AWOL and the reform proposals
Fellow Council members, many apologies for missing the meetings in LA this week but alas my duties as IPRA president intervened. And I was flying during our voting meeting so could not dial-in without bankrupting the BC. Anyway, it seems that some good progress was made on many issues (though I note not on the politically sensitive issue of IGOs). GNSO reform The reform proposals pose some fundamental challenges to the heritage we guard known as the bottom-up process. While we may differ in outcomes with respect to constituency boundary changes, it may be productive to have debate on some of the wider issues of the reform proposals. In particular it would be good to know fellow Council members views on the objective that Council should manage the PDP but not decide (if I may paraphrase). This objective is separate to its implementation (eg work groups ) for which I see little need to debate as we do them anyway when we believe they are right to do. But I am concerned that the objective may weaken Council by diminishing the incentive for participation. It would be good to learn of opinions on this. Philip
Hi, I sent the following in to the gnso-improvements list during the meeting on Monday. a. ---- To the members of the committee: First I thank the working group for its efforts and find myself in agreement with much of the report. While I agree that the GNSO Council should not be a legislative body, I am concerned about scope in your definition of "management." The report seems rather explicit in defining management solely as responsibility for process. I think that the notion of management needs to be expanded to include responsibility for Policy management. I think the idea of the Council only being responsible for process management is too limited. And while I accept the arguments that this will make recruitment much more difficult, not only among constituencies and stakeholder group, but within the Nomcom process, I think that this is the lesser of the problems with this approach. I support the idea of Working Groups, despite the challenge involved in creating working groups that are of sufficiently diverse and of manageable size. I think that the Council needs to remain responsible for the policy activities and output of the working groups. Not only do I think that councillors should be chosen as stewards for these Working Groups, but I believe that the Council should have a role in determining whether the policy recommendations are compatible with ICANN mission and core value and other policy recommendations. Beyond this there is a need to make sure that the various policy recommendation are not seen individually but are seen in the light of other policy processes and efforts. This does not mean that the council should be able to reject the work of a working group because it disagrees with the conclusions. It does mean that the council should be able to return policy recommendations to the working group with policy issues and concerns that it believes are not adequately dealt with. I agree with the comment that Thomas Narten made, it is critical for the council to have a voice in deciding whether the policy recommendations of a working group are good for the Internet community. To me, this means that the council must retain a policy management role. Avri On 2 nov 2007, at 06.59, Philip Sheppard wrote:
Fellow Council members, many apologies for missing the meetings in LA this week but alas my duties as IPRA president intervened. And I was flying during our voting meeting so could not dial-in without bankrupting the BC.
Anyway, it seems that some good progress was made on many issues (though I note not on the politically sensitive issue of IGOs).
GNSO reform The reform proposals pose some fundamental challenges to the heritage we guard known as the bottom-up process. While we may differ in outcomes with respect to constituency boundary changes, it may be productive to have debate on some of the wider issues of the reform proposals. In particular it would be good to know fellow Council members views on the objective that Council should manage the PDP but not decide (if I may paraphrase). This objective is separate to its implementation (eg work groups ) for which I see little need to debate as we do them anyway when we believe they are right to do.
But I am concerned that the objective may weaken Council by diminishing the incentive for participation.
It would be good to learn of opinions on this.
Philip
Avri, I did not assume such a restrictive role for the Council under the proposed improvements, i.e., " the Council only being responsible for process management". I assumed that the Council's responsibilities would include policy management in a broader sense than just process management although I think the two areas are hard to differentiate in some cases. I fully agree with you that the policy items you identified should be the responsibility of the Council under the proposed model and would add to your examples the following: ensuring that policy development work complies with Bylaws restrictions defining consensus policy development (a change recommended in the recommendations) or, if the work does not apply as possible consensus policy development, making that clear to the working group in advance and throughout the process as needed. When I made my public comments in the GNSO Improvements Workshop on Monday, I made them with the above assumption. That is why I thought that there would still be good motivation to participate on the Council. If in fact, the BGC WG intended the more restrictive role of the Council as you concluded, then I would have more empathy for the concern about attracting qualified participants to the Council. It seems to me that it would be very good if you, as chair, seek clarification from the BGC WG in this regard so that we know whether or not there is a concern here that we should address or not. Chuck Gomes "This message is intended for the use of the individual or entity to which it is addressed, and may contain information that is privileged, confidential and exempt from disclosure under applicable law. Any unauthorized use, distribution, or disclosure is strictly prohibited. If you have received this message in error, please notify sender immediately and destroy/delete the original transmission." ________________________________ From: owner-council@gnso.icann.org [mailto:owner-council@gnso.icann.org] On Behalf Of Avri Doria Sent: Friday, November 02, 2007 10:14 AM To: Council GNSO Subject: Re: [council] AWOL and the reform proposals Hi, I sent the following in to the gnso-improvements list during the meeting on Monday. a. ---- To the members of the committee: First I thank the working group for its efforts and find myself in agreement with much of the report. While I agree that the GNSO Council should not be a legislative body, I am concerned about scope in your definition of "management." The report seems rather explicit in defining management solely as responsibility for process. I think that the notion of management needs to be expanded to include responsibility for Policy management. I think the idea of the Council only being responsible for process management is too limited. And while I accept the arguments that this will make recruitment much more difficult, not only among constituencies and stakeholder group, but within the Nomcom process, I think that this is the lesser of the problems with this approach. I support the idea of Working Groups, despite the challenge involved in creating working groups that are of sufficiently diverse and of manageable size. I think that the Council needs to remain responsible for the policy activities and output of the working groups. Not only do I think that councillors should be chosen as stewards for these Working Groups, but I believe that the Council should have a role in determining whether the policy recommendations are compatible with ICANN mission and core value and other policy recommendations. Beyond this there is a need to make sure that the various policy recommendation are not seen individually but are seen in the light of other policy processes and efforts. This does not mean that the council should be able to reject the work of a working group because it disagrees with the conclusions. It does mean that the council should be able to return policy recommendations to the working group with policy issues and concerns that it believes are not adequately dealt with. I agree with the comment that Thomas Narten made, it is critical for the council to have a voice in deciding whether the policy recommendations of a working group are good for the Internet community. To me, this means that the council must retain a policy management role. Avri On 2 nov 2007, at 06.59, Philip Sheppard wrote: Fellow Council members, many apologies for missing the meetings in LA this week but alas my duties as IPRA president intervened. And I was flying during our voting meeting so could not dial-in without bankrupting the BC. Anyway, it seems that some good progress was made on many issues (though I note not on the politically sensitive issue of IGOs). GNSO reform The reform proposals pose some fundamental challenges to the heritage we guard known as the bottom-up process. While we may differ in outcomes with respect to constituency boundary changes, it may be productive to have debate on some of the wider issues of the reform proposals. In particular it would be good to know fellow Council members views on the objective that Council should manage the PDP but not decide (if I may paraphrase). This objective is separate to its implementation (eg work groups ) for which I see little need to debate as we do them anyway when we believe they are right to do. But I am concerned that the objective may weaken Council by diminishing the incentive for participation. It would be good to learn of opinions on this. Philip
Hello Chuck,
responsibility of the Council under the proposed model and would add to your examples the following: ensuring that policy development work complies with Bylaws restrictions defining consensus policy development (a change recommended in the recommendations) or, if the work does not apply as possible consensus policy development, making that clear to the working group in advance and throughout the process as needed.
This has been a discussion that has been happening in a few forums. I have recommended that we distinguish between: "GNSO Policy Recommendations" which generally refer to a policy for implementation by ICANN staff (e.g new gTLDs, registry service approval process, procedures for conflicts with national laws and ICANN contracts with respect to WHOIS etc). And "GNSO Policy Recommendations for new Consensus Policies" which are policies that are binding on registries and registrars. The defined term "Consensus Policies" is related to the contracts with registrars and registries, and such policies will be binding on registrars and registries (e.g Transfers Policy, WHOIS data reminder policy). As Chuck has stated, it is important to establish expectations clearly at the beginning of a PDP on what category the recommendations are likely to fall into, and at the conclusion of the PDP it should also be clear whether the recommendations are within the definition of "Consensus Policies". Unfortunately the term "consensus" has two meanings in the GNSO and ICANN. One definition relates to the degree of support for particular recommendations (ie did the GNSO reach "consensus" on this recommendation?), and the other definition relates to the contractual term in the gTLD agreements (ie is the policy a "Consensus Policy" as defined in the registry/registrar agreement?). There is also a need to consider defining the scope of the GNSO with respect to areas of policy development to provide more clarity for the community. Some of the language developed in registry/registrar agreements may be relevant. E.g "issues for which uniform or coordinated resolution is reasonably necessary to facilitate interoperability, Security and/or Stability of the Internet or DNS; " "resolution of disputes regarding the registration of domain names (as opposed to the use of such domain names)." Etc Regards, Bruce And GNSO P
participants (4)
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Avri Doria -
Bruce Tonkin -
Gomes, Chuck -
Philip Sheppard