[WSIS CS-Plenary] Group of the Friends of the Chair meeting / overall summit drafting process

[Ralf Bendrath]

Hi all,

fresh on http://www.worldsummit2005.org: 

Some news I got this evening from the "Group of the Friends of the
Chair" meeting in Geneva today, and based on that and other info an
analysis of the overall drafting process, especially its lack of
multistakeholderism. I included some links, so you might want to read it
online (and the visits help us keep the funding...).

I heard that Renata and Viola will also write about this over the
weekend. We obviously need some discussion on our further engagement in
this process. This will also be a topic at the CS workshops around the
UN ICT Task Force in Berlin in November. See our website for the latest
updates on this.

Best, Ralf

------------------------

Drafting Process for Tunis Summit Declaration is Starting
"Group of Friends of the Chair" met today, civil society mostly locked
out

21 October 2004. In order to avoid another long and exhausting political
battle, the governmental delegates at PrepCom I in June had agreed to
form a "Group of the Friends of the Chair" that will draft the summit
declaration for WSIS 2005. Today, the group met for the first time in
Geneva. All stakeholders are invited to submit written input to
wsis at itu.int for the draft summit declaration by 2 November 2004. Civil
society participation is significantly lower than in the PrepCom
drafting process in the first phase of WSIS.

Structure of the drafting group

At the intergovernmental bureau meeting on 30 September, the governments
had agreed that the "Group of the Friends of the Chair" (GFC) will be
composed of 6 governments per UN region plus regional coordinators. The
two host countries (Switzerland and Tunisia) and the Secretary General
of the ITU will be ex officio members. Other governments will be
admitted as observers at all meetings. 

Already there, the discussion focused on the participation of the
observers, including civil society organizations. Today, the usual
suspects like Egypt, Pakistan and other less democratic governments
again stressed the need for discussion and negotiations only among
governments. Others, like the Dutch EU presidency, insisted on having at
least meaningful options for civil society organizations to give their
"important and valuable input". The chairman of the preparatory
committee and of the GFC, ambassador Janis Karklins from Latvia, is also
obviously trying to facilitate as much observer participation as
possible.

The intergovernmental bureau had already agreed to invite observers to
"special sessions" of the GFC. The first meeting of the GFC today was
announced as such a "special session", giving civil society the
opportunity to voice their views of the drafting process.

Structure of WSIS 2005 summit declaration, input sought from
stakeholders

The "non-paper" provided by chairman Karklins for today's meeting
already outlines the final summit declaration document. 

It will probably start with a "political chapeau" that will state "the
determination of member states and other stakeholders in the WSIS
process" for implementation of the political goals agreed at the first
part of WSIS. Realistically, it will be mostly backslapping with no
references to the still existing conflicts (think WIPO and WTO for a
second) or underlying political and economic questions.

Following will be an operational part with four chapters: "Solutions" /
implementation, financial mechanisms, Internet governance, and the way
ahead from Tunis. The parts on finance and Internet governance will
consider the outcomes and reports of the respective working groups set
up by WSIS I.

All stakeholders, including civil society, are asked to submit written
input for the draft summit declaration until 2 November to wsis at itu.int.
Chairman Karklins will then draft a first version for the next (closed)
meeting of the GFC in mid-November.

Civil Society participation: One step forward, two steps back

This development is somewhat better than the usual diplomatic practice
of groups of the friends of the chair, which are normally
governmental-only at all meetings. At the meeting of the
intergovernmental bureau with the civil society bureau during PrepCom I
in June, chairman Karklins had even said that he could envisage having
civil society and private sector representatives as normal members in
the group of friends of the President. But some governments still want
to keep observers out of the process, so this far-reaching proposal did
not get through. 

So, compared to the much more open and inclusive drafting process in the
first phase of WSIS, it means a huge step back. 

The next two meetings of the GFC in November and December are almost
completely governments-only (except for one afternoon). This is where
the important deals will be made and the whole direction and message for
the WSIS 2005 declaration will be structured and mostly agreed upon. The
observers will only be allowed to participate on the first day of the
GFC meeting in January. 

This is not a level of inclusiveness that many civil society members had
envisaged, and that has already been and will be practiced in the WSIS
Working Group on Internet Governance (WGIG). Even the much less
transparently formed WSIS Task Force on Financial Mechanisms (TFFM) has
civil society delegates as full members. 

Some hopes had been raised in earlier discussions around the GFC
mechanism, because the draft summit declaration would also incorporate
the results of various "WSIS-related" meetings. Here, a broad
understanding of "WSIS-related" could have helped to channel the
outcomes of civil society meetings into the draft declaration. But as
the intergovernmental bureau has also agreed in its 30 September
meeting, civil society can not organize WSIS thematic or regional
events. Only events sponsored by a UN agency or a government can qualify
for being an official side event. So don't put the WSIS logo on your
event flyers if you are an NGO. And don't hope its outcomes will end up
in the official WSIS process unless you have very receptive government
representatives as your guests.

Civil Society: Stay in or get out?

These developments are even more disappointing if you consider the
overall discussion on stronger involvement of civil society in UN policy
processes. An important document in this field - the Cardoso Report from
June 2004 - suggests even more substantial participation than during the
first phase of WSIS. 

By the way: It is really ironic that the "non-paper" prepared by
chairman Karklins for today's GFC meeting mentions the "determination of
member states and other stakeholders in the WSIS process" when at the
same time the "other stakeholders" do not really have a voice in the
drafting of the summit outcomes.

Civil society clearly will have to discuss the consequences from this.
At PrepCom I, the civil society plenary has officially stated among its
conditions for further participation in the official WSIS process

"We insist that we don't fall back behind the highest levels of
inclusiveness and participation from the first phase. Instead, we even
want to improve them. (
)Whatever Political Declaration is to be adopted
in Tunis, appropriate mechanisms have to guarantee that civil society is
truly involved in any drafting process and supported in commenting and
proposing amendments in a timely manner."

The civil society plenary also had made clear in the same declaration
that "we are not willing to play an alibi role or lend our legitimacy to
a process that excludes us from true meaningful participation." 

The debate on how to deal with this situation now has to be held across
civil society. 

It seems clear that the Working Group on Internet Governance (WGIG) is a
space where meaningful participation of civil society is assured. It is
less clear if this really is the case for the Task Force on Financial
Mechanisms (TFFM), where the drafting of the final report had already
started before the TFFM has been set up, civil society participation is
much smaller than in the WGIG, and the selection process for civil
society members completely lacked transparency and representativeness. 

If there is any chance to make the Group of the Friends of the Chair
(GFC) a more inclusive space for drafting the final summit declaration
is far from sure. At the moment, it seems more discouraging. So maybe
civil society should again start working on its own WSIS summit
declaration for 2005.