I'm not sure that I have a problem with the pure concept of stakeholders. What is missing is a sense of balance as you note in your papers, that the end-users of the Internet have more of a stake in its direction than its service providers and profiteers, but the latter get themselves more representation because they have a financial interest to study and exploit any gaps in well-intentioned rules.
In ICANN the inequality isn't even subtle; it's hard-coded. The self-interested have the ability to compel the Board to do their bidding while governments and the public interest (ie, those outside the domain-buying food chain) sit on the sidelines giving easily-ignored advice.
Were the script flipped -- public and state interests in policy-making roles with the self-interested participating as advisors -- the DNS would look very different than it does now. But that genie ain't going back in the bottle.
We'lll have to disagree on the hope. IMO there is absolutely zero incentive for the status quo to relinquish its power and impose accountability on itself. Given a golden opportunity to do so, we got that cruel joke of an "empowered community" which doubled down on the imbalance.
It's my belief at this time, based on how ICANN has used previous opportunities to improve itself, that meaningful reform from within is not possible. The stimulus for change will have to be external -- maybe the EU, maybe the California AG, maybe some chaotic event or action so publicly unpalatable that the non-treaty-bound trust that countries have in ICANN disintegrates. To me that scenario is far more plausible than progress from within. The .ORG debacle was a wake-up call, the next such episode may push the boundary of acceptability too far. When it comes, the threat will not arise from the usual ITU bugaboo, but from some yet-unimagined source.