HI Bill, hi all,
Thanks for making three different threads - very much appreciated that
these important questions will not get lost.
I think Niels's questions are broader than just addition of the human
rights obligation into the bylaws. I am puzzled, too and would really like
to get answers.
Warm regards
Tatiana

On 20 August 2016 at 09:55, William Drake <[log in to unmask]> wrote:

> (was: A Few Take-Aways from Meet the Candidates Call re: Council
> Transparency and Coordination)
>
> Hi
>
> How about we discuss the human rights issue issue under this subject line?
>
>
> I have to admit I that I too was puzzled by what happened in Marrakech on
> this, both in real time and after reading the transcript.  It would be good
> to understand everyones’ views on this crucial issue.
>
> Thanks
>
> Bill
>
> On Aug 19, 2016, at 20:52, Niels ten Oever <[log in to unmask]>
> wrote:
>
> Dear all,
>
> I think Bill and Milton raised very important questions concerning the
> work of the GNSO. I would like to ask two more questions based on what
> Milton has already asked.
>
> I read in Ed’s statement about his strong commitment to freedom of
> expression. I would like to ask again – after asking this in person, in
> a session and in the +1 thread here, because I believe it is important
> for us to know: Why did Ed vote, as the only GNSO councilor, against the
> addition of a commitment for ICANN to respect human rights to ICANN bylaws?
> This is not just about NCSG GNSO councilors, but Ed was only one of ALL
> GNSO councilors to vote against the commitment to human rights.
>
> And furthermore, why did Ed not discuss this openly, before the vote, on
> the NCSG list. Because I think the concerns Ed had were not shared
> widely within the NCSG, except for Heritage and himself.
>
> I find it a problem of accountability how Ed continuously seem to not
> want to discuss this openly within our constituency, but does vote on
> behalf of it. Here I would like to quote the charter again:
>
> "Each NCSG GNSO Council Representative shall represent, within the GNSO
> Council, ICANN and its activities, the goals and priorities of the NCSG
> to the best of his/her ability and in accordance with the principle of
> consensus building."
>
> and:
>
> "Council Representatives will, however, be expected to understand the
> varied positions in the NCSG and to explain to the membership how their
> votes are in support of noncommercial interests. NCSG GNSO Councilors
> should work with the NCSG‑PC to develop NCSG policy positions. NCSG GNSO
> Council Representatives are expected to keep the NCSG membership
> informed of policy issues before the GNSO Council, to seek input from
> the NCSG membership and to be responsive to member requests for
> information on matters pending before the Council."
>
> Last but not least. If you look at the voting history in the GNSO, it is
> clear that there is a pattern of Ed structurally making other choices
> than the other NCSG GNSO councilors. I do not think this is necessarily
> bad, but I do not see any explanation for this reflected in Ed’s statement.
>
> Best,
>
> Niels
>
>
> On 08/19/2016 12:57 PM, Mueller, Milton L wrote:
>
> I would like to raise an issue that was completely avoided in our
> discussions yesterday.
>
>
>
> Probably the biggest issue facing the whole ICANN environment right now
> is the IANA transition – the end of US Govt control of the DNS root
> zone, and the completion of ICANN’s movement toward self-governance.
>
>
>
> My sense is that the overwhelming majority of us in this Stakeholder
> Group (NCSG) are in favor of the transition and the accountability
> reforms associated with it. None of us thinks they are perfect, of
> course, but almost all of us believe that we are better off making those
> changes than sticking with the status quo.
>
>
>
> There are a few exceptions. It is clear that the Heritage Foundation,
> one of our (eligible!) member organization, is working very hard in
> Washington to raise obstacles to the transition. It appears to me that
> one of our Council members, Ed Morris, has aligned himself with the
> Heritage folks in opposing completion of the transition at this time,
> though I could be wrong about that.
>
>
>
> I think it is perfectly acceptable for there to be different views
> within the NCSG. However, it’s also critical for our members to know
> what they are voting for, and to have that debate openly. To my mind, a
> Council member who actively works against the completion of the
> transition has a dramatically different vision of the nature of ICANN
> and its long term future than one who wants to move ahead with the
> accountability reforms and IANA transition.
>
>
>
> Therefore it’s critical for our members to know how all Councilors stand
> on this question.
>
>
>
> So I’d like to see the candidates answer these questions;
>
>
>
> 1.       Do you think that if the U.S. Congress blocks the transition in
> the next 6 weeks that it will be a disaster for the multistakeholder
> model of Internet governance? Why or why not?
>
>
>
> 2.       Are you actively supporting the Heritage Foundation’s (and
> other rightwing groups’) efforts to mobilize Congressional Republicans
> to block the transition?
>
>
>
> 3.       How do you think we as a SG should respond if the transition is
> blocked by the U.S. Congress?
>
>
>
>
>
> I look forward to discussion of these questions by the candidates.
>
>
>
>
>
> Dr. Milton L. Mueller
>
> Professor, School of Public Policy
>
> Georgia Institute of Technology
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> *From:*NCSG-Discuss [mailto:[log in to unmask]
> <[log in to unmask]>] *On Behalf Of
> *William Drake
> *Sent:* Friday, August 19, 2016 6:04 AM
> *To:* [log in to unmask] <[log in to unmask]>
> *Subject:* A Few Take-Aways from Meet the Candidates Call re: Council
> Transparency and Coordination
>
>
>
> Hi
>
>
>
> Yesterday’s call provided a useful opportunity for dialogue on the
> candidates’ views and priorities and also turned out to offer some folks
> a chance to start clearing the air, however uncomfortably, regarding
> issues that arose within our Council contingent the last cycle.  I’d
> like to suggest a couple take-aways in hopes that we can re-set that
> which needs to be and move forward on a firmer footing.  Purely my own
> views, which I guess some folks will disagree with, in which case fine,
> let’s talk it out.
>
>
>
> 1.  Differences of perspective among Councilors are fine but these
> should be openly shared in order to preserve trust. It might make sense
> for the interested parties to find some congenial space in which to
> privately work through past bits of friction that arose re: e.g.
> Marrakech, the GNSO chair selection, and whatever else.  It doesn’t make
> sense to leave misunderstandings unresolved and entrenched as it can
> impact on the effectiveness of the team effort going forward. Hyderabad
> obviously offers F2F options, which are likely to be the most productive
> in coming to resolutions, but it might make sense not to wait entirely
> on this.
>
>
>
> 2. It would be helpful if Councilors could be sure to attend the monthly
> NCSG calls and proactively share their thinking about upcoming Council
> meetings and votes with each other and the wider membership.  In ancient
> times when I was on Council we regarded these as fairly mandatory and
> tried to miss only exceptionally and with notification, but more
> recently participation seems to have be spottier at times (I believe the
> NCSG chair has attendance records?).  Yes we’re all volunteers with day
> jobs and travels so things can happen, but it shouldn’t be the case that
> people miss more than a couple per annual cycle.
>
>
>
> 3. In parallel, it’d be good to have greater open discussion of pending
> votes and positions on the NCSG PC mail list.  I’ve been on that list
> since we set it up in 2011 (first as a Councilor, then as an observer)
> and think it’s under-utilized resource that should work in synch with
> our monthly calls and those of the Council.  Of course, issues should
> not always be sorted purely on an internal PC basis; important policy
> choices at least should also be vetted on ncsg-discuss so the PC is well
> informed by a feel for general member sentiment, even if it’s divided.
>
>
>
> Either way, between the monthly calls and the PC, we shouldn’t have
> cases where members of the team don’t know until they arrive at a
> Council meeting how their colleagues will vote, or what contacts and
> representations of the group’s shared positions are being made to other
> stakeholder groups, etc.  You can’t have a team effort if people are
> unaware of each others’ doings.
>
>
>
> 4.  Part of the PC’s challenge has always been to ensure effective
> chairing, including tracking of progress on open projects, herding cats,
> etc.  We’ve always appointed Councilors to chair but the results have
> been variable as people are already maxed out.  On yesterday’s call Ed
> made a suggestion that merits consideration: having a non-Council member
> as chair, and allocating one of the NCSG travel slots to this person so
> as to promote their continuous coordination of the process.  It’d be
> interesting to hear views on this.
>
>
>
> 5.  After-meeting reporting to the membership of the issues and votes
> should be routinized.  This doesn’t have involve demanding magnum opus
> treatments, a couple paragraphs one a month should be sufficient and
> doable.  I’d suggested (below) that the six Councilors could rotate the
> responsibility, as was briefly attempted in 2009-2010.  Stephanie
> counter-proposed on the call that reporting be done by non-Councilors,
> in part as a way of on-boarding ‘new blood’ and helping to prepare folks
> to stand for Council in a future election.  This could work too,
> although it may involve some extra coordination to ensure every
> Councilors’ votes and views are reflected to taste.  Worth a try…
>
>
>
> If we could do at least some of this, I think it’d increase our team’s
> solidarity and our general members’ understanding of what their
> representative are up to, what’s in play in the GNSO, and what the
> opportunities for engaging in working groups and such are.  It’d also
> make our votes in elections more well informed.
>
>
>
> Thoughts?
>
>
>
> Bill
>
>
>
>
>
>    On Aug 17, 2016, at 10:39, William Drake <[log in to unmask]
>    <mailto:[log in to unmask] <[log in to unmask]>>> wrote:
>
>
>
>    Hi
>
>
>
>        On Aug 16, 2016, at 23:38, Robin Gross <[log in to unmask]
>        <mailto:[log in to unmask] <[log in to unmask]>>> wrote:
>
>
>
>        Agreed.  It is important for members to become more acquainted
>        with our representatives and resumes are extremely helpful for that.
>
>
>
>    Sharing candidates’ resumes is not a bad idea.  But I’d like to
>    suggest we go beyond this.  Two issue we might want to consider on
>    tomorrow’s call:
>
>
>
>    When I joined Council in 2009, we discussed the need for better
>    reporting to members as to what their reps were actually doing in
>    Council.  We launched an attempt to deal with this by having
>    Councilors take turns doing brief reports about Council meetings.
>    Alas it didn’t get far, after a couple times the sense of urgency
>    faded, people told themselves “well, members can always look at the
>    Council archive to see what’s happening," and the effort drifted
>    off.  But of course it’s actually not easy for a member to dive
>    through the Council archive and try to reconstruct what’s happening,
>    and it’s not so hard to compose a one or two paragraph summary of a
>    monthly Council meeting indicating how our reps voted on which
>    issues, especially if the workload is rotated among six Councilors,
>    making it just a few times per year each.  So while it’s a bit
>    uncomfortable suggesting work to be done by others, I’d like to put
>    this idea back on the table ahead of our Meet the Candidates call
>    tomorrow.  It need not be an one onerous thing, and after all we
>    exist to participate in the GNSO, so surely we should be able to
>    know how our reps are representing us in the GNSO.  Especially when
>    we’re being asked to vote them into ‘office’ (for incumbents) on the
>    basis of past performance.
>
>
>
>    More generally, we have long debated the matter of coordination
>    among Council reps.  Unlike most if not all other parts of the GNSO,
>    NCSG by charter doesn’t normally do ‘directed voting,’ where the
>    members are bound to vote in conformity with a rough consensus
>    position.  We have a charter provision to do this in exceptional
>    cases, but I don’t recall it ever being invoked.  We’ve always been
>    content to operate on the notion that the Councilor does what s/he
>    thinks is in the best interest of civil society @ GNSO, and if
>    members don’t approve of anyone’s action they can vote them out in
>    the next cycle.  But as that has not really happened, it’s sort of a
>    meaningless check and balance.  And this is not without consequence,
>    as we’ve sometimes had internal differences within our contingent
>    that have arguably undermined our effectiveness and credibility in
>    the eyes of the community and staff, and can even allow our various
>    business stakeholder group counterparts to exploit the differences
>    in order to push through what they want in opposition to our common
>    baseline views.  So at a minimum, we need to do better somehow at
>    team coordination and make sure all our Councilors know what each
>    other is doing and why and so there’s no real time surprises,
>    especially during meetings with high stakes votes.
>
>
>
>    Thoughts?
>
>
>
>    Best
>
>
>
>    Bill
>
>
>
>
> --
> Niels ten Oever
> Head of Digital
>
> Article 19
> www.article19.org
>
> PGP fingerprint    8D9F C567 BEE4 A431 56C4
>                   678B 08B5 A0F2 636D 68E9
>
>
>
> *************************************************************
> William J. Drake
> International Fellow & Lecturer
>   Media Change & Innovation Division, IPMZ
>   University of Zurich, Switzerland
> [log in to unmask] (direct), [log in to unmask] (lists),
>   www.williamdrake.org
> *The Working Group on Internet Governance - 10th Anniversary Reflections*
> New book at http://amzn.to/22hWZxC
> *************************************************************
>
>