At-Large Workspace: Enhancing the Effectiveness of ICANN’s Multistakeholder Model – Next Steps

See: Google Doc (comment-only)

AT-LARGE ADVISORY COMMITTEE

ALAC Statement on Enhancing the Effectiveness of ICANN’s Multistakeholder Model - Next Steps

Introduction

EE/staff to complete (ALAC statement on following page)

ALAC Statement on Enhancing the Effectiveness of ICANN’s Multistakeholder Model - Next Steps

Intro:  At large is pleased to respond to this request for comments on next steps in the evolution of ICANN's multistakeholder model.  ALAC represents the interests of the end user community  etc.  etc. .............  

1. Priority issues vs. "low hanging fruit"

At Large is concerned about the current ranking of issues that remain before us. We note that the final 6 issues identified by the community as essential to the evolution of ICANN's multistakeholder model at have now been reranked into 3 priority issues and 3 "other" issues. In contrast, the previous request for comments (February 2020) asked the community to identify issues that were already being addressed in some way, that could be considered "low hanging fruit" and others that were more fundamental and would have to be approached in more holistic ways. We think it is important to retain that original representation of these issues. We would describe the issues  "Prioritization of work/efficient use of resources" and "Precision and scoping the work" as "low hanging fruit" -- items that are already being addressed in multiple ways -- as the current report clearly points out. 

Although we are sensitive to the fact that bandwidth to deal with issues is limited and that solutions to process issues like prioritization and scoping are already in the pipeline, that does not cause other issues on the list to become less important. We emphasize that all six of these issues, having already been culled from a list of 21 issues, are "priority issues." Unless all issues are addressed, we will have a more efficient version of the same model, not an evolution of the model as was the original intention. 

We note that community participants are invited to initiate their own actions to help address additional work areas. Regretfully, framed this way, this no longer feels like a community-wide push to improve the system but an invitation to single constituencies to "go it alone." For overstretched. under-resourced volunteer based groups, this is not a viable way forward.

In order to restore the balance of attention to priority issues, At Large seeks a timeline that would see all issues addressed by the end of the current 5 year strategic plan.

1. Moving out of silos

We reiterate our message in previous submissions (Feb. 2020, Oct. 2019, June 2019)  that ICANN's multistakeholder model cannot evolve without a wholistic review of roles and responsibilities within the system. At Large questions a structure where the policy decisions take place in a constituency where the registries/registrars, civil society and the business communities, are represented whereas the security community, governments and end users are relegated to advisors -- in short, where some of the multi stakeholders are more equal than others.

As noted in the current description on the consensus, representation and inclusivity issue - "the community has difficulty reaching consensus in policymaking and other work processes for a variety of reasons, primarily among which is a lack of incentives for stakeholders to compromise."  Until such time as there is a much stronger incentive for the main players in the GNSO to compromise, then the solutions to the third main issue - consensus - will be illusive. Silos are a major contributor to this problem.

We have suggested, in our response to the ATRT3 report that the recommendation to replace specific reviews with a Holistic Review be swiftly implemented.  We believe that this would result in a uniform process aimed towards ensuring continuous improvement of the ICANN community and the multistakeholder governance model it represents, as per Section 8 of the ATRT3 final report. If there is one holistic review, then the more important issues of silos, complexity and trust have to be addressed, particularly the silos - raising questions about cross community dialogue and how to support it. 

1. Restoring recruitment and demographics 

With respect to consensus, representation and inclusivity, we are concerned about the omission of the closely related topics of demographics and recruitment. The footnote at the bottom of page 4 states: "The Business Constituency, in its public comments regarding the work plan, suggested a seventh topic - Recruitment and Demographics. As there was no other support for the inclusion of this topic, it has not been fully explored as part of this project."  We find this puzzling. In its response to the October 2019 request of comments, At Large contributed quite a number of suggestions towards supporting and growing active and concerned stakeholder participation. We spoke of representativeness and inclusiveness and demographics and recruitment in terms of partner issues. In its next response, (Feb. 2020), At Large stated quite clearly that we believe that representativeness/inclusiveness and demographics/recruitment were two inter-related but different streams. Although At Large did not specifically ask for recruitment and demographics to be added as a seventh topic, our comments on these topics over the three consecutive comment papers emphasize our view of the importance of these issues. 

The analysis of responses to the requests for comments ought to have taken ALACs concerns into account and found a way to include recruitment and demographics as part of the discussion. We ask that this omission be rectified.    

1. Reviewing previous responses

We find that this request for comments forces us into narrow funnel that does not take into account much of the work the community has done on the the evovling MSM model. In researching our response to this report, we have reviewed our own responses to previous requests for comments to the evolving MSM model and note that we have been asked for and have contributed a great many suggestions already on actions and activities that could be undertaken to improve the way ICANN's MSM model works and we are sure, so have all other stakeholder groups involved. We see no evidence of this work in the current report. 

We request that ICANN staff create and release a document that analyses the responses that have already been offered and how these suggestions fit into the issues that have been identified. This should lead to a community discussion about the efficacy of those suggestions.

1. Identifying gaps

We expect that a staff analysis of our previous responses will fill in some of the gaps in the current paper. To these we add the following:

On the issue of prioritization: 

We note that the ALAC fully endorses the recommendation to enhance current methods of Prioritization and Rationalization of Activities, Policies, and Recommendations (as per Section 10 of the ATRT3 report). This needs to be done through a community-led entity tasked with conducting a prioritization process for recommendations made by review teams and cross-community groups.

Prioritization for At Large starts from the regions and is then put forward to the SO/AC chairs. Recognizing that SOs set direction for the work activities, the inputs each region puts into that discussion will help prioritize for At Large workload purposes. 

On complexity:

We suggest that the development of learning materials go beyond webinars and ICANN learn with community driven initiatives such as:

Schools of internet governance

Central database for all resources that are being developed regionally and centrally including ppts, video recording, info on respecting copyright, etc.

1. Pandemic related issues

Since the onset of the cod-vid19 pandemic, ICANN processes and the work of staff and volunteers have been seriously disrupted and this will certainly affect our work on evolving the MSM model. But redesigned processes can shed new light. At the recent online public meetings, we were pleased at the multistakeholder turnout to the ALAC policy sessions. All parties were around the table to discuss solutions, or at least explain what they are doing to address the issues. We suggest that this pattern be continued during future public meetings, virtual and face to face. It takes the discussions out of the silos, clarifies the issues, allows all parties to be heard.

ICANN public meetings should continue to feature policy sessions where ALAC is the host, asking the questions, seeking better explanations (thus addressing the complexity issue) breaking down the silos - and in the process, starting to redefine roles. 

ALAC also recommends that ICANN consider making more use of regional face to face meetings once we start to emerge from this crisis. 

1. Evaluation of success

(From the report: The Board proposes an ongoing evaluation method, which may be connected to the evaluation of the strategic plan which is under discussion. The Board is also open to suggestions for other approaches that may help us better understand if the project is achieving its goals. For example, should progress be evaluated based on meeting objectives within a particular time frame or budget? Or should more subjective metrics be used, such as: Is there a sense that consensus is better defined and thus more achievable? Would partial progress on these goals be sufficient to declare the effort a success?)

The At-Large community supports a metrics-based approach to community work and participation, among others through the ALAC Subcommittee on Metrics. Adjusting all community processes to a clear metrics framework would significantly benefit the work done by the diverse, intercultural multistakeholder community, as it currently stands.  We are in agreement with the recommendations on metrics and reporting presented in section 9 of the ATRT3 report.