[discuss] cgi.br release regarding Brazil Global MSM on Internet Governance

[parminder]

On Sunday 12 January 2014 09:43 PM, Milton L Mueller wrote:
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>> from the announcement.
>>
>> "The meeting is a partnership between CGI.br and /1net."
>>
>> So, John, do you still hold that 1Net is yet only a discussion space and
>> it is up to its steering committee to make it what it wants to.... Most
> Parminder, as I read this I wonder where you have been for the last three months. The political complexion of the Brazil meeting has been evident since October. All doubts were cleared up by mid-November, with the initial announcements coming from Brazil. In mid-November the IGP blog wrote:

I remember reading it, and also realizing that you had mistaken an 
announcement made by Adiel by on this list on nov 18 to be an official 
announcement by the Brazilians. Adiel announced that the non gov members 
on various organsing committees will be '1Net representatives' who will 
be selected by the 1Net coordination committee.

The Nov 26th official announcement of the 'Brazil meeting' by the 
Brazilians made no mention of 1NEt at all.  It is evident that what 
Adiel wrote about may be what 1Net wanted but not at all what Brazilians 
agreed to bestow upon it. ON 27th Nov Carlos confirmed through an email 
to 2 open CS lists that 1Net was not to be any kind of single conduit or 
anything....

BTW, I had very poor and intermittent connectivity from late nov to end 
dec and so yes, I missed a lot of action...

But evidently it was only in the LOG meeting report of 20th Dec that 
1Net's gate-keeping role appears for the first time in official records. 
I dont know what happened between end Nov and end Dec, but the above are 
publicly known facts...

I have limited resources to keep following this high politik in all its 
complications.... But I think civil society should be doing much better 
than it is doing. That is the point I have been trying to make in the 
last 2 days or so.

>
> "The [organizational] structures [announced by CGI] show clearly how the meeting is a negotiated compromise between the Internet technical organizations and Brazil’s government.

I agree, it is . Especially now, since the 20th meeting. Although I am 
not sure we can say it is the 'tech community'. I think it is largely 
ICANN.
>   Both sides get to populate half of the four steering committees proposed. The ICANN/Internet

Oh! ICANN as Internet! What fetishism . You werent like this, Milton ;)
> side takes care of representation of nongovernmental stakeholders (business, civil society, academia and NGOs).

We agree on this. That looks like is the deal. And I am fully opposed to 
it... Just want those in civil society who still do not think, or feign 
ignorance, that this the deal, to know, now with Milton's confirmation - 
that this indeed is the deal.   That ICANN 'takes care' of the non gov 
representation at the Brazil meeting... And let they make public  their 
views on this deal.... I have asked for an IGC membership voting whether 
they support this deal,. Milton, are you ready for such a vote?


> The Brazilian side emphasizes representation of states."
>
> Since the status of the Brazil meeting as a bridge between the technical governance organizations led by ICANN and national-states led by Brazil has has been obvious almost from the beginning of the process,

No, that is not how I read Brazil meeting. And I know that is not how 
most in civil society read it. Brazil meeting arose from some new 
damning proof of already know unacceptable level of US domination and 
control over the global Internet . Brazilian officials repeatedly said 
in Bali that the proposed meeting goes much much beyond ICANN/ I* issues...


parminder

>   I wonder what you actually expect to accomplish by a) pretending that this is a big surprise and b) beating this list and the 1net people over the head with what all of us already know.


>
> If we're going to have a legitimating and broadly inclusive meeting in April, someone had to kick it off, someone had to take responsibility for organizing it. Efforts have been made by both the Brazil side and the 1net side to be as open and inclusive as possible, though I will admit (and again, was 2 months ahead of you in noticing this) that the early stages of 1net were clumsy and needlessly untransparent.
>
> [snip]
>
>> This is completely disregarding 4 key civil society networks who said at
>> Bali - and then formally through a letter - that they were not going
>> through 1Net but want to be directly involved in the Brazilian meeting.
> Nice try. But for CS, academia and PS as a whole it is actually better to have a single, known, well-observed channel run by a reasonably neutral entity than to have a proliferation of unaccountable back channels.
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