experience was quite positive once one removes the negative gloss that has been painted over it by those who found the process of debate and elections, and perhaps some of the people elected, to be less dignified and more rough-edged than they felt proper for their image of what ICANN ought to be. Rough edges I can deal with, that is not my objection to direct election. Indeed, sometimes I wish the edges were rougher. In its zeal to be polite and diplomatic, sometimes ALAC stifles itself better than ICANN staff ever could. Of course, some cultures in the world don't work well with hard confrontation -- and while I can accept that fact, I also have the realization that ICANN's vested interests will never be constrained by being asked politely to do the right thing. I'm not sure how to deal with this but I'm not sure that a pure abandonment of ALAC's vision is the answer.
Maybe even more than Karl, I would argue that the presence of the (opaque, unaccountable, unrecallable) NomComm in the selection of ALAC members is a virus designed to keep At-Large civil and tame -- to maintain the "company union" mentality of which you spoke. The continuing role of the NomCom in ALAC is a subtle but real reminder that ICANN does not sufficiently trust At-Large to pick all of its own leaders -- no wonder its policy advice carries so little weight. The NomComm -- with its representation from ICANN's vested-interest constituencies -- is trusted by ICANN to assert the public interest as well as At-Large itself. Imagine my amazement at Westlake's proposal to expand ALAC purely through more NomComm seats...
But let's say that I'm wrong, as I often am, and let's say "let's not do direct elections". That does not rule out a representational system that interposes but one layer of indirection between internet users and seats on ICANN's board of directors. I'd be happy with that kind of system as long as that intermediary layer of representatives are all seated by the action of internet users and that the choices they may make are not excessively constrained. You can see from this logic why I find the layer upon layer of the current ALAC to be an undesirable trait - it puts users too far from the seat of authority.
Well, I can't speak for other RALOs, but the North American one agreed from the outset that individual users must not be penalized for wanting to participate without an ALS to channel through. So people may choose at least one less level removed. It is notable that the current ALAC representative to the Board is a member of NARALO but not through an ALS.
I can defend the presence of the RALO level at least to the extent that the policy development process is so unwieldy, that breaking At-Large up into regions at least allows more personal involvement. This is especially true when English isn't the main local language.
Having said that, my agreement with your desire to keep layers as few as possible has been the prime motivation behind my (seemingly solitary) campaign against ALAC's forming an Executive Committee.
The issue in my mind is the exercise of accountability - how do internet users make sure that ICANN serves to promote their interests. It would be nice if we could somehow brew up an ICANN that could be accountable unto itself with only a limited amount of corrective external pressure from the community of internet users.
"Accountable unto itself" seems the very definition of the NomComm and look what it has given us: a Board that lets the staff run the show and an ALAC with neither the stamina nor respect to fulfil its mandate. Given the pretence that its members are already placed by the NomComm to serve the "public interest", the Board can easily marginalize the "advice" of its own at-large community as being redundant.
How is this "nice"?
- Evan
PS: I want to make clear that my problem with the NomComm participation in ALAC does not extend to my opinion of all the individuals actually placed that way. Some, including the NomComm appointee from my own region, have clearly distinguished themselves. However, I would still prefer that these same individuals would have attained their position through an accountable, recallable, transparent process rather than the one we got.
_______________________________________________ At-Large mailing list At-Large@atlarge-lists.icann.org http://atlarge-lists.icann.org/mailman/listinfo/at-large_atlarge-lists.icann...
At-Large Official Site: http://atlarge.icann.org