Participants: W Kleinwaechter, A Peake, S Bachollet, D Thompson, Gareth Shaerman, Nguyen Thon Hue, C Wilkinson
Staff: N Ashton-Hart, H Ullrich, M Langenegger
1. Outline about the WG workshop and summit session work
1.1 Historical background of WGs formation
Following a survey with 15 proposed subjects, the 5 most popular issues were retained and 5 working groups were formed. The summit participants were directed to the group that corresponded to their choices; given the availability (max. 15 people per group) and the language needs.
Each group must elect a Chair, 1 or 2 Vice-Chairs and a Rapporteur. These officers will help ensuring the coordination with the other working groups (parallel issues) and split up the work into several parts.
1.2 Timeline pre-summit and summit WG4 activity
a)Pre-summit: sessions during the next three weeks
work on a preliminary draft which should outline what the group thought the discussion should be about and what the statement should aim towards. Discussion on ideas about the summit introductory session on the Saturday, the choice of a speaker and how that introductory session could set up the rest of the discussion
b)Summit:Saturday 28 March: 14h30 – 15h30: introductory session on transparency/Accountability (Main room – general session)
Sunday 1 March : 2 workshop sessions and lunch break
9h-10h: adoption of agenda, election of Chair, Vice-Chairs, Rapporteur, issue overview, review of subject and documents
10h-12h30: work on finalizing statement
12h30-14h: lunch
14h-16h15: work on finalizing statement
Tuesday 2 April: 14h-16h15 finalization of WG statement
A PSC presentation could take place on the Saturday and the introductory session could end with some question that the workshop would seek to answer
2. Documentary source for the statement
More information about the draft statement and the reference material for the WG4
http://www.atlarge.icann.org/summit/wg/transparency-en.htm
a)PSC sources:
the committee has published some basic documents on transparency and accountability within the Icann structure.
PSC will provide an introduction on the subject at the summit.
A Peake and W Kleinwaechter will work on a document summarizing the accountability/transparency issues from an At-Large perspective.
b)At-Large previous comments on Accountability/Transparency
There are no previous At-Large statement on the issue per se.
Several related comments are embedded in previous statements made by At-Large on other issues.
At-Large staff will produce a staff paper outlining what is relevant and where to find it. This will serve as a background for drafting the pre-summit statement.
c)External documentation regarding Accountability/Transparency
One World Trust, a British NGO, has specialized in increasing the Transparency and accountability of international, civil society and private sector organizations. The trust provides tools and recommendations as well as publishes each year a global accountability report where they focus on a number of NGOs and other type organizations in the private and non private sector
3. WG4 participants’ overview on T/A
1/ possible overlap between the WG 2 ‘Future structure & governance of Icann’ and WG 4 ‘Transparency/accountability’
S Bachollet explained that WG 2 is about ‘structure’ while WG 4 is more about ‘process’. A lunch or breakfast will be facilitated across the WGs during the summit so as to allow coordination and exchange of input between the different groups.
2/ Transparency
Icann’s need to give structure and priorities to the information it gives to the public on its Website. There lacks techniques to filter through the volume of information and simplified introductions of the issue.
There needs to be a quarterly linkage between the actual Icann Board agenda and the flow of bottom-up process issues: There should be a formal policy-making process that follows the format of comments, responses to comments and resulting outcomes.
Drafts and their subsequent revisions should have footnotes and the changes between the successive versions of a document should be highlighted to clarify to witch public comment they answer and why that comment was made first. This would help the Board.
3/ Make Icann website more user-friendly
Participants get confused with the profusion of Icann wikis. They were advised to open their Skype chat window during teleconferences. It would allow them to exchange information with the other participants and keep pace with the meeting
4/ Icann’s accountability
Two issues are prevail:
a) role of the GAC and its surrogate function for a full accountability to the governments – here, opinions of the public are divided
b) role of Icann regarding some of its external stakeholders, i.e. the business community feels that Icann’s accountability is understated in the current state.
The basic Icann model should be preserved but that the accountability issue should be discussed pro-actively with regards to the counter-proposal of a fully governmental management of Icann, as an alternative to the US tutelage.
However, that kind of issue should be addressed primarily to the GAC as the GAC represent the governments of the general public.
