Re: [Eligibility-discuss] Discussion at gendispatch?

[John C Klensin <[e-mail]>]

--On Thursday, November 7, 2019 17:57 -0500 Michael Richardson
<[e-mail]> wrote:

> 
> John C Klensin <[e-mail]> wrote:
>     > This is fine with me with, as is my wont, a few
> qualifications     > and concerns:
> 
> I think that you dip into the weeds, and it will attract
> rats/ratholes.

You are probably correct and other conversations have convinced
me I should drop that line of inquiry and concern and, very
likely, out of  this discussion.

>     > (1)  Whether it should be possible to initiate a recall
> from a     > petition all of whose signatories are remote or
> if we need to     > require some signatures from people who
> are nomcom-qualified or     > at least attend some meetings in
> person?
> 
> Let me rephrase.
>   1) Are exclusively remotely-enfranchised people in a
> different category than      onsite-enfranchised people?

Of course they are.  They don't pay registration fees (at least
until we change that), they are not eligible to serve on either
recall committees or nomcoms, and, if I correctly understand
another concern that has been raised in this discussion, it is
harder to determine that they are human by visual inspection.

Or perhaps those issues are captured by the definition of what
remote people are enfranchised, but then the logic underlying
the question becomes somewhat circular.
 
>     > (2) Whether people with some special historical status
> wrt the     > IETF such as having been Nomcom-qualified at
> some point, having     > RFCs published in the IETF Stream,
> having been a WG Chair or     > member of the IAB or IESG,
> having attended some number of     > meetings, etc., should
> have special status wrt signing recall     > petitions?  And,
> if so, what good does it do them or the     > community?
> 
>   2) whether previously onsite-enfranchised people should have
> some lower bar      for becoming remotely-enfranchised?

Or whether remote people should have criteria for becoming
enfranchised that includes either previously being
onsite-enfranchised and/or meeting some other prior active
participation conditions.

>      NEVER mind the detail of how WG chair, RFC, etc.
> contributes to      being remotely-enfranchised.
>      The question is whether there are two categories or three.

Ok.  But, again, by presuming that "remotely-enfranchised" is a
well-defined category at this point, I'm a little concerned that
comparisons between it and other categories may become circular.
 
>     > (3) Whether members of an I* body should be treated in
> some     > special way wrt recalls.  It has been pointed out
> that, if the     > number of required signatures  is reduced
> to 10, the IESG     > doesn't need special provisions to
> initiate a recall all by     > itself.  But that turns the
> question around, to, e.g., whether     > the members of an I*
> body (or more than one of them) should be     > allowed to
> initiate a recall on their own or whether some     > external
> signatures should be required.
> 
>   3) are I* people enfranchised.

This is two questions.  (3a) are I* people allowed to initiate
petitions (which I think is what you mean by "enfranchised" in
your note)?  Today, the answer to that is "no" because they are
not nomcom-eligible.  (3b) Are a sufficient number of I* people
enabled to bypass the normal petition process in the same way
that the Ombudsteam is?

>     > (4) Whether registration should be sufficient to count
> as remote     > participation or whether, e.g., someone should
> be required to     > sign into some WG sessions in Meetecho as
> a participant?  If the     > answer to this question is "yes",
> should signing at least some     > WG blue sheets (rather
> than, e.g., paying the registration fee     > and spending the
> week at the beach or bar) be required for     >
> nomcom-eligibility
> 
>   4) what is the definition of attendance/participation?
>      (this is where WG chair,RFC, etc. could be discussed)

ok

>     > In addition, and drawing inspiration [1] from an ICANN
> call a     > few of hours ago, we know from other bodies and
> even some IETF     > experience that two ways to kill an idea
> are to either keep     > changing the discussion venue or to
> deal with the report of one     > committee by creating a new
> committee.  Noting that the modern     > incarnation of this
> effort was an IETF list discussion and I-D     > posted in the
> first quarter of the year, a demand for a BOF, an     >
> discussion of virtual BoFs that distracted almost everyone from
>     > the issue(s), a discussion that was moved to this list
> (and, in     > the process, nearly killed off), then an
> interim meeting that     > took months to organize, I think
> any discussion at gendispatch     > should (MUST?) be
> carefully scoped and constrained so as to     > prevent yet
> another diversion.
> 
> Hmm, interesting observation.
> I would like to add that restricting the discussion to recall
> (which has only happened once) also seems to be a way to put
> off discussion of enfranchisement for selection, rather than
> recall.

As indicated above, I am inclined to drop that line of
discussion and, unless I am seriously provoked, will not comment
on it after this note.  However, I think it is desirable to keep
our reasoning clear (whether we agree or not).  The assertion
"recall has only happened once" has been repeated several times.
It is, objectively, false for almost any reasonable definition
of "recall happened":

(a) If it means "someone was actually removed from a position by
use of the recall procedure", it has happened zero times.

(b) It if means "completed petitions were handed  to the ISOC
President/CEO, a recall committee chair appointed, and a recall
committee convened, that has also happened zero times.  Even
"competed petitions were handed to the ISOC President/CEO and
checked by the Secretariat", zero times.

(c) If it means "the process of collecting signatures for a
petition was initiated", then it has happened several times.

(d) Only if it means "there was a public discussion of the
perceived issue, requests were made for volunteers to sign a
petition, and at least some people stepped forward" do we have a
case with one instance.  

I don't see enough difference between (c) and (d) for that to be
significant in determining whether recall was used, especially
because the outcome of (d) was a voluntary resignation (but an
apology and significant change in behavior would have been
equally useful and appropriate) and the outcome of some
instances of (c) were apologies and significant changes in
behavior (even though a voluntary resignation would have been
equally useful and appropriate).   YMMD.

As to enfranchisement for selection, I think that has been put
off for any number of reasons, including, AFAIK, that there is
not active I-D that even makes a proposal.  So, whether my
now-abandoned concern provides an additional reason does not
seem particularly important.  Again, YMMD.

best,
   john