Hi On Sep 3, 2009, at 12:32 AM, Bruce Tonkin wrote:
Hello Tim,
But my suggestion is that the topic be Accountability.
That would certainly be useful at some point. There have indeed been some proposals that were prepared by a President's advisory committee, but there hasn't really been an open community discussion on the topic at an ICANN meeting. The topic seems to get more discussion at USA hearings on the JPA, and IGF discussion forums under the topic of Internet Governance generally.
NCUC strongly favors making accountability the focus, inter alia for the reasons Bruce mentions. Moreover, it's probably a more effective counterproposal to the GAC than malicious conduct.
Part of the issue is defining what is meant by accountability by the various parties raising that issue.
Do they mean accountable to a Government or Governments, or do they mean accountability to the ICANN community - ie accountable to "members' in some way? Sometimes it seems to me that parties mean accountable to someone that they can influence :-)
Defining the topic narrowly will inevitably leave some parties feeling that their chief concerns about accountability are not being addressed. It would be better to have a structured discussion that addresses the different dimensions in turn. And in this context (probably this is a rather orthogonal view), given the larger global political debates---not only on JPA and in the IGF, but also in intergovernmental settings like CSTD/ECOSOC and the ITU (where the secretariat and quite a lot of governments are getting pretty aggressive about expanding its role in many aspects of Internet governance)---I would not side-step taking on the question of "accountability to governments" just because people find it odious. Actually, I think that's a good reason to take it on. On Sep 2, 2009, at 2:10 AM, Adrian Kinderis wrote:
I am sick and tired of the GAC throwing stones from a distance and not getting their hands dirty.
So let's suggest a topic on which they would feel compelled to get their hands dirty, and thrash it out. Best, Bill