[WSIS CS-Plenary] CS at the upcoming Tunis meeting / CS input into Internet Governance activities

[Thomas Ruddy]

Dear plenary,
I also attended the CONGO Briefing. Only later,
though, did I come to understand the importance of
having a broader representation of CS in attendance at
the upcoming Tunis meeting than the CS Bureau could
provide alone. Therefore I support the ideas put forth
by Bill and Karin.

A second issue that I've watched arise recently is
whether and, if so, how CS wants to bring its input
into the Internet Governance activities that are
picking up speed in parallel to the Tunis
preparations, namely in Rome and NY.

For instance, for the ICANN Meeting in Rome
forthcoming from 2-6 March 2004, the agenda has just
been released,
http://www.icann.org/meetings/rome/#ScheduleandAgenda

The agenda includes a session by a civil society
group, ICANN's At Large Advisory Committee, which has
issued a Draft Statement on the WSIS Declaration of
Principles and Plan of Actions,
http://alac.icann.org/wsis/statement-wsis-20jan04.htm

So let me put forth two questions:

1. How does our Plenary relate to the work being
undertaken by ICANN's At Large Advisory Committee?

2. The WSIS CS Internet Governance (aka the Internet /
ICT Global Governance Caucus) has been seeking a role
for itself in the new group that Kofi Annan is to set
up as a result of WSIS. How does our Plenary relate to
that?  Could the WSIS CS Internet Governance represent
the CS Plenary?

Regards,
Thomas, moderator www.wsis.ethz.ch

--- William Drake <wdrake at ictsd.ch> wrote:
> Hi Karen,
> 
> > From: plenary-admin at wsis-cs.org
> [mailto:plenary-admin at wsis-cs.org]On
> > Behalf Of karen banks
> > Sent: Wednesday, February 11, 2004 3:48 PM
> >
> > ** Can someone clarify who will be participating
> in the March 3-4 meeting
> > from civil society, and who is making those
> decisions? **
> 
> As Rik's summary indicated, there was some
> discussion of your question at
> the CONGO meeting.  The Tunisian ambassador said
> that his government wants
> civil society to be fully involved, and to that end
> is inviting the bureau
> to the Tunis meeting to plan the next steps.  In the
> Q&A I pointed out that
> caucuses and working groups were formed bottom up by
> CSOs themselves, all
> have members, have been the locus of a lot of
> activity, and hence be
> involved in phase II planning along with the
> families.  Accordingly, I asked
> what steps Tunisia would be taking to ensure this
> broad-based participation.
> The Tunisian ambassador replied that his government
> wants civil society to
> be fully involved, and to that end is inviting the
> bureau to the Tunis
> meeting to plan the next steps.
> 
> I then asked the Swiss ambassador, Charles Geiger of
> the secretariat, and
> Alain the same question.  Basically their answers
> were to effect that it's
> up to the CSOs to organize themselves in whatever
> way best reflects their
> members' interests.  Renate suggested that to the
> extent that the Tunis
> planning meeting could blur from process to content
> issues (which is
> inevitable, given the need to decide what will be
> addressed etc), perhaps it
> would make sense to have a representative of
> contents and themes there as
> well.
> 
> That's where things stand.
> 
> Aside from such process matters, I should add that
> there were some
> disturbing suggestions about possible new thematic
> focuses for phase II,
> including "security" and "ethics."  Maybe we'll end
> up with a new Acceptable
> Use Policy....
> 
> Cheers,
> 
> Bill
> 
> 
> ******************************************
> William J. Drake
> Geneva, Switzerland
> wdrake at ictsd.ch
> http://www.citi.columbia.edu/affiliates/wdrake.htm
> Director, Project on the Information Revolution
>   and Global Governance
> Senior Associate, International Centre for Trade
>   and Sustainable Development www.ictsd.org
> ******************************************
> 
> 
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