Re: [council] AoC RT Endorsement Process, Motion, and Amendments

[Stéphane Van Gelder <stephane.vangelder@xxxxxxxxx>]

Isn't this up to each group? I know the some constituencies have different 
rules for their councillors than we do in the RrSG. So I would have thought 
this is a perspective thing, each group having its own on the matter...

Stéphane

Le 15 juin 2010 à 08:50, Adrian Kinderis a écrit :

> I think it is a great conversation topic.
>  
> If we are not allowed to act without conferring with our SG’s why is there a 
> number of us.
>  
> You may as well have one person with three votes (for the RrSG anyway...)
>  
> Adrian Kinderis
> 
>  
> From: William Drake [mailto:william.drake@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx] 
> Sent: Monday, 14 June 2010 8:59 PM
> To: Adrian Kinderis
> Cc: Gomes, Chuck; Rosette, Kristina; GNSO Council List; Knobenw
> Subject: Re: [council] AoC RT Endorsement Process, Motion, and Amendments
>  
> Hi Adrian
>  
> On Jun 14, 2010, at 11:08 AM, Adrian Kinderis wrote:
> 
> 
> Bill,
>  
> .  I thought we were elected to represent our respective slices of the 
> community and after consulting with them could act in their names, and if 
> they don't like what we've done we get unelected in the next cycle.
>  
> Is this not the same debate as “participatory vs representative”?
>  
> FWIW I'd say it's related but different.  In our discussion prior I suggested 
> we should allow participation subject to the agreed conditions rather than 
> following a strictly representational model in which people could only 
> "speak" through their Councilors, but I certainly didn't suggest that we're 
> not elected to represent them.  Whereas what Kristina seems to be saying is 
> that only SGs can take decisions on nominees and Council action would hence 
> be independent of the community, which would imply we don't represent it.  
> But maybe I'm failing to read between these lines correctly...
> 
>  
> For what it is worth, I share the same quandary.
>  
> I didn't realize the Council was so ontologically challenged.  Would this 
> merit a group conversation in some setting, e.g. the Saturday dinner?
>  
> Bill
> 
>  
>  
>  
>  
> From: owner-council@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx [mailto:owner-council@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx] On 
> Behalf Of William Drake
> Sent: Monday, June 14, 2010 6:17 PM
> To: Gomes, Chuck
> Cc: Rosette, Kristina; GNSO Council List; Knobenw
> Subject: Re: [council] AoC RT Endorsement Process, Motion, and Amendments
>  
> Hello,
>  
> It seems there are two levels to this discussion.  The broader one concerns 
> the nature and role of the Council.  Kristina argues that the Council " has 
> been greatly restricted in the restructuring and the initially proposed 
> mechanism goes beyond that role," and that "having a slightly more 
> complicated process at the SG level is far preferable to having the Council 
> take on an SG role and make nominations independent of the community."  I 
> wasn't around when the veterans among us were having the constitutional 
> discussions leading to Council reform, so I guess I'm not sufficiently 
> clueful on how everyone sees this.  While I understand that Council is now 
> supposed to be more a coordinator/facilitator of community processes than the 
> doer of all things, I did not take this to mean that it cannot legitimately 
> make decisions via votes on matters like adding a person or two to enhance 
> the diversity of the GNSO's RT nominations because that would be acting 
> independently of the community.  I thought we were elected to represent our 
> respective slices of the community and after consulting with them could act 
> in their names, and if they don't like what we've done we get unelected in 
> the next cycle.  So then what decisions can we take that do not constitute 
> acting independently of the community, where's the boundary line?  If I'm the 
> only one who is perplexed I hope someone will straighten me out in Brussels...
>  
> Anyway, on the issue at hand, Chuck your understanding of the drafting team's 
> proposal is not different from everyone else's.  The text clearly says "The 
> Council will consider the resulting list of up to four nominees at its next 
> teleconference.  If the list does not meet the above mentioned diversity 
> objectives, the Council as a whole may choose to endorse up to two additional 
> candidates..."  Two additional is additive, not substitutive.  To my 
> knowledge, the notion that after considering diversity options the Council 
> would endorse only four (Kristina's Step 2, below) is new, it wasn't included 
> in the amendment language she sent to the list (quoted at the bottom) and I 
> don't recall anyone suggesting it on the call.  From my standpoint, this is 
> even more problematic than what we were talking about previously.  It would 
> either a) astronomically politicize the process by raising the prospect that 
> Council could overturn SG's one-per endorsements, leading to inter-SG 
> squabbling over whose gets dumped and associated bad feelings...and talk 
> about undercutting SG sovereignty!; or b) create really strong disincentives 
> to do anything to enhance diversity in order to avoid that scenario.  
>  
> The whole point of the drafting team proposal was to make the process simple 
> and apolitical, driven in large part by the fact that the ATRT model with the 
> two competitive seats appeared to generate a lot of confusion and agitation 
> within one SG in Nairobi.  This proposal would plunge us far in the opposite 
> direction.
>  
> Circling back to what we were talking about yesterday, the text below that 
> Kristina sent Thursday during the call says, "the Council as a whole may 
> choose to endorse up to two additional candidates, from among those 
> identified by the stakeholder groups under item 2."  That plainly means only 
> those identified by the stakeholder groups under item 2, there's no 
> misunderstanding here.  In yesterday's message she instead proposes what 
> Chuck suggested on the call, that the rest of the pool could in fact be 
> considered, but only after Council has discussed SGs' back-up endorsements.  
> This is better from the standpoint of those of us who think Council should be 
> able to consider the whole pool, but as I said yesterday it's not obvious why 
> we would need to legislate what we would undoubtedly do anyway based on 
> common sense and courtesy.  But if it makes folks happier....While we're at 
> it, maybe we should also codify the precise sequence of the discussion, i.e. 
> the order in which SG back-ups get considered and the time allotted to each?  
>  
> Best,
>  
> Bill
>  
>  
>  
>  
> On Jun 14, 2010, at 6:24 AM, Gomes, Chuck wrote:
> 
> 
> 
> All this makes me think that my understanding may be different than everyone 
> else.   I understood that endorsements by the SGs would remain regardless of 
> what the Council might do to improve diversity.  If the Council was 
> successful at gaining support for one or two candidates that improved the 
> diversity of the pool, then the pool of endorsed candidates would increase to 
> 5 or 6 depending on whether one or two additional candidates were selected.  
> The difference as I understood it between what Kristina proposed and the 
> original procedure, which is apparently wrong, was that the step in the 
> original procedures the Council would look at the full slate of candidates 
> seeking GNSO endorsement while what I thought Kristina suggested was that the 
> Council would first look at SG named alternates first and only if that was 
> unsuccessful would they look at the full slate of candidates seeking GNSO 
> endorsement.
>  
> Chuck
>  
> From: Rosette, Kristina [mailto:krosette@xxxxxxx] 
> Sent: Sunday, June 13, 2010 10:17 PM
> To: William Drake; Gomes, Chuck
> Cc: GNSO Council List; Knobenw
> Subject: RE: [council] AoC RT Endorsement Process, Motion, and Amendments
>  
> I hope I'm responding to the most recent message. If not, would someone 
> please forward it?  (All of my email rules have disappeared and I now have 
> thousands of messages in my in box.)
>  
> The concern driving the proposed amendment is that the Council's role has 
> been greatly restricted in the restructuring and the initially proposed 
> mechanism goes beyond that role.  The greater specificity in the process, the 
> greater the certainty.  There was concern that the Council would move 
> directly to the broader applicant pool without considering the SG additional 
> candidates.
>  
> To avoid any confusion about my proposed amendments (and it appears there may 
> be some), here's the step-by-step for the two scenarios
>  
> Scenario 1 (diversity goals met with SG nominees):  Council receives 4 
> nominated (or whatever we're calling them) candidates (1 from each SG), 
> diversity goals are satisfied, so Council endorses all four candidates. 
>  
> Scenario 2 (diversity goals not met):
>  
> Step1:  Council receives 4 nominated SG candidates (1 from each SG), but 
> diversity goals are not met.
> Step 2:  Council then considers the 6 additional candidates (2 SGs named 1, 2 
> SGs named 2) named by the SGs.  If consideration of these additonal 
> candidates results in a slate that meets diverseity goals, Council endorses 4 
> candidates.  If not, see Step 3.
> Step 3:  Council then considers all remaining persons in the applicant pool 
> (e.g., all persons who submitted applications but weren't nomiated by SGs or 
> identified as "additional candidates).  The last sentence in my number 4 was 
> directed to this step.
>  
> If my proposed amendments did not make that clear, please let me at what step 
> they weren't clear enough.
>  
> From: William Drake [mailto:william.drake@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx] 
> Sent: Sunday, June 13, 2010 11:30 AM
> To: Gomes, Chuck
> Cc: GNSO Council List; Rosette, Kristina; Knobenw
> Subject: Re: [council] AoC RT Endorsement Process, Motion, and Amendments
> 
> Hi Chuck
>  
> On Jun 13, 2010, at 4:48 PM, Gomes, Chuck wrote:
> I personally support the motion as proposed because I think the required 
> threshold of 60% of each house for any additional candidates provides more 
> than enough protection to ensure SG support.  That would require 5 
> affirmative votes for the CPH and 8 affirmative votes of the NCPH, so no SG 
> could control the vote, not even with the NCA vote.  With that protection, it 
> seems problematic to add more complexity to the process.
> At the same time, if there are those who cannot support the original motion 
> as is, I think I could support a modification that would do the following:
> 1.       If the Council decides to try to improve the diversity of the pool 
> of GNSO endorsed candidates, they would first consider those alternate 
> candidates proposed by the SGs, if any. 
>  
> Wouldn't we do this anyone as a matter of courtesy and common sense without 
> codifying it?  If there's a pool of 8 candidates and SGs have come to 
> internal agreement that they could support persons x y and z, presumably 
> their reps would indicate that when the conversation begins and we'd commence 
> talking about x y and z before moving on to the five nobody had yet 
> preferred.  Would anyone really say well, your SG may like Ms. x but I refuse 
> to talk about her and insist we start with someone nobody's said they favor?
> 
> 
> 
> 
> (One flaw with this as Bill noted in our meeting last week is that an SG 
> could submit all remaining candidates as alternates.)
>  
> After I said that, somewhat in jest, Kristina specified in the amendment, 
> "notify Council of one or two additional candidates whom it could support, if 
> available." 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 2.       If the Council is unable to approve any additional candidates to 
> improve diversity of the pool using only  SG proposed alternates, then they 
> could consider the entire set of candidates requesting GNSO endorsement.
> 3.       I would add one new wrinkle to this: SG’s should only propose 
> alternates that are of a different geographical location or gender than their 
> primary candidate.  In fact this would probably be a useful amendment to the 
> original motion.
>  
> I'd favor that, but not if it's tied to prohibiting the Council from even 
> considering people who were not so designated.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> What the IPC is proposing is that only applicants that SGs have previously 
> designated as acceptable back-ups could even be considered by the Council for 
> this purpose.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> [Gomes, Chuck]  I didn’t understand it as this restrictive.  I thought 
> Kristina said that the SG alternatives would be considered first; then if 
> that didn’t result in a successful resolution, other candidates could be 
> considered. 
> 
> That's what you suggested as an alternative.  Kristina's text says
> 3.  Change third bullet of #2 to read:  Each stakeholder group is encouraged 
> to (a) identify in its internal deliberations and (b) notify Council of one 
> or two additional candidates whom it could support, if available, in the 
> event that the diversity procedure outlined in item 4 below is utilized.  
> 
> 4.  Change the now-third sentence of point 4 to read: If, however, the list 
> does not meet the above mentioned diversity objectives, the Council as a 
> whole may choose to endorse up to two additional candidates, from among those 
> identified by the stakeholder groups under item 2, who would help to give the 
> list of GNSO nominees the desired balance.  If consideration of these 
> additional stakeholder group-identified candidates does not meet the 
> diversity objectives, the Council may refer to the GNSO applicant pool to 
> identify these additional candidates.
> 
> So anyone in the applicant pool who has not been specifically endorsed for 
> possible consideration could not be considered.  
>  
> Best,
>  
> Bill
>  
>  
> ***********************************************************
> William J. Drake
> Senior Associate
> Centre for International Governance
> Graduate Institute of International and
>  Development Studies
> Geneva, Switzerland
> william.drake@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
> www.graduateinstitute.ch/cig/drake.html
> www.linkedin.com/in/williamjdrake
> ***********************************************************
> 
>  
>  
> ***********************************************************
> William J. Drake
> Senior Associate
> Centre for International Governance
> Graduate Institute of International and
>  Development Studies
> Geneva, Switzerland
> william.drake@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
> www.graduateinstitute.ch/cig/drake.html
> www.linkedin.com/in/williamjdrake
> ***********************************************************
> 
>