FINISHED COPY
NINTH ANNUAL MEETING OF THE
INTERNET GOVERNANCE FORUM 2014
ISTANBUL, TURKEY
"CONNECTING CONTINENTS FOR ENHANCED
MULTI-STAKEHOLDER INTERNET GOVERNANCE"
03 SEPTEMBER 2014
16:30
BPF 1
DEVELOPING MEANINGFUL MULTISTAKEHOLDER
PARTICIPATION MECHANISMS
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This is the output of the real-time captioning taken during the IGF 2014 Istanbul, Turkey, meetings. Although it is largely accurate, in some cases it may be incomplete or inaccurate due to inaudible passages or transcription errors. It is posted as an aid to understanding the proceedings at the session, but should not be treated as an authoritative record.
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>> AVRI DORIA: It is 4:30, so I guess it's time to start. My name is Avri Doria and I'll be moderating this session on best practices or current best practices in multistakeholder participation.
We have a fairly full panel, and as such, I'm going to try and limit most of our talking to 2 minutes per turn, if at all possible, which means usually you sort of say what you have to say, but you have no need to repeat it in three different ways, if you can.
Now, this session basically represents a step in a new process that the IGF is going through on trying to collect the best practices in a number of areas. In our case, it's multistakeholder participation. And basically, a document has been collected of the first comments on this by John Laprise, and it's been available for discussion for a short time, and so we wanted to basically start out today with discussions on that. The way this is set up to run is I'm first going to ask the panelists to give a 2‑minute discussion of what they think is the most important point, and it may be a definition. It may be an example, something implicit about best practice or something explicit about best practice.
So basically, at this point, I want to introduce the first speaker, who's a remote participant, and it's Guilherme Almeida ‑‑ and please, if I mispronounce anybody's name, forgive me ‑‑ who's a specialist in Public Policies and Government Management at Brazilian Federal Ministry of Planning, Budget and Management.
So, Guilherme, if you'd like to give us your introductory comments.
>> GUILHERME ALMEIDA: Thank you, Avri. I hope you're hearing me well. Okay with the transmission? All right.
>> AVRI DORIA: Yes.
>> GUILHERME ALMEIDA: My name is Guilherme Almeida, and I work for the Brazilian Government who have been using online collaboration tools to enhance the multistakeholder processes in the Ministry since 2009, and the most successful experiment so far is the collaborative drafting of the [ Inaudible] Bill of Rights ‑‑
[ Audio instability ]
‑‑ which I had the opportunity and the honour to lead, so I would like to use it as a source from which to bring some experiences and lessons learned contributed to this process.
First, a first lesson learned is that technology really contributes to a better balance in multistakeholder processes so provided that you have minimum conditions that widely grant Internet access. Online platforms, they promote an equal footing to the specific processes, so it's easy and less expensive to access a website than traveling to a meeting, and so we reducing the barriers to access is an incentive for participation. Also, one methodological tool which is quite relevant is that it's fundamental to contextualize the debate and to organize in an involved manner.
So we really can use a document ‑‑ and the clearly stated boundaries of the session, these are really good practices. Also having the debate organised in the iterative manner so people know which are necessary steps and which are necessary turns. This allows to consolidate existing consensuses and to further advance on controversial issues.
Also, it's really important to clearly communicate what are the expected outcomes, and how decisions are made in the process.
Well, another good strategy is to itemize the dates, so segmenting the discussions into smaller and more specific topics it allows stakeholders to provide more detailed analysis and it also allows stakeholders to present their counterarguments to arguments that have already been presented, so this works as a magnifying lens to the debate and existing evidences and allows people to in focus on them. And finally, transparency is crucial to any such a process, not only to ensure trust, but also to ensure legitimacy.
All contributions should be made publicly available and they should be submitted to general analysis and criticism, so transparency more than that is necessary in the decision‑making processes to ensure full accountability.
These are experiences we bring from the National Government policy making process, but I believe that they should also inform multistakeholder offices which are not submitted to international boundaries. We saw this in NETmundial, I'm sure we'll see these in the processes to come. Thank you very much.
>> AVRI DORIA: Thank you. Next I have Sebastien Bellagamba. There you are.
>> SEBASTIEN BELLAGAMBA: I moved.
>> AVRI DORIA: Who is Regional Bureau Director for Latin America and the Caribbean Internet Society. Please.
>> SEBASTIEN BELLAGAMBA: Thank you very much. I'm really happy to be here. I think we have to put some context on this ‑‑ bring it forward. Thank you.
I would like to say some few words about what we are doing in this respect in Latin America and continuing in particular which consider for us in the region as extremely good exercise in this.
Multistakeholder Collaboration is something that the process, the multistakeholder process is something that is spreading, spilling over the region right now and it's something that we have to keep promoting for developing healthy communities at least in our region in Latin America so it's something that we are extremely engaged and extremely willing to collaborate and participate with the different stakeholders.
In that sense, there are some good examples that we have in the region. For the sake of time, I'm not going to give specific examples right now, but the one thing that I see is important to make the point today is that we have to find continuity in these efforts. That's something that is extremely important.
Sometimes we just try to produce advances just by bulk advances and that's not the way at least it will work in our region. We have to have continuity so we start today something here which is very promising which we very welcome but I think we are ‑‑ we have to set the target of this continuing collaboration and look forward in a way that we don't wait until the next IGF for continuing the effort. We work here globally and even locally or regionally through the local National IGFs, through whatever mechanism we can think of, in whatever novel way we can think of but we have to commit to that and that's something that I wanted to highlight. Thank you.
>> AVRI DORIA: You made two points, one of which we'll follow up on at the end in terms of the: Where do we go from here, the what's the next steps but also on the point of the specific examples you wanted to make, those would be good things to contribute into the process as it moves on.
The next speaker I've got and I'm pretty much going in alphabetical order is Guy Berger, UNESCO Director, Director of Freedom of Expression and Media Development. Please.
>> GUY BERGER: Good afternoon, everybody. So I was asked initially just to reflect on UNESCO's experience of multistakeholder mode of operation, and I'll spend a minute to tell you. You may know that UNESCO convened the first review events on the WSIS+10 which was a conference in Paris last year, and it was multistakeholder in the sense that it involved quite a range of different groups, so there were 1,450 people. 32% of the people came from Civil Society. 22% were from Governments. Private sector, 11%. Academia, 13%, and then it goes a bit smaller after that. UN intergovernmental constituency, 9%. There were a few others, technical community, and some who didn't identify themselves.
I think the importance of this event, which represented 130 countries there, and also 800 remote participants, was that it came up with the Final Statement through a very participative, transparent, open process, and the Final Statement, it says quite important things.
For example, it says in the Final Statement, "Multistakeholder processes have become an essential and unique approach to engagement in addressing issues affecting the knowledge and information societies."
It says it invites all stakeholders to acknowledge the importance of and renew their commitment to the Internet Governance Forum. So those are the two things in this Final Statement. So this was the multistakeholder statement. It was at UNESCO. It doesn't carry that much weight on its own, but here's the interesting thing: This was proposed by one of the UNESCO Member States 8 months later at the general conference of 195 Member States, and they agreed. They endorsed it.
So you have Governments saying that they support multistakeholders, an invitation to support the IGF so this is quite a significant outcome of the multistakeholder process that flowed into an intergovernmental process and really I think gave so much weight to the fact that you had this multistakeholder what gave weight and legitimacy finally and why the Member States through their diplomats felt that they actually could not adopt this. In fact there was some debate. One Government said well, this really wasn't all of us as Governments and a response by another Government said: Well, we were there at this multistakeholder conference.
So we can't distance ourselves from it, so they voted for it. And just the last comment: We have to do a similar kind of thing, this year and next year, because UNESCO now has to make an Internet issues study looking at privacy, Freedom of Expression, access and ethics. This will be quite important in presenting options for Member States as to what UNESCO and its members say we should be doing on these issues going ahead.
So next year, March 3rd and 4th in Paris you have an excuse to come to Paris, we will have a multistakeholder conference to look at the draft of this. I hope that the study will be enriched by that process. I'm sure it will. But it will also be legitimized in some ways and carry more weight when finally it gets presented to the 195 Governments in the next year. So please come next March, and make the multistakeholder model work.
>> AVRI DORIA: Thank you. Yes, and having seen parts of ‑‑ read parts of that, this is really quite encouraging to have multistakeholder endorsed in such a way. So the next speaker is Norbert Bollow, who's the co‑convenor of the Just Net Coalition.
>> NORBERT BOLLOW: Thank you. Talking about what is important about best practices, I would say it's important to bring the practice first of all to an acceptable level to make it acceptable. A key point is it must be Democratic. Democracy has several aspects. One aspect is the human right aspect. A state cannot be Democratic if it doesn't respect Human Rights. And every person must have the right to actually enforce his human right against some process which might be majority based, but to have a Democratic state, every single person has the right to actually enforce his human rights.
Also, there is this problem of some entities having too much power and there must be a democratic process of limiting that power. For example, some states have institutions that like to do mass surveillance. There must be a democratic process to stop that from happening, and right now the multistakeholder process does not really stop that from happening. So I'd say to bring it up to acceptable level, it must be brought to the point of actually stopping these Human Rights violations. It must be brought to a point of stopping abuses of power of any kind: Commercial power, surveillance power, whatever power. Thank you.
>> AVRI DORIA: The next I have Bobby Flaim, supervisory Special Agent, Federal Bureau of investigation, Government of the United States of America. Please.
>> ROBERT FLAIM: Yes, Bobby Flaim from the FBI, I work in Washington, D.C., I guess I got started in the multistakeholder, I guess, model of participation in ICANN about 10 years ago, and I've also participated at ARIN, and also the IGF, and I think from the law enforcement's perspective, it's very important to participate as one of the, I guess, stakeholders in the multistakeholder process. If we're not here and we're not learning what industry is doing, what policies are going on, then I think we're short changing ourselves in law enforcement.
I think we watch a lot of Hollywood, and we have sexy screens, but it really doesn't work like that, so we need to be where the people are, where the decisions are being made, where the collaboration is being done, because it's very, very important for us. In my own personal experience in ICANN and with the IGF, there's a lot of very smart people to talk to and to collaborate with to get things done, to make actually the Internet more safe and secure.
So I think best practices really, number one, is participation, just being there. Second is actually knowing what the topic is, what the subject is, being able to articulate your own position, and also know the positions of others.
And from there is to collaborate, to work effectively with the partners who are at the multistakeholder organisations such as ICANN, ARIN, the IGF, to ensure that you're all moving in the same direction, so from my perspective, I guess I would say those three things: Participate openly and transparently, and to cooperate and collaborate with all the stakeholders.
>> AVRI DORIA: A very fine list of attributes for a best practice for multistakeholder practice. Thank you. So next I have Grace Githaiga, who's Associate at Kenya ICT Action Network. Thanks.
>> GRACE GITHAIGA: Before I came here, we had a meeting as the African grouping where we were looking at what multistakeholderism means for us, and one of the things that we agree is that there is action in multistakeholder happening in Africa. However it is uncoordinated. It is erratic and it has not been institutionalized and sometimes it is not transparent.
Some people also felt that multistakeholderism for Africa is complex. What exactly is it? What is the definition? How do you go about multistakeholderism? And how critical is it to Africa vis‑a‑vis other critical issues like land issues, water issues?
So there was that debate. However, for me and in terms of best practices, I think multistakeholderism needs trust. And I'm speaking that from the perspective of Africa, that there's need for each stakeholder to recognize the unique stakeholders and they're also experts in their own way, in the policy matter that is under discussion. There's also the need to recognize that each stakeholder does bring something on to the table that is useful to the rest of the society, and that each stakeholder has actually a role in shaping the policy process in question.
It is therefore in terms of trust and building trust, the need to recognize that these processes must reflect views of different stakeholders in whatever final outcomes that will be agreed in the policy process and if views of certain stakeholders are not reflected, then there's need to provide legitimate reasons for that lack of incorporation. Either they didn't meet some certain threshold, either they're not grounded in law, or they cannot be practical. Maybe they're offensive to the public morals. Just provide the stakeholders with why their views cannot be incorporated.
And finally, on the issue of trust, that actions must be taken in light of what stakeholders have provided to just avoid suspicions and to encourage the need to work together and build society.
>> AVRI DORIA: And we'll be coming back to that topic of trust a little later in this discussion. So thanks for bringing it into the beginning.
Next I have Susie Hargreaves, CEO of Internet Watch Foundation. Please go.
>> SUSIE GARGREAVES: Thanks very much. I run the Internet Watch Foundation, which is the U.K. hotline for reporting child sexual abuse content, most successful hotline in the world. And the U.K. now has less than 1% of known child sexual abuse content, down from 18% in 1996. And the reason we were able to do that is we're a multistakeholder organisation. We're a charity and self‑regulatory body, but we work with all the groups that need to work together, independent of law enforcement and the Government, but everybody who needs to work together gets together to fight this problem so that means that we have, we're funded by the Internet industry and the industry, the police, Government, the public, Civil Society, academia and ourselves all work together to develop a shared goal and I think that the issue around child protection where we have lots of examples of multistakeholder working which works and I know it's low hanging fruit in terms of the fact that we can all get behind a particular issue, but I think we can show how people who traditionally won't sit in a room together will when they believe in something and I'm going to cover some issues around trust later. Thank you.
>> AVRI DORIA: Thank you. Next I have Byron Holland, CEO Canadian Internet Registration Authority.
>> BYRON HOLLAND: Thank you. We're the folks who managed the ccTLD for Canada and do dot CA so I'm going to provide a few thoughts on accountability and I do that as a practitioner, somebody who has run an accountable organisation that delivers on a public service for the public mandate.
So accountability is often thought of and discussed in conceptual terms or theoretical terms or principles or fairly high‑level dialogue, but at the end of the day, you have to deliver it on the ground and make it real. And those are some of the things that I wanted to speak about.
Because in my experience, accountability is one of the most critical aspects of delivering on a multistakeholder organisation, and I would say it's also one of the most challenging, because when we talk about multistakeholderism to a great degree, we're talking about the processes themselves that make it up, the processes by which communities or groups or multiple communities come together and deliver a solution or an outcome.
And for that outcome to have legitimacy, even among potential, quote, losers or people who didn't get their way, there's got to be trust in that process. And that's a significant challenge. Accountability is just plain hard work. Some of you probably were in the Section this morning when we spent over an hour and a half talking about accountability, and still didn't necessarily come to any concrete conclusions but it really starts I would say with effective Bylaws, but those become in a sense just the table stakes, the Bylaws, the elections, the words on paper. But we've all seen organisations both in the private sector and the not‑for‑profit Sector who have good Bylaws, good paper, and get themselves into significant trouble in terms of accountability. So it's more than just that.
It's table stakes, but it's not enough. I think that we have to be really sure that the organisation's members are very engaged in whatever the issues of the day are, and that's one of the most significant challenges. It takes commitment by the organisation. It takes resources to engage members or stakeholders, and above all, it takes a considerable amount of just plain work. And I'll use some examples in our experience at CIRA. We are a member‑based organisation. Anybody who has a .CA can become a member. It's free, so the barrier to entry is very, very low, and anybody who has a .CA can become a member.
But members themselves play a fundamental role in generating accountability. We have direct elections for our Board, for example, by the members. And the challenge there is whale in theory, that's great, it's: How do you make sure that you have enough high‑quality or candidates who have to be members? How do you get enough members actually engaged in the election process?
Because if you in theory run a reasonably performing organisation there aren't a lot of things in the domain space right now in Canada that are generating controversy. It's like the power. We turn it on, it works, it's relatively cheap, we're okay with it. How do you get members engaged in that environment? So we've been doing a number of things on the ground.
We do member events. We create Forums, we participate in various trade shows, all on the ground activities that take time, money and effort, but we believe are absolutely critical in engaging the membership and generating more members who will then participate in the election process who therefore confer legitimacy in the outcome of the Board and the Board itself through its decisions builds trust because of high‑quality decisions and outputs, and it all starts with that basic hard work on the ground with the appropriate resources. And that to me is where accountability really starts.
>> AVRI DORIA: And I'll be coming back to the accountability subject to a little later so hopefully you'll be able to add even more. So that would be good. Thank you.
And our last speaker in this first round is Izumi Okutani, Policy Liaison at JPNIC.
I'm sorry, and then Jim ‑‑ I'm so sorry I didn't have you in my list forgive me because you were added later and I built off an old list. Forgive me. I couldn't find you even.
>> IZUMI OKUTANI: Hi, everyone. My name is Izumi Okutani, and I'm engaged in the community that develops policies for IP address which is one of the critical Internet resources and something else that I'm recently engaged is trying to nurture a platform where several different stakeholders within Japan is able to come and have discussions together. It may be a little bit surprising that we really don't have this multistakeholder platform in Japan, where we do have very developed the Internet infrastructure, and we do have very active technical communities discussing various Internet issues. However, when it comes to the issue of internet governance, people really don't have very clear ideas about what the issues at stake is, and when I use the word "multistakeholder," people don't know what it means so I would like to add some practical specific ways on how we may be able to help in cases when there is no multistakeholder environment.
And one of the things that we've done is we've set up a platform, but just setting up a platform and saying okay, it's open to everybody, is not going to help people to participate so you really have to identify: Who are the stakeholders in our local context? And then proactively reach out to these individual people and explaining to them: Okay, these are the issues that are being discussed and for example spam or privacy, those things, people think that it's really something, an issue that's related to them. But when you put it in the package of Internet governance people think it's something not related to them so you have to like create this link and make people to understand that these are the issues that relate to them, and to engage and encourage them to participate more in the platform that we have.
Another point that I would like to add, in case we want to reach a consensus or agreement on a particular point, or have a specific action, then instead of having one‑time meeting, it might be helpful to have more continuous kind of engagement, something that Sebastien has raised as well. An example that I would be able to share is the Forum that we have in the address management policy development where we have biannual meetings plus mailing list so this helps people to continuously engage in discussions and be able to feel that they have this Forum any time that they want to engage, they can do that.
This may be a little bit of a challenge in case it's the more global multistakeholder, with much more different stakeholders being involved in addition to the technical community but if we are specific enough in a topic, for example these best practices Forums, I think there are five things being picked up instead of let's discuss about Internet Governance discussions in general, this may be something we're able to engage with people and try to reach some kind of agreement so those are the observations that I'm making based on my experience. And I would like to speak a little bit more later on stakeholders.
>> AVRI DORIA: Thank you very much. And last this time, truly last, is Jimson Olufuye. I've been using your first name for so long who's ICC basis from Africa and I don't know specifically what business you have. But please.
>> JIMSON OLUFUYE: My name is Jimson Olufuye. The pronunciation is okay. I represent Africa ICT Alliance, the private sector organisation to promote private sector participation in the multistakeholder dialogue globally and we're also part of ICC BASIS and also the business constituency of ICANN so I have some kind of reference points for my presentation.
First and foremost I want to talk about governance. Like Holland mentioned, he's talking about the community. The governance framework, the best practice for a multistakeholder is the setting must follow a pre‑defined governance framework in the sense that there has to be a Secretariat, there has to be focal points for driving the activities of the policy framework for the multistakeholder organisation. Again, there has to be some formal input for all stakeholders. Like in ICANN, there is a lot of opportunity for developing participation. This is quite important. But it's multiareas or multistakeholder environment feel that private sector is private sector so they don't have resources.
It's not true from developing countries. In developing nations many really just concerned about basic life sustenance so coming to Istanbul or Bali, you need to correct them. Like the USG and private sector, initial stage of Internet development ‑‑ so that is happening too in Africa to bring in these stakeholders in developing countries to be at the table on equal footing so that their opinions can also be heard and they can also mature.
One thing I've observed within ICANN as a reference was I involved and ICT BASIS about audit. There is a review process to see how we're performing so that is quite important when it comes to your governance framework as it's performing, is everybody involved. Are you transparent indeed? Are you trustworthy even in your relationship with one another? So all these things are very important, auditing process, periodic audit after two years or after three years, review of your performance over the years. So that is quite important, as well.
And the best practice also that has worked very well in ICANN through which a number of us have been involved is as we also see in this Forum is remote participation, using technology. Technology is being used very well to ensure that voices are heard. In ICANN, the business constituency, and also the ICT BASIS, so any organisation is concerned about best practice for multistakeholderism must be in focus also on use of technology for remote participation so that if funding is not there for people to be there where the discussion is going on, they can also participate remotely. Thank you.
>> AVRI DORIA: And thank you all for the introductory statements and thank you all for keeping them close to the 2 minutes I had asked for. Most of them didn't go much over. A little but not much. The next part of this is basically taking a couple of the themes that were broken out in the paper and the way I've asked to do it is that each one of those themes will have a short statement made by one of the panelists and then open up on that particular subject to the rest of the participants around the table and in the room but try and keep each one fairly short, like 10 minutes or less, just because this is just really getting the conversation started. I'm really hoping that we go beyond this to get the conversation. This is coming basically out of the paper that was created and that the content from this meeting as well as future conversations will be fodder for future versions of the paper.
So in terms of starting this, basically there were five topics that sort of came out. There was the definitions, attributes and commonalities in multistakeholder practice, a discussion on stakeholders, a discussion on trust, one on accountability and transparency, and then I'll talk a little bit about next steps and get some more feedback on that so first I'd like to ask Norbert to basically give a couple minutes on basically getting us started on the discussion on definitions, attributes and commonalities of the multistakeholder practice and best practice in that. Thank you.
>> NORBERT BOLLOW: So one definition that has been proposed, I'm going to read it and I'll try not to read too fast. So that you have a chance to actually reflect, is this a good definition or not.
So the proposed definition goes like this: The study and practice of forms of participatory democracy that allow for all who have a stake and who have an inclination to participate on an equal footing in the deliberation of issues and the recommendation of solutions.
Now, I want to be a bit provocative so we get to an actual discussion, and first question, the idea of having equal footing in a Public Policy discussion recognizing that there are vast differences of power. Some stakeholders are much more powerful than others. Where we can put them on the chairs around the table, tell them: You discuss on an equal footing, but the question is: Is that going to create a reality of equal footing or not?
I would like to further provoke by quoting from the directives of an organisation which is not very well liked in the Internet Community, the standardization organisations ISO and IAC, which say in their directives, the consensus process involves seeking to take into account the views of all parties concerned, and to reconcile any conflicting arguments. For me, this captures very well, what I appreciate about a multistakeholder process even if it does not use the word ‑‑ I mean, this definition is ancient. It goes back way beyond before the term "multistakeholder" became popular, one point I would like to raise is: Somehow, all those processes are in English.
Isn't it ‑‑ isn't there some parties concerned who do not speak English, who are somehow excluded by our choice of language from being able to participate in any way? And while I appreciate the UN best practice of having interpretation in 6 languages, just having some sessions at the IGF in 6 languages does not actually empower anyone to effectively participate into a policy making process. Thank you.
>> AVRI DORIA: Anyone like to sort of respond to that, to take that on? Or perhaps add another point? Yes, please, Constance Bommelaer.
>> CONSTANCE BOMMELAER: Thank you Avri. I'm with The Internet Society. So as an alternative, perhaps to consider the definition that came out on multistakeholder processes, and whether we could compile the two definitions. We have a document, it is an outcome document that was agreed. The definition I think that came out of this process is very close to the NETmundial so I was wondering for consistency whether it might be a good idea to try to compile them in order to have some sort of consistency in terms of definitions.
>> AVRI DORIA: I think we should take a number of definitions, the NETmundial. There's any number of them. So certainly combining multiple definitions into one that we can reach consensus on would probably be in terms of finding common definition so when you're speaking of another document you're speaking of your contribution of comments that was appended to the main document? Or are you speaking of the NETmundial document?
>> CONSTANCE BOMMELAER: The NETmundial one.
>> AVRI DORIA: We should take that and see how we can blend all those, yes, Chuck?
>> CHUCK GOMES: Thanks, Avri and thanks for that introduction. I always have trouble with the word "equal." Maybe it's because may background is in math and that may be my handicap. But in the multistakeholder model, is it ever really possible in reality to have equal? I think that's a great goal. But when you have language differences, some are translated, some are not. When you have people with different financial means that can attend in person and some cannot, and so right now, what's the better word? I don't know. I think that's a good goal but I think we also need to be realistic, what's the right word or what phrase to say it? I'm not sure but we use that word all the time, equal. And yet it's also impossible in a truly multistakeholder environment to do that unless you have unlimited resources which we don't have.
>> AVRI DORIA: Did I see oh okay, yes. Yes, please go ahead.
>> IZUMI OKUTANI: Excuse me. Many of the questions that Norbert raised are very relevant to my situation because I'm trying to build a people and the Japanese community to also participate in global discussions and the issue of language is very ‑‑ something of concern. But at the same time it's not realistic to ask for translation in all the languages, so I think something that maybe the National or Regional IGF can play is raise awareness within your local community, and then have more people who have thoughts, and then maybe not everybody can participate. But the point that I think earlier a gentleman raised about remote participation or have someone who can represent and give feedback from the global IGF, that might be something that might not be a perfect solution in the way that Chuck has mentioned, but might change the situation a little bit.
>> AVRI DORIA: Discussion?
>> SEBASTIEN BELLAGAMBA: Thank you. Yes, I would like to add to what she was saying, about the specific cases that I have had before. We participate very actively in the Latin America and Caribbean IGF which is held every year and we do have translating for the three main languages that are spoken in the region. We are still having some languages out, our region speaks more than three languages but we do have English, Spanish and Portuguese. We are missing the French in Haiti, the Creoleans have languages from the Caribbean, the Dutch spoken in many areas but I think there is something in between but I think also I would like to develop from what our colleague said from Africa said about the ‑‑ how difficult it is for people mostly from developing countries to reach places like Istanbul or Bali or Baku. But I think two things come together when you see the whole process as an aggregation process that could be thought of that way.
Having strong popularity now in our Internet Governance multistakeholder process where it starts with National, rather than subregional and Regional and then global and that's something we in our region we can imagine something like that happening, and we set up our Regional and we're setting up National IGFs in order to work that way, preceding the global one in order to find the next level in a bottom‑up fashion, if you dare. Thank you.
>> AVRI DORIA: Basically I have time to take one more comment on this topic before I move on to the next one, if there is one last comment. Yes, Jimson, please.
>> JIMSON OLUFUYE: Just to quickly portray the fact that nationally, I think in Nigeria, it has balanced out. We can see equal participation so to speak. But regionally, that is where the challenge is. When I mentioned that we need to see a business ‑‑ because if it's happening for example maybe in Tokyo and there are people in Gambia or in Tunisia, if you want private sector represented and to come, that is ‑‑ there has to be some form of encouragement at this level of Internet governance in that region.
So the point again is to use technology to balance out. People need to prioritize, what is the investment for me, for business, really. And that is usually the case for business, because today, one of the things that was issued at the private sector at the Regional level and I tried to explain that.
And I'm glad to say that even UNDESA has recognized that developing nation's businesses just as they encourage Civil Society from developing nations to participate, the business Sector needs to be encouraged at the point like this until maturity. That's the point.
And on the language, yes, there's always a challenge of equality, or it's a goal. The goal is a good goal and perhaps down the line true technology and automatic translation, that could be possible to overcome the language barrier. In Nigeria today, we're beginning to get that, but it was not so before. It was not so before. But right now all stakeholders are involved in a true multistakeholder approach and with the charter so to speak in governance framework guidance.
>> AVRI DORIA: Thank you and I'm hoping that we continue this discussion on the list after this meeting but that was a very good presentation of many different points.
Moving on now to the second topic which was stakeholders and Izumi is going to give us a lead‑in to that.
>> IZUMI OKUTANI: So I think there are a couple of ways we can interpret the word "stakeholders." One is stakeholder groupings in the way that it's listed in the document. I can't list them all but for example Civil Society, the Government, business, et cetera, et cetera. And the other way of interpreting stakeholders, not to be too binded with these groupings but consider in the people who are affected by a certain policy implementation and so when you think about why is multistakeholder important, is while I understand it's a bit based on the spirit that when you consider policy implementation, it's very important to everybody that's affected is informed and be able to give inputs.
And so if you consider in that aspect, Japan on the issue, make stakeholder is different and also if within a stakeholder group, make stakeholder for spam and technical community may be different from a stakeholder group in content creation, for example. So when you think about stakeholder groups, it may be a good reference but you might want to be careful and not fall into just groupings and say: Okay, we've ticked all the stakeholder groups, and we're engaging everybody. So I want to share this observation, and would love to hear what others think about it.
>> AVRI DORIA: Thank you. I always like it when somebody brings in the "tick the box" problem, because that seems to be something that happens so very frequently. So I'm wondering, would anyone else like to comment on the subject of stakeholders at this point? Please.
>> DARIA CATALUI: Hello. I'm Daria Catalui. I work on the e‑Education in the European Network and Information Security Agency, ENISA. Maybe some of you know it. I just want to share an insight regarding the stakeholder definition. I call it the European Cybersecurity month, which is every October. And I can tell you already that only when you present and you introduce in your presentation the world stakeholder, you already lost some of the audience, so basically, it's a very technical term for the majority of the common users. Also, if people in the same room come from different backgrounds and different stakeholder communities, then they will not have the same understanding on the stakeholder.
So we use it a lot in all our reports that we publish them, but it's mainly a very bureaucratic word that we use mainly for those that we know what it means.
For the grassroots communities, I tend to use, like, explanations, and I lead the process in such a way that we conclude that, okay, this was a stakeholder consultation, so they already know what it means stakeholder. Not the English word, because the English word everybody knows, but the content of it.
>> AVRI DORIA: Thank you. That's a very good commented. Very important comment we forget. Thank you. Yes, please introduce yourself.
>> RICARDO POPPI: Thank you. My name is Ricardo Poppi. I work for Brazilian Government's General Secretariat of Brazilian Presidency responsible to dealing with participation, political participation. I think the concerns that I would address and bring to the table that connects to others is we get out of good experience by dealing with the big consultation for our Arena NETmundial. It was in parallel of NETmundial in April that was counted with the participation of more than 2,000 people, and the language we used was not related to the language commonly used on Internet Governance Forums. It was very a grassroots language. The question was: What Internet do you want?
The proposals were very connected to everyday use of the users but then we systematized that dealt with liberty of expressions and other things and this experience leads us to the reflection of when the multistakeholder environment is producing Public Policy, it's important that they are very ‑‑ that they are doing a representation of the society as a whole, and how is it possible to do this connection drinking on the experience of the everyday Internet user?
How to first of all mobilize this user that matters of Internet Governance affects its everyday life and how he can contribute with the debate. And maybe I will provoke a reflection on the answer for this question, maybe we are missing a Sector in this multistakeholder model, maybe the Sector that can help with this connection culturally, something like that.
>> AVRI DORIA: Thank you. And I think one of the problems and one of the processes is to try and make sure that we don't miss sectors, so I think that part of the exercise is indeed, how do we figure out how not to miss sectors as they are created?
Any other comment on this topic? Yes, please.
>> NORBERT BOLLOW: Thank you. One thing that I'm always concerned about when I hear this stakeholder categorizing, and I say this as one who is really proud of being Civil Society and happy to be Civil Society, for me it's not a problem, to associate with that, but the question is: How useful is the category of Civil Society nowadays? When the modern state of Switzerland was created in 1848, there was one political party that had all the seats in Parliament, but over time there became more political parties, and right now we have quite a number of them. And maybe we need this kind of process also within our stakeholder categories, that people are not just identified as being Civil Society or business, but we may need to create groupings within these categories reflecting different viewpoints, and helping people with one or the other kind of subgroup of the stakeholder grouping to somehow coordinate and help reduce the overall complexity of the picture by aggregating similar viewpoints. Thank you.
>> AVRI DORIA: I like that notion of aggregation, and one quote that I've heard a couple times from people is: When we go home at night, we're all Civil Society. So indeed, it does make it difficult to differentiate those different meetings, and those of us that are active in Civil Society view it differently than those who say, I'm Civil Society when I go home at night.
Anyone else would like to comment on this particular topic before moving on to the next? Yes?
>> SEBASTIEN BELLAGAMBA: Yes, just a small comment regarding your remarks on his intervention. In my perspective, multistakeholderism means that every single interested party has to have no barriers to participate. Instead of we have the duty of bringing people, because it might be the case that some stakeholders don't want to participate. We have to be open to that. So I think we should focus more on enabling the possibility to participate instead of just concentrating on bringing them altogether. We have to get everyone together here.
>> AVRI DORIA: That's a good way to end this particular segment and move on is we've got to bring in everyone. Okay, thank you.
Okay, now, the next topic was "trust," and I have two people that will do an introductory comment, and then we'll move on to open discussion.
The first one would be Susie Hargreaves. Would you like to speak on trust?
>> SUSIE GARGREAVES: Okay. Thanks very much. I just wanted to say on the stakeholder issue, that I guess the reason why I think our organisation works is that our stakeholders have all got something at stake so they're going to lose or gain from the situation if they are involved and I think that applies to how you can deal with the imbalance between stakeholders. So for example the problem we're trying to resolve on online sexual abuse is not solvable without all stakeholders of all sizes working together, and there has to be an acknowledgment of that.
So how do we gain people's trust? Well, first of all, they have to have a common goal. And sometimes they have a range of multiple motivations within that common goal but absolutely it has to be the common goal that is there first and foremost.
And for us, it's also about transparency and accountability, and we do that through an independent Board. We have independent processes. We have our independent appeals and complaints process and this also ensures that this balance within the stakeholders involved.
We also make sure that we learn from the stakes and our Board applies a level of scrutiny to what we do, and actually that's kind of constantly evolving issue.
And the main reason I think the multistakeholder partnership works is results. We actually have practical results which we publish, and we build on, and we're an effective partnership and ultimately if it's not effective it's not going to achieve any results so that's hugely important.
And the last thing I just wanted to say was, yeah, so actually, no, I think I covered everything. Thank you. Thanks.
>> AVRI DORIA: And Bob Flaim.
>> ROBERT FLAIM: Let me echo everything she just said and I also wanted to talk about what Byron said because he said quality decision and output is trust. That is very important. The only thing I could add to trust, also would be transparency, having a connection, follow‑through if people are asking things and they're expecting things to follow through and to make sure whether you say you can do it or not. And consistency.
Are you acting the same way with everyone? And are you being correct in what you say and what you do and also doing that on a consistent basis. So that's the basis for trust. I know when I first started coming to ICANN and ARIN, law enforcement always has a very strong reaction either one way or another. I know when I came, what are you doing here? Why is the FBI here? What's happening? What's going on?
Just by being there and being the same person and showing that trying to be an equal and fruitful partner and stakeholder I think has benefited my organisation a lot.
>> AVRI DORIA: Thank you. So anyone else wish to comment on the subject of trust? Yes, please do so.
>> JIMSON OLUFUYE: Thank you. Really, trust is a very big word, really, very, very critical word. And I say I trust you that you will deliver, and so I expect you to deliver. It's really big, but many times you find that it's broken one way or the other and so just as Susie mentioned, a key element of ensuring trust is maintained is transparency, transparency throughout the process, the auditing process. In fact, that's why auditing is quite important, checking the process again, but trust is actually key for us moving forward, but without trust, I would not be here. Many of us would not be here.
We trust that this was going to happen, that this event would happen and based on the record that was published before, so I just want to underscore that transparency is very key to ensure trust is sustained, and trust is actually a big word, and it's good for question in the multistakeholder environment and for multistakeholderism.
>> AVRI DORIA: Yes, please, Grace and then ‑‑
>> GRACE GITHAIGA: I think coming from an environment where we have seen, for example, mistrusts among stakeholders, especially because for us, the threat sometimes is the element. Sometimes it's businesses, and trust really ‑‑ I think in talking about trust, probably some of the questions we need to ask ourselves is whether then we need to accord Governments that special status in any multistakeholder process, or whether it is possible for them to participate like any other stakeholder grouping.
And it's the same for businesses. So in terms of trusting each other, what role is each bringing into the process?
The second thing is, when we participate, do we trust each other? Do we see value in participating in processes? Do we see value in bringing our voices onto the table? And I think that will need to be very clear. And finally, in multistakeholderism and for us to trust each other, do we actually need to define who is a stakeholder? And I guess that might take us into bigger debates or debates that will never end and you know, do we need to actually define an approach on which stakeholder participates in this process and so that we don't lose trust?
>> AVRI DORIA: Thank you. It is interesting how we are beginning to see that while these things sort of get divided, they really do start to affect each other, and contain elements. Please, Byron.
>> BYRON HOLLAND: Thank you. Yeah, just picking up on the trust motif, I mean, it's easy to say, I'm sure we've all heard it: Trust takes a long time to build and it's very easy to destroy, a long time to earn and easy to spend. And I think that's something we should pay particular attention to when we talk about sustainable multistakeholder mechanisms that we may want to build or foster or continue to encourage. And in particular, and it's ‑‑ the paper itself speaks a little bit to this is when there's fundamental imbalance in power dynamic between various stakeholders. So all stakeholders may be equal, in quotations, in some way in that they have equal opportunity maybe to speak around a table like this.
But if there's a fundamental imbalance in the actual power, a Government representative versus a single Civil Society actor, for example, then we need to have mechanisms in place that realistically recognize that, and try to find an appropriate balance that enables trust to build. Because when there's a fundamental imbalance in power, I believe there's going to be an inherent lack of trust until it's built up or accommodated for in some way, shape or form because we build these mechanisms, we sustain these mechanisms. I think we need to make sure we take that into account.
>> AVRI DORIA: Any other comments? Yes, please.
>> RICARDO POPPI: I think there is one thing important about trust is to relate trust to legitimacy, as different things that relate to each other. Trust is related about how strong is the mechanism of multistakeholder? In all sectors and people that trust each other and decisions and agreed on the Forum.
But if you have a weak mechanism or a mechanism without trust, it affects the legitimacy of the mechanism by the whole ‑‑ as is seen by the whole country or the whole people, and that's the point that I think connects with the participation, because if you have reacting what they said in finishing out the other panel, if we talk about lowering barriers for people participating, we maybe should look how we are dealing with these barriers, which barriers we're talking about, because sometimes people are not participating because not because they don't want, but because they can't understand what's going on, so it's ‑‑ because that's why I thought about sectors and all this stuff because we even in Civil Society, we work in a matter of organised Civil Society and there is the cities that don't see itself in organised Civil Society, and they have no means to participate. That's related to more legitimacy than to trust, but I think that's co‑related.
>> AVRI DORIA: Thank you. I just wanted to make a note for the transcribers that that wasn't Jimson speaking. I'm not ‑‑ Ricardo, sorry. I wanted to make sure it got the right name. Please, okay. So three comments. You wanted to comment some more, and you did, I wanted you to go, and then we have a last comment.
>> SUSIE GARGREAVES: Okay, thank you. I just wanted to comment about how you build trust in the first place. So you could say our situation is very mature relationship which I'm in a similar situation in a number of countries in Africa, where we have a situation where industry won't even go in the same room as law enforcement, and we're having to start from scratch. And actually, I think that's where the role of trusted intermediaries comes in.
And actually, you know, there is a role that people can play who can prove that we can show results in good multistakeholder working. And it's a hell of a long journey to go on, and I acknowledge that, but actually the journey has to start somewhere, and actually, that's where we can take models of good practice where it has worked and actually not impose, because every country is different and culturally different and we need to be aware of that and the cultural sensitivities, but actually use that experience to really help build those partnerships.
>> AVRI DORIA: Thank you. Please quickly give your name again and I've gone over the time I wanted on this segment so please make your comment short.
>> DARIA CATALUI: Okay. I will be quick. I'm Daria. I just wanted to make it more complex because from my work experience, trust relates to more things, is the trust in between the two people, between the organisations, the trust in the system, and the trust in the process, so while building a multistakeholder approach, I and we have to take into account all these separate things, which can be somehow conflicting.
>> AVRI DORIA: And Sebastien, you had the last?
>> SEBASTIEN BELLAGAMBA: Yeah, taking the third one, the trust on the process, I would say there's three components which are very important for that. One is transparency, how decisions are taken. The second one would be accountability, what do you do when you take a decision? How you behave after that.
And the third one which is very important is predictability. The whole system has to be predictable for everyone.
>> AVRI DORIA: Thank you and it's a wonderful lead‑in to the next topic which was accountability and transparency but perhaps we also should add predictability to that.
Byron, I don't know if you ‑‑ you spoke about that in the beginning and you spoke of Bylaws and you spoke of good CEOs and how they're chosen. I don't know if you wanted to add anything more to kick this off or should I just open that?
>> BYRON HOLLAND: Sure. Maybe I'll say a couple of things, because I think as this conversation is moving on, we see more and more clearly the interrelationship of all of these elements, and when we talk about accountability, you were just saying with trust, with legitimacy, and how do you actually order those?
And I think that the multistakeholder environment, of course, is as I said at the beginning, is based on different stakeholders coming together to try to find a solution or come to a common goal or outcome. And how do you do that in a way that's legitimate when we have very different perceived and actual power balances within those different stakeholder environments?
How do the winners and losers in an outcome both believe that it's a legitimate outcome still, and can live with it? And that legitimacy I think is based on having trust in the processes and the organisations that are involved.
And part of that is having clear intent at the outset. Maybe if I could just offer a short parable that can provide kind of an actual example of something we experienced that I think could be a good example overall and that's within the IXP world in Canada. So Internet exchange points were very underrepresented in Canada, because of our geography in the U.S., all our Internet traffic went north‑south based on old telco lines, et cetera. As a result almost no Internet exchange points in Canada. In 2011 my organisation was working on this and concerned about it and we thought, how can we start to stimulate Internet exchange points across Canada? So we can have an East‑West environment not a North‑South environment? And this is also I think interesting in the ICANN context because at some point, somebody has to lead, even in a multistakeholder environment. Things don't just happen spontaneously.
We want to have organic things but somebody has to plant the seed, right, essentially? So part of it is being in an organisation where you're accountable to various stakeholders: The Internet, the ISP community, the Government et cetera, like we tend to be, as well as our members and other stakeholders. But we decided that it would be worthwhile to make an investment in trying to start more IXPs.
We started with clear intent by commissioning expert third‑party research. We brought in Packet Clearing House, Dr. Edelman from Harvard, did pure research in the Canadian context, made it freely available to all. Published it, promoted it. It obviously articulated the landscape, which showed a dearth of IXPs, and then we started reaching out to communities and saying: We think your community, based on population and other things, would be a good environment for IXPs. We're not in the IXP business. We'd love to be a member, because you know what? There's a global best practice. They're member based not‑for‑profit organisations that generally run quality IXPs, so here's a model. And we can help, but we don't want to run it.
And we got mixed messages back. There was trust in some areas, lack of trust in others. But we were very clear in our intent. We provided expert third party opinion freely available to all, and we said: We'll help, but we're not in the business of running IXPs. And we had very different experiences across Canada, and the good news is we have three times as many IXPs today as we did 2.5 years ago. Now, when you start with a low number of course you can triple it but the good news is we have tripled the number of IXPs in spite of very different power relationships between, say, CIRA and tiny little IXPs in small communities. Yet by being clear with our intent, by living up to what we said which is we're not going to come in and take it over, run it. There's no ill ‑‑ there's no unanticipated outcome here. It's clear. It's predictable. All of those things came together to even in the environments where there was lack of trust build trust, gain legitimacy, particularly when after we helped for a while, we pulled back as we said we would and said: We're not here to run it.
We want to be a member like the rest of you guys. That's it. That built legitimacy, credibility, and because we were firm on the one thing, we believe in a particular model, that model has also conferred accountability to the IXPs, whereas in some cases the initial thoughts of IXP members would not have been able to confer that final level of accountability to those individual organisations.
So all of these point really is: All of those pieces are hard won, but critical to providing good accountability for each, in this case, individual member‑based IXP.
>> AVRI DORIA: Thank you. I think it's very good to ‑‑ we've had a couple examples here and I think as this work progresses it will be good to collect more of them and get some of them documented.
Can take a couple more people on this topic of accountability, and transparency, and perhaps predictability. Would anyone else like to contribute to that at the moment? If not, I'll move on, but ‑‑ yes, please.
>> B. GRAHAM: Bill Graham speaking as an individual. It strikes me that there's ‑‑ it's really healthy to hear the amount of discussion that's going on these days in a number of environments about accountability. I still really struggle, and I'm hoping the work going forward over the next year can help with this ‑‑ I still really struggle with coming to an understanding of what people mean by "accountability" in the sense of, accountability for who ‑‑ to who, for what?
And what I hear most of the discussion focusing on is a kind of top‑down accountability, where a decision‑maker is accountable to the people affected by the decision. But it strikes me in a multistakeholder process there's also got to be a level of accountability on the part of the stakeholders to the decision‑making or the decision‑implementing entity.
And I don't hear that being ‑‑ the topic of accountability being brought into that full circle kind of discussion, because certainly there are many, many ways that organisations that are implementing decisions that need to improve their accountability but I really feel like drawing on my own experience for example on the ICANN Board, I don't feel I have a good sense of how people making representations to the Board are accountable to their communities and how they're accountable for supporting a decision or an implementation once it's made. Thanks.
>> AVRI DORIA: It was very good to actually hear the notion of circular, because there is that whole notion that in an accountability, you basically have to keep going around in a circle, and reaching down and moving back up. So thank you for bringing in circles.
Would anyone else like to add a comment on accountability and transparency? Yes, please.
>> CHUCK GOMES: Chuck Gomes from VeriSign, Inc. One of the things we do is often confuse the two. They're both absolutely essential but having transparency is not the same thing as having accountability.
>> AVRI DORIA: Let's say accountability is impossible without transparency so they are indeed different things. Any last words on accountability and transparency before I move on to the last item?
No? Okay. So basically the next ‑‑ the last item before I give each of the panelists a chance to make a closing remark is the next steps. Now, I don't know if Constance if you'd like to say something about this whole environment. I mentioned a little bit at the beginning that this was sort of the beginning of process that we would like to basically continue working on in some manner throughout the year, not quite sure yet. We're kind of figuring out what it means to work through the year at IGF.
And then have an outcome at next year's but if you could add a little bit more about the overall process of the, you know, best practices, or what I'm trying to get us to call "current best practices," because I think best practices change over time.
>> CONSTANCE BOMMELAER: Thank you very much, Avri. Good afternoon to everyone. I'm Constance Bommelaer from The Internet Society. I will as Avri has requested give some background information on these new tracks, the IGF Best Practices Forums.
It was felt last year coming out of NETmundial and listening to the call that was expressed through the NETmundial principles that it would be necessary for the IGF to strengthen its outcomes. And we're not talking here about creating a process where people would negotiate on text but rather on specific issues, such as spam, such as establishing certs, developing meaningful multistakeholder mechanisms, online child protection, and the development of local content. These were the five tracks for this year's IGF Best Practices Forums.
The intent was to gather all the relevant experts, document existing or current best practices, make that information available on the IGF website, because we've been hearing over and over that after the IGF has ended, it's important for stakeholders to be able to go to the IGF website and find relevant information, find the list of lead experts, find the publications of research and any relevant documents relating to a specific topic.
I've said that the initial objective was to gather information on current best practices. It is also ‑‑ and because it is mentioned in the Tunis Agenda, if possible, when possible, to identify common ground among stakeholders, among existing common ‑‑ existing best practices, to recognize, to acknowledge, that there is consensus.
And this is the possible outcomes that these different groups, these different tracks, are working towards. Again, it's very important for the IGF to start strengthening its working procedures without becoming a negotiating body, and this new experiment that we are starting with the Best Practices Forums, it is a beginning. It will go on. The work will continue inter‑sessionally between IGF Istanbul and IGF Brazil, and we're counting on lead experts around this table to take the work forward. But again this is on a voluntary basis.
When experts are done with the topic, the discussion should die and we should move on to the next relevant topic. Thank you.
>> AVRI DORIA: We're close to out of time. So I basically would like to now turn to the panelists and ask each of them, and I'm going to go in reverse alphabetical order this time simply because got to pick an ordering and basically just in a minute or so, but close to a minute, give a sort of what you think is among the most important things that we need to take away with us as we move into sort of continuing to work on this.
So Jimson, please.
>> JIMSON OLUFUYE: Yeah, thank you very much. I want to see this as a marathon, not a sprint, in that we have to see it through the long‑term perspective that we want this process to work. It is the best approach be because I recall when we started in Nigeria, there was really confusion. There were fightings among all stakeholders, until the President called everybody, said all of you, business, all of you Civil Society, sit down and work it out among yourselves. I want peace. Since 2005 it needs to work and we need to now review consistently. Consistent review of the process and involvement so awareness is very important.
So some other governments in Africa are concerned about what are the Africans, what can we take away? So I think this is one of those important things that we can have.
They say okay, really? Oh, yes, so I think it's a very good workshop and we need to focus more on this going forward, not until the next IGF or even throughout the next period but to the next idea. Thank you.
>> AVRI DORIA: Izumi, please.
>> IZUMI OKUTANI: Yes, I think these discussions have been very useful in confirming what are the understandings about the common concepts and I reserve some of the common grounds and observations about each of the concepts and what I would be interested in seeing additionally are specific examples of things that are being taken to address and realize some of the concepts. I think that would make the document much more practical and useful.
>> AVRI DORIA: Thank you.
>> BYRON HOLLAND: Thanks. Three comments. In part what I've heard around here is I think it's important that as we build what are the new best practices or evolve the current best practices that there be an enhanced focus on predictability. And that's something that I think is important. I think we should at least have a conversation or maybe even acknowledge that what we're looking for to a great degree is equality of opportunity, not necessarily equality of outcome as long as everybody can participate in a meaningful way. It doesn't mean we all have to always have the same outcome particularly in relation to the different kind of constituencies in a given topic whatever it may be and that the mechanisms at least recognize if not celebrate or are very positive about the fact that there are very different power balances within the various stakeholder groups and take advantage of that. Thank you.
>> AVRI DORIA: Thank you. Susie?
>> SUSIE GARGREAVES: One of the things I'd like to leave is don't discount models of good practice in multistakeholder working that exists in child protection and signer security, signer crime because we do have the same issues. It's not easier. We work with exactly the same governments, law enforcement, Internet companies as other issues, so I would say learn from our experience as well because we do have some models of good practice. Thank you.
>> AVRI DORIA: Thank you. A very good suggestion. Grace, please.
>> GRACE GITHAIGA: What I'm about to say may be people may not agree with me but that's from my experience, and it is that we need to understand that when people come into processes, they are coming with interests. There is therefore need to understand that different stakeholders have different interests in whatever processes that are there.
You know, for example, when we are working with Governments, now I understand after what happened in WCIT and what the Kenyan Government, the position that the Kenyan Government took, and the fact it annoyed many African countries is that they have their own internal agreements, and we were seen like the position that we took then missed some of those agreements and therefore they feel that they're not able to get some positions that they have within the ITU and other processes. And therefore we've been telling them if the natives understand probably would have come to a common understanding.
When Civil Society participates mostly it's to ensure that the problems that Governments or businesses are not seen actually highlighted and dealt with. Businesses also are made aware of what happens, and probably then there's an approach so my final comment is that we just need to understand the different stakeholders have different interests.
>> AVRI DORIA: Thank you. Bobby, please?
>> ROBERT FLAIM: I think the only thing I would add is that we should all go back to our own particular colleagues, whether it be law enforcement, civil society or business interests and let them know that this is important that they participate and also mention them as well so they can get a better grasp of the land and also be more productive while they're here, as well.
>> AVRI DORIA: Thank you.
>> NORBERT BOLLOW: One main take‑away: This trust, how trust can easily be destroyed is much related to what I mentioned in the beginning about the need to have an acceptable level, because in any of the many aspects that we have been discussing, like accountability. Like having some kind of recourse if something goes wrong or maybe went wrong, if we don't have an acceptable level there, trust is going to be destroyed quite quickly so going forward I would say we need to work out for the different aspects what is the minimal amount of quality that we must have for an acceptable practice, so that we don't go destroying trust, and then beyond that, figure out how to get an even better practice, better than the minimal acceptable level, which will help building trust. Thank you.
>> AVRI DORIA: Thank you. I've got Guy next, please.
>> GUY BERGER: Thank you. What I enjoyed about this discussion I think is the recognition that this means different things in different contexts, and multistakeholderism in the formation of ‑‑ formulation of policies, such as new Domain Names, is different ‑‑ formulation of policy is different to adoption of policy, and thus a different implementation or oversight of implementation. So I think applying that more venue related understanding is important but I'd also like to prioritize a few things we were celebrating. One thing is: Is consensus always the preferred goal of multistakeholderism? How important is it ‑‑ have multistakeholder failed if you don't have consensus?
Second, accountability, to what extent could accountability be a risk for bureaucracy inflexibility as against creativity and flexibility? To what ex tent instead of examining the merits of positions you look at who the author is and you say, well, you don't represent anybody so why should we listen to you?
And my last problematizing point is: Isn't it sometimes good to keep this term fuzzy rather than define it? We can kind of say what it's not to some extent, it's not unilateral but the point, the argument is made here, it's a marathon, not a sprint. I don't know, maybe it could be relevant in certain sprinting situations.
So let's keep it a little bit fuzzy. Let's also remember it's a very contested term. Sometimes it's used, co‑option from the top. It's used for sort of grassroots pressure from below and people are wrestling over this term and using it sometimes in ways which precisely because it is vague, nobody can quite kind of change ‑‑ really get down to things. And we should think carefully about the methods which we use to understand it. If you frame it as a game you get a very different concept of multistakeholderism if you say it's a game as opposed to a power contest as opposed to a business partnership or opposed to a Democratic process. These are all different metaphors so we have to think each one means a different thing for multistakeholderism. Let's kind of keep it in play. Thank you.
>> AVRI DORIA: What a marvelous set of provocations for the ongoing discussion on the list. I think that's great. Sebastien?
>> SEBASTIEN BELLAGAMBA: Thank you. Very happy with this panel and looking forward to continued work. I think when we finish our work we have produced two things. One is the output itself, the best practices and the other one to have shown how mature this multistakeholder process is, which is really, really good so looking forward and very happy. Thank you very much.
>> AVRI DORIA: Thank you. I don't know if Guilherme is online and wants to say anything.
>> GUILHERME ALMEIDA: Yep.
>> AVRI DORIA: Good. I'm glad you're there, please.
>> GUILHERME ALMEIDA: I'd just like to emphasize the relevance of transparency and accountability to decision‑making processes related to multistakeholder initiatives. We have already achieved several advancements with respect to the transparency in the procedures, but I think we should emphasize transparency and accountability in the decision‑making process. This will really account for the legitimacy and the trust among all the multistakeholder ‑‑ all stakeholders.
>> AVRI DORIA: Thank you. And I want to thank you all. We do have a list. I believe we'll keep working on that same list. Yes, John, would you like to say something? Sorry.
>> J. LAPRISE: John Laprise, for the record, for the IGF Secretariat. I want to thank all of you who have contributed to the list. Your work provides the Foundation for the work I do in compiling and writing these best practices. And I'd like to invite everyone who is listening in, either here or distance, if you haven't already said something, come and join the list, come and contribute. Contribute on the document. We want your comments. Your input is critical to the success of this process.
So if you've been silent today, please come and contribute. Thank you.
>> AVRI DORIA: Thank you. And last thing I'll say is that invitation even goes for people that weren't here today, who listen to this thing in a week or a month or several months. So if anybody happens to listen to this later, we need your stuff.
So anyhow, thank you all, and I will see you online.
[ Applause ]
[ End of session ]
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This is the output of the real-time captioning taken during the IGF 2014 Istanbul, Turkey, meetings. Although it is largely accurate, in some cases it may be incomplete or inaccurate due to inaudible passages or transcription errors. It is posted as an aid to understanding the proceedings at the session, but should not be treated as an authoritative record.
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