and in the IETF model, if you don't like an Internet standard you can develop your own version. No one will stop you, but will it reach adoption is another matter. ----- Original Message ----- From: "Karl Auerbach" <karl@cavebear.com> To: "At-Large Worldwide" <at-large@atlarge-lists.icann.org>, "Evan Leibovitch" <evan@telly.org> Sent: Thursday, 19 February, 2009 11:36:23 AM (GMT+1200) Auto-Detected Subject: Re: [At-Large] ICANN PREGUNTAS Evan Leibovitch wrote:
It seems to me -- despite my relative youth in ICANN politics -- that this culture of consensus has simply led to governance by "what offends the least" as opposed to leadership or assertion of even its published mission.
I very much agree with you. (I recognize the irony that by agreeing I am risking the creation of a consensus. ;-) In my year 2000 platform for the board I argued against the use of consensus methods - http://www.cavebear.com/archive/icann-board/platform.htm#voting-not-consensu... If one looks at the fiduciary obligations of a board member one finds that those obligations require that every decision of a board member, whether that decision be for, against, or to abstain, must be made on an informed and independent basis. That requirement for independent decisionmaking by each board member suggests that mooing loudly and going along with the heard, which is one somewhat pejorative definition of consensus, is not consistent with the obligations that board members undertake. It is very hard to make fully independent and informed decisions, particularly when the definition of informed and independent is such that board members can chose to defer to the advice from certain special sources, such as attorneys or accountants - thus, for instance, information from staff can only be used after a mental process in which a board member evaluates the credibility and accuracy of the staff source and accepts the full responsibility upon himself/herself for the decision that is being made. The idea of consensus policy comes from the IETF. It worked in the IETF - and I say "worked" in the past tense because there are signs that it isn't working as well as it once did - when we were a relatively small group with similar educational and socioeconomic backgrounds and the matters before us were very technical and could be tested against the hard and cold reality of the operational internet. That consensus idea does not work well in the political world of ICANN. --karl--