I would like to pick up on a thread (which I fully agree with) present 
in David Cake’s posting. He writes:

/The GAC-GNSO Coordination Group has been trying hard to demonstrate to 
the GAC the many ways they can be a part of the GNSO policy development 
process…. There is absolutely no guarantee that anyone outside the GAC 
will have any influence at all - sure, a major policy decision will be 
discussed for some time, and you might be able to informally lobby your 
GAC rep. But there is no guarantee at all - GAC advice can be proposed 
virtually direct from the floor, and be in the GAC communique shortly 
afterward, with no opportunity for anyone outside the GAC to even know 
what it is./

GAC representatives are representatives of their governments, and their 
governments are supposed to be representative of the will of the people 
as expressed by the people, which is not the case in non-democratic 
governments. There are however lots of democratic governments and one of 
the ICANN multistakeholder efforts should be to press governments to 
carry on a more inclusive domestic stakeholder dialogue within their own 
countries, a dialogue that would better inform individual GAC member 
positions, and increase transparency and accountability between 
constituencies at the national level.

Least this be thought of as an impertinent suggestion, this can be 
promoted at the ICANN level on the grounds that national inclusive 
dialogue is a win-win: at the national level informing national 
stakeholders for better national Internet policy; and globally producing 
better policy deliberations among a better informed GAC, GNSO and others 
within ICANN.

As civil society works to increase the awareness, knowledge, engagement 
and accountability of the Internet’s civil society stakeholders, it is 
not unreasonable to suggest to GAC that it should do the same. In the 
absence of such a process there are reasons to worry about Board voting 
formulas that allow arbitrary and ill-advised GAC proposals being fast 
tracked with no deliberation, and no effective way to fight 
ill-considered policy decisions.

Sam L