Dear all,
This is a friendly reminder of the call for volunteers as ccNSO appointed member to the CCWG Accountability. The closing date for self-nomination is 28 November 2014, 23.59 UTC.

Please note that one of the questions is: "  a statement of what the candidate sees as being the main objectives that ccTLD operators should be seeking in an IANA transition proposal.”
This should be read as saying: 
  a statement of what the candidate sees as being the main objectives that ccTLD operators should be seeking in Enhancement of ICANN’s Accountability proposal(s). 

Kind regards,
Bart



Call for Nominations for ccTLD Managers to Participate in the Cross-Community Working Group Enhancing ICANN Accountability

 

Summary

At it’s meeting on 20 November 2014, the ccNSO adopted the charter of the Cross Community Working Group Accountability (https://community.icann.org/download/attachments/49359098/Enhancing%20ICANN%20Accountability%20FINAL%20-%20Clean%20-%20Charter%20-%20updated%203%20November%202014.pdf?api=v2)   and will participate as one of the chartering organizations. As chartering organization the ccNSO has been asked to appoint up to five (5) members of the CCWG.  The purpose of this email is to seek nominations for these five (5) places.  The ccNSO Council will appoint the members to the CCWG at a special meeting on 25 September 2014.

Background

On 14 March 2014 the US Department of Commerce’s National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) announced its intent to transition stewardship of the Internet Assigned Numbers Authority (IANA) functions to the global multistakeholder community. The NTIA asked the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN), as the IANA functions contractor and global coordinator for the Domain Name System (DNS), to convene a multistakeholder process to develop a proposal for the transition.  IANA also said that the transition proposal must have broad community support and address the following four principles:

·       Support and enhance the multistakeholder model;

·       Maintain the security, stability, and resiliency of the Internet DNS;

·       Meet the needs and expectation of the global customers and partners of the IANA services; and,

·       Maintain the openness of the Internet.

The NTIA also said that it will not accept a proposal that replaces the NTIA role with a government-led or an inter-governmental organization solution.  Full details of IANA’s announcement are available at: http://www.ntia.doc.gov/press-release/2014/ntia-announces-intent-transition-key-internet-domain-name-functions. 

During discussions around the transition process, the community raised the broader topic of the impact of the change on ICANN's accountability given its historical contractual relationship with the United States and NTIA. Accountability in this context is defined, according to the NETmundial multistakeholder statement, as the existence of mechanisms for independent checks and balances as well as for review and redress.

Statements made by various stakeholders, including the ccNSO Council, suggest that current accountability mechanisms need to be reviewed and, if need be, improved, amended, replaced, or supplemented with new mechanisms (see for instance ATRT recommendations) in light of the changing historic contractual relationship with the U.S. Government. Considering that the NTIA has stressed that it is expecting community consensus regarding the transition, a failure to meet stakeholder expectations with regards to accountability may create a situation where NTIA does not accept the IANA transition proposal as meeting its conditions. Thus reviewing ICANN’s accountability mechanisms was considered to be crucial for the transition process.

The CCWG-Accountability, which charter was adopted by the ccNSO Council, is expected to deliver proposals that would enhance ICANN’s accountability towards all stakeholders, including, but not limited to, the ccTLD community.

Given the tight time-frame under which the IANA Stewardship Transition Proposals need to be developed, and the interdependency of the Stewardship Transition Process and Enhancing ICANN’s Accountability Process, the CCWG-Accountability will have to work as expeditiously as possible to identify those mechanisms that must be in place or committed to before the IANA Stewardship Transition in light of the changing historical contractual relationship with the U.S. Government (Work Stream 1) and those mechanisms for which a timeline for implementation may extend beyond the IANA Stewardship Transition (Work Stream 2).

 

ccTLD Participation in the Cross-Community Working Group

In accordance with the adopted charter of the CCWG Accountability, the ccNSO (as well as each of the other chartering organizations) shall appoint a minimum of 2 and a maximum of 5 members to the working group. The ccNSO Council decided – as usual- that membership of the CCWG is open to all ccTLDs, both ccNSO members and non-ccNSO members. 

In addition, the CCWG will be open to any interested person as an Participants, who may be from the ccNSO, from a stakeholder group not represented in the CCWG, or may be self-appointed. Participants will be able to actively participate in and attend all CCWG meetings. A call for participants will be send out at a later stage.

However, any consensus calls or decisions that need to be made will be limited to CCWG members appointed by the ccNSO and the other chartering organizations, and members are expected to inform their stakeholder group regularly on progress made and seek engagement in the process.

Call for Nominations

The ccNSO Council is seeking nominations from ccTLD managers (independent of ccNSO membership), who might wish to serve as one of the five (5) ccTLD members on the CCWG Accountability.

Candidates are expected to have:

·       A thorough understanding and interest in accountability issues, in particular as they relate to ICANN and from a ccTLD manager’s perspective,

·       Commit to actively participate in the activities of the CCWG on an ongoing and long-term basis; and

·       Where appropriate, solicit and communicate the views and concerns of individuals from the ccTLD community.

·       Effective communication skills in order to represent ccTLD interests on the CCWG and to keep the ccNSO and broader ccTLD community abreast of the state of play in the cross-community group.

Candidates for this role are requested to provide the ccNSO (ccNSOsecretariat@icann.org ) with the following by 28 November 2014, 23.59 UTC).

·       a recent curriculum vitae summarizing background and experience, including that in ccTLD operations, and

·       a statement of what the candidate sees as being the main objectives that ccTLD operators should be seeking in an IANA transition proposal. 

The list of nominations will be made public.

The ccNSO Council will select and appoint the five members on the WG, based on the selection criteria mentioned above and taking into account the diversity of the ccTLD community, including geographical diversity.

Interviews of shortlisted candidates may be conducted.