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

[Alexander Blom]

Hi everyone,

In this respect it is interesting to take a look at
https://www.isocfoundation.org/about/our-projects/ which confirms that from
the 4+ million in grants in 2020, roughly 10% of ISOC's grants go to
chapter activities; the rest goes to outside parties. To all probability,
the foundation spends more on itself than on chapter grants. Then on top of
that there is the 600k for the NSRC, another cause that ISOC spends more on
than on chapter grants. To sum it up: chapters are at the bottom of the
list.

My chapter was refused a grant 4 times, and so we have given up on the
foundation more or less, which, unless we are able to find other means,
reduces us to a chapter that writes clever letters and participates in
public consultations but not much else.

Some possible fixes (very much coloured by my chapters' experience I am
afraid):

   - institute the possibility to appeal a decision by the foundation to
   reject a grant application. Currently, three anonymous judges can render
   hours and hours of volunteer work useless in a matter of a few sentences,
   whether they misunderstood aspects of a proposal, use inappropriate
   standards or show themselves to be human in another way: an appeal
   procedure could do a lot of good here.
   - Judge a grant application from a chapter on all its merits; not only
   for what it can do for ISOC.org itself but also how it strengthens a
   chapter, what it does for the local community etc.
   - Involve the regional chapter managers: they are based locally and
   often know the people within the chapters much better.
   - Spend more money on chapter grants: 10% is NOT enough.

Second of all, I very much appreciate the effort by George and Muhammed to
get feedback from the chapters directly instead of going through the
official 10 step process. Does the latter needs to change? Let's keep in
touch!

Met vriendelijke groet,
Kind regards

Alexander Blom
ISOCNL

Op ma 27 sep. 2021 om 14:13 schreef Veni Markovski via Chapter-delegates <
chapter-delegates at elists.isoc.org>:

> 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 <chapter-delegat>
>
>
> --
>
> Best regards,
> Veni
> Chair of the Board
> Internet Society - Bulgariahttps://www.isoc.bg
> pgp:5BA1366E veni at veni.com
>
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