RE: [council] 3 Council members or 2?

[Grant Forsyth <Grant.Forsyth@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Milton
Thanks for being frank in your personal view.
It does not surprise me that all elected representatives of a constituency
vote in the same way - hopefully in line with their constituency determined
stand on an issue. For an elected member to vote against the policy position
their constituency had decided  to adopt, would likely be unacceptable to
the constituency - regardless of the region the GNSO representative comes
from.

However, to focus simply on the voting on GNSO Council of constituency
members misses the argument as to the desirability of the greater regional
diversity that 3 versus 2 constituency representatives bring. In a well
functioning constituency, the GNSO representatives perform a number of roles
including bringing to the GNSO discussions their culturally diverse
experiences, contributing that diversity to discussions, task forces and
work groups and bringing back to their constituency their perspective -
again, enriched by their particular diverse cultural experience - for
discussion within the constituency in the process of determining a
constituency policy position. Hopefully you have experienced this diversity
and enriched perspective in the consultation that NCUC reps have engaged in
between the matters and discussions of the GNSO Council and the NCUC
constituency policy determination process?

I for one, not withstanding that some on Council might wish to offensively
"lump" me into a general category of "white middle class male", consider
that my experiences are different to those of my NA and EU colleagues. I
hope that my experiences, and those from others around the world, contribute
value in the discussions that are held on Council.

Besides the benefits of greater cultural diversity, the other major benefit
of 3 versus 2 constituency reps, is the acknowledgement that for most of us
ICANN is job in addition to our day jobs and hence we are quite constrained
in the time that we can devote to ICANN. For that reason, having 2 rather
than just 1 representative colleague to share the work and available for
reflection on GNSO Council matters, is crucial.

You can see that like Ken and others, I think this is an issue that needs to
be given proper consideration by Council in sufficient time to be put before
the Board to ensure that they can properly consider the issues and make a
determination such that the individual constituency elections will not be
disrupted through uncertainty.

Bruce, I look forward to this being on the Council agenda - if not on 17
July, then at our next meeting.
Regards


Grant Forsyth
Business Constituency Rep

-----Original Message-----
From: Milton Mueller [mailto:Mueller@xxxxxxx]
Sent: Sunday, 13 July, 2003 10:05
To: council@xxxxxxxx; Bruce.Tonkin@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [council] 3 Council members or 2?


While we are weighing in on the 3 members per constituency
issue, I may as well make it clear that I and most NCUC 
members I have talked to prefer to remain with the current 
plan to have only two GNSO Council representatives per 
constituency. 

In part, this stems from NCUC's own unique situation, in which
we have rarely been able to generate regular and
informed participation by all three GNSO Council members.
We look forward with relief to the prospect of only 
needing two members to devote so much time to 
GNSO Council activities. 

But we believe the argument applies equally well to the
other constituencies, because we note that in almost
all cases (the only exception typically being the NCUC,
which is actually has the most diversified interests) all 
three representatives vote the same way. What, then,
is the point of having three representatives? 

If I saw the AF or LAC-region members of the ISPCC, CBUC,
IPCC, registrars or gTLD registries consistently voting
differently from the NA or EU-region members, I would
feel differently about this. But the record shows that 
invariably the commercial constituencies vote the same way 
regardless of what region they are from on every significant 
issue. 

--MM