[council] GNSO questions regarding ALAC Statement on GNSO WG Guidelines

[Alan Greenberg]

There have been several questions regarding the ALAC statement on 
GNSO WG Guidelines. I would be happy to elaborate during tomorrow's 
meeting if it is desired.

The ALAC statement says, inter alia,

"Specifically, we recommend that the GNSO involves active 
representation from other constituencies -- and in particular ICANN's 
standing Advisory Committees -- in policy development Working Groups, 
from the beginning. Such early involvement ensures widespread 
community investment in the policy process, especially from 
stakeholder representative groups that are strategically mandated by 
ICANN bylaws to be involved in policy. Early community participation 
in policy issues avoids the need to resort to corrective measures 
that are never as effective as "doing it right the first time". Such 
corrective measures, a number of which have proliferated to address 
deficiencies in the existing policy process, exact a significant cost 
in time delay, human resources, and monetary expense by both ICANN 
and third parties."

I earlier said that I believe that the ALAC is supporting the current 
process, and suggesting that the GNSO be even more pro-active, 
specifically with the ACs which do not routinely participate. The 
ALAC has been active in such WG over the last several years, but the 
same cannot be said for the other ACs.  History indicates that public 
calls for participation alone are generally not sufficient.

This generated the request that I be more explicit if the ALAC is 
requesting changes in the final product.

My initial interpretation of the ALAC statement was correct. The 
current outreach recommendation on page 6 of 
http://gnso.icann.org/improvements/gnso-working-group-guidelines-final-10dec10-en.pdf 
says:

Depending upon the scope of the Working Group and its intended 
subject matter, the following avenues could be explored:
- Publication of announcement on relevant ICANN web sites, including 
by not limited to the GNSO and other Supporting Organization and 
Advisory Committee web pages.
- Distribution of announcement to GNSO Stakeholder Groups, 
Constituencies, and/or other ICANN Supporting Organisations and 
Advisory Committees.
- Circulation of announcement to organizations that are considered to 
have expertise/knowledge/interest in relation to the subject matter 
of the Working Group.

The ALAC believes that more personal, one-to-one contact would be 
helpful in getting the attention of other groups when their input 
would be useful. General announcements do not attract sufficient 
attention. For instance, the GNSO Chair or the Interim WG Chair could 
reach out to the GAC Chair, or individuals known to be knowledgeable 
or interested.

That being said, I am not sure this needs to be enshrined in the 
formal document. But if the GNSO feels that such enshrinement is 
necessary to make it happen, then perhaps it should be.

Alan
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