[Chapter-delegates] What should ISOC's future goals be? How can we work toward achieving them as ISOC Chapters?

[Veni Markovski]

Hi, everyone.
There's a lot in Richard's words, which could be used for the good of 
ISOC *and* the Chapters. I hope it will be, and won't remain only as a 
possibility. See some comments below (warning - it's a long read).

On 9/25/21 10:40, Richard Hill via Chapter-delegates wrote:
>
> Dear George and Muhammed,
>
> Here are my thoughts regarding your two questions:
>
> 1. Allocation of resources for activities: as far as I can tell, an 
> overwhelming share of the resources is allocated to projects that are 
> driven by staff. I would favor allocating more resources to chapters. 
> I do realize that there are various mechanisms for chapters to request 
> grants, in particular for projects, but I feel that it should be 
> simpler for chapters to obtain grants, and that more funding should be 
> available for chapters.
>
Sounds logical; I'd add - there are already criteria that chapters cover 
for the admin funding. These can be expanded, or updated, to reflect 
such a change.

> 2. Effectiveness of activities: it seems to me that most of ISOC’s 
> activities are US-centric. There are a number of reasons for this: it 
> is a US organization, subject to US law, as Andrew frequently reminds 
> us. But I think that ISOC would be more effective if it were less 
> US-centric. That might require a change in ISOC’s legal status, but I 
> understand that there is no prospect for discussing any such change in 
> the foreseeable future.
>
Richard, there are many US-based NGOs, which do great work overseas.
An example I gave earlier, was the Global Internet Policy Initiative or 
GIPI: https://www.internetpolicy.net/

What GIPI did in Bulgaria helped a lot the local Internet community in 
providing expertise to the Bulgarian Parliament in order to change some 
relevant laws to be Internet-friendly. This has resulted in having 880 
ISPs today (at the peak they were about 2,000) for a country with 7 
million people population...

> 3. Effectiveness of exchange of information: in my view, the voice of 
> the Chapters is not sufficiently reflected.
>

Agree.

> I’m not sure how to address that. A number of proposals were made 
> during the early stages of the Reform Group, but that group has been 
> quiet for a while, perhaps because there hasn’t been much push from 
> the co-chairs to restart discussions.
>
> I agree with Gihan’s suggestion: “ ISOC [should] take a bottom-up 
> approach in much of its activities, where the chapters (and org and 
> individual members) initiate most of the work and the staff implement 
> them under the guidance of the members. Right now, most programs are 
> staff driven and have little input from members.”
>

Changing the approach will be very difficult, if not impossible. By now 
ISOC is a well-established organization with exactly the opposite 
approach. Chapters are not (and IMHO should not be) in the position to 
dictate the staff what work to implement, but  neither should be the 
organizational members. I say that, because I've heard opinions that all 
members of ISOC are equal, but the org members are more equal than the 
Chapters. While it may be based on observations that I don't have access 
to, I always remember one of the arguments from my time on the Board of 
Trustees: chapters can't have the same say in ISOC matters, because they 
don't contribute to the budget. While this is a fact, it's also a fact 
that the Chapters provide a different level of diversity, legitimacy and 
international spirit of ISOC. Without the Chapters, it will be purely 
US-based, US-populated organization. The Chapters provide diversity that 
ISOC needs (at least IMHO). Chapters are the ones, who elect Trustees, 
majority of who are non US-based. Chapters also try to elect equally 
male and female Trustees... Fun fact: when Chapters-elected Trustee Olga 
Cavalli resigned earlier this year, the Board appointed in her place a 
man. It's good he is from Pakistan; few years ago, in a similar 
situation, the Board appointed an American - in a Board, which already 
had plenty of Americans.
Today, there are 10 Trustees, who are based in the US (including the 
CEO), 1 in Senegal (chapters), 1 in Mexico (chapters), and 1 in Pakistan 
(appointed by the BoT). Similar is the situation with the top leadership 
among the staff, where there's only one, who is not US-based.

So, to answer George and Muhammad's questions - perhaps this is an area, 
where ISOC should start looking into. Maybe change the by-laws, to make 
sure that Trustees are representing the geography and gender diversity 
of all its members - organizational, chapters, individuals? Maybe 
something else - up to the BoT to decide.

>
> Best,
>
> Richard
>
> *From:*Chapter-delegates [mailto:chapter-delegat
>

-- 

Best regards,
Veni
Chair of the Board
Internet Society - Bulgaria
https://www.isoc.bg  
pgp:5BA1366Eveni at veni.com
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