Re: #18 Stress of GAC Consensus advice Dear Steve, With the hindsight of the call, your example reminds me of the .wine and .vin case. so it goes beyond a theoretical test. a) I think the case you are discussing is a question of the different layers of representation (all under accountability of course) The GAC has representation at the Board level The GAC has more or less representation at the NomCom level, depending on recent proposal The GAC has earlier engagement at the policy level and late advice at the Board level The GAC has in general the same weight as all SO/ACs, or doesn’t it? b) the we are talking about there internal rules Their bylaws about consensus decision making In the .wine and .vin case there was no consensus. I have problems in using such specific cases of stress cases under general “accountability” title and try to solve it just by changes in the bylaws. I think it needs a little bit more structural analysis if all SO/ACs have the same weight (consensus based or not) at all levels,in all processes, at all times or not. I f we just start limiting how to change internal issues in the GAC we might face larger inconsistencies further down the road. Carlos Raul Gutierrez GNSO Council
On Feb 16, 2015, at 2:42 PM, Steve DelBianco <sdelbianco@netchoice.org> wrote:
Cheryl — attached is an updated version 4 of our stress test document. Give it a look and you may decide it’s worth circulating before our call Tuesday.
First, I made the updates that came up during our working session Thursday morning in Singapore.
Second, I added application of stress test #18 in Category IV (see page 3). This is a stress test regarding GAC Advice:
18. Governments in ICANN’s Government Advisory Committee (GAC) amend their operating procedures to change from consensus decisions to majority voting for advice to ICANN’s board.
Consequence: Under current bylaws, ICANN must consider and respond to GAC advice, even if that advice were not supported by consensus. A majority of governments could thereby approve GAC advice that restricted free online expression, for example.
Existing Accountability Measures: Current ICANN Bylaws (Section XI) give due deference to GAC advice, including a requirement to try and find “a mutually acceptable solution.”
This is required for any GAC advice, not just for GAC consensus advice.
Today, GAC adopts formal advice according to its Operating Principle 47: “consensus is understood to mean the practice of adopting decisions by general agreement in the absence of any formal objection.” But the GAC may at any time change its procedures to use majority voting instead of consensus.
CCWG Proposed Accountability Measures: One proposed measure is to give the community standing to veto a board decision. If ICANN board acquiesced to GAC advice that was not supported by GAC consensus, the community veto could enable reversal of that decision.
Another proposed measure is to amend ICANN bylaws (Section XI 1j) to give due deference only to GAC consensus advice, and add a definition of “consensus”.
The GAC could change its Operating Principle 47 to use majority voting for formal GAC advice, but ICANN bylaws would require due deference only to advice that had GAC consensus.
Best, Steve — Steve DelBianco Executive Director NetChoice http://www.NetChoice.org <http://www.netchoice.org/> and http://blog.netchoice.org <http://blog.netchoice.org/> +1.703.615.6206
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