[EURO-Discuss] List of nominations for Belgrade GA
Christopher Wilkinson
cw at christopherwilkinson.eu
Fri May 27 15:16:25 UTC 2011
Dear Friends and Colleagues:
May I express my appreciation to all those who have accepted to stand
for election to the EURALO board at the forthcoming Annual Meeting in
Belgrade.
I am however concerned about the manner in which EURALO appears to be
reaching a conclusion on this matter.
Civil Society in general and the ICANN At Large in particular have not
yet reached the threshold of participation and representation that
would lend sufficient credibility to their necessary and worthy
efforts in several international Internet fora. EURALO needs to
continue to work on this, in terms of its membership, structures and
representation. Although these concerns are - I think - shared among
our membership, I wonder whether we all appreciate how much still
needs to be done, particularly to establish the autonomy of At Large
and ALAC with respect to ICANN.
In this context, it was - I suggest - an error of judgment on the
part of our elected ICANN Board member to have initiated his own
"ticket" of candidates to the EURALO Board, whatever the merits of the
individual candidates concerned. The At Large Board member is elected
by ALAC and the RALO's, not vice-versa.
Furthermore, we thus give proof patent to our critics that At Large is
a creature of ICANN. For instance, I would not expect that individual
ICANN Board members would be intervening in the election of other
Constituency or Supporting Organisations' councils, which in turn
elect their ICANN Board members. There would be a conflict of
interest, or at least a détournement. Should it ever be so, it would
not be an example to be followed.
In this respect, for future reference, I would recommend that EURALO
elections be conducted by a neutral election committee supported by
the ICANN staff.
I would also recommend that candidates be nominated and seconded
individually by member ALS's. Since EURALO wants to have larger
numbers of ALS ("outreach") and greater participation from within
member ALS ("inreach"), then I suggest that we could begin right here.
Contrariwise, if the whole "ticket" is nominated internally, I can
think of no better way of turning off the potential interest of
newcomers. (And we need them, many.)
Finally, I would turn to our individual members. At this stage in the
development of EURALO, I suggest that our individual members enjoy
neither the representativity nor the mandate to act as officers of
EURALO. Those individual members who wish to exercise a mandate in At
Large - and thankfully there are some - should give priority to
creating their corresponding ALS's, as provided for in the amended
EURALO Statutes. Otherwise, yet again, EURALO and ALAC lay themselves
open to the characterisation of a self-perpetuating group of ICANN
insiders. None of us want that.
Needless to say, the above comments may not be taken as criticism of
any of our members, candidates, officers or delegates.
This is about EURALO's process, and how it may be perceived both
internally and externally. And about how it may be improved.
With my best regards to you all and best wishes for a successful
meeting in Belgrade.
Christopher Wilkinson
ISOC-Belgium-Wallonia ALS
On 27 May 2011, at 12:14, Wolf Ludwig wrote:
More information about the EURO-Discuss
mailing list