[Mmwg] IGF workshops

[Milton Mueller]

>>> Avri Doria <avri at acm.org> 5/30/2006 5:29:21 AM >>>
>one of the ideas being looked at is for there to be a number of  
>multistakeholder workshops that will be organized by various  
>multistakeholder groups on IG relevant topics that are not  
>necessarily limited to the thematic definitions.

Substitute the word "working groups" for the word "workshops" and I
think we have already addressed this somewhat in our earlier discussions
and proposals. You are right, however, that we did not address how to
select one proposal over another given more proposals than the event
could accommodate.

Unfortunately, as far as I can tell, all process ideas have been
completely ignored by the UN people, who have chosen not to create a
process but rather have relied on "UN politics as usual" to make
decisions. I see no effort to incorporate any new ideas about IGF
procedures and structure into the decisions so far. What I see, first,
was a disastrous concession to the G77 (which wanted a large MAG
composed of 40 people), and then some completely discretionary political
bargaining with ICANN and ISOC to gain their political and financial
support. 

So we can reliably conclude that workshop criteria will be established
in a similar way. We might as well, however, take a stab at proposing
some better ways.

>one way to do this would be for there to be criteria defining for  
>such a multistakeholder workshop that would allow the secretariat to 

>schedule them on a first come first served basis.

Not sure what you mean here. There is a real tension between "first
come first served" (FCFS) as an assignment/recognition criteria and the
notion of "criteria". Unless the criteria are highly objective, and
require no subjective value judgments, and act as a prior filter to
application of the FCFS principle, then you must substitute "criteria"
for FCFS. 

Given the somewhat chaotic politics surroiunding the MAG, I would hope
that workshop proposals would not simply be thrown, like red meat into a
pit of snarling wolves, into the MAG for discussion. But that is
probably what will happen. 

That being said, here are some ideas for preselection filters:

There should be a template for application and a rigidly enforced
deadline.
All proposals should be publicly registered and transparent to the
public. ALL proposals! 
One workshop to an organization? 
International organizations should not be permitted to administer
workshops on their own
No workshop should be vetoed on the basis of its topic

>one constraint i think we have to assume is that the workshop be MSH 

>oriented and not limited to a single point of view or sector of the  
>community.

This is a complicated issue, easier said than done. MS dialogue and
relations are much harder to establish than we think. It is easy for
governments and IOs in particular to "fake" MSH by using their power and
resources to involve GONGOs or astro-turf organizations or bought-off
academics as tokens. It is much, much harder, on the other hand, for
civil society advocacy groups or independent, critical researchers to
engage governments, IOs and business. 

This MMWG has aspiration to involve governments and PS as well as CS
but really doesn't. If its very exoistence depended on first gaining MSH
support, it is clear that this WG would never be allowed to exist. 

Also, do you really want to force all workshops to present "all sides"
and who decides how many sides are "all sides?" How can you discuss an
issue like content blocking if one significant group (the govts that do
it) refuses to recognize that it is an issue and owuld prefer not to
talk about it at all? There is a danger of preventing any real
discussion from taking place among