Re: [hrpc] HRPC recharter

[Jens Finkhaeuser <[e-mail]>]

Hi,

as a relative newcomer, of course, I'm still trying to figure out whether my understanding of things is accurate. But other RGs also primarily offer a space for disseminating research that takes place elsewhere, and secondly for authoring drafts that capture the consensus forming around these topics *within the RG*. That part makes perfect sense to me, IMHO.

Since the topic is on the intersection between human rights and protocol design, it is clear enough as well that the purpose is to provide a bridge between two otherwise distinct worlds that influence each other. That implies that there are two kinds of output to be expected from the group: one detailing human rights impacts to protocol designers. And the other detailing protocol design impacts to human rights folk.

Rhetoric on RFCs aside, there is no requirement for protocol designers to adhere to the documents aimed at them.

As for the second class of documents, the main use case is of course to influence policy in such a way that there is ideally no conflict between the two separate concerns. I'm not sure I'd characterize this as partial policy development, however. It's better categorized as expert advice, which policy makers would otherwise each have to solicit independently, probably with less consensus. Again, however, policy makers are under no obligation to consider these outputs.

It's perhaps also worth highlighting that other RGs/WGs have similar or stronger ties to policy makers, for much the same reason: without an explicit bridge function, interactions between the concerns remain unstructured and fraught with misunderstandings.

Personally, I'm puzzled why this is relatively contentious here, while easily accepted elsewhere.

I feel - perhaps incorrectly - that the main reason this is the case because in other instances of such interactions, the influence on policy makers can be dismissed as devoid of any ethical decision making. Unfortunately, this is true in much the same way as it's possible to be fascinated by firearms and console oneself that a gun alone can never harm anyone: it always needs someone to fire it, so *that* is where the ethics questions lie, never with the technology itself. When it comes to human rights, on the other hand, the ethics of it are front and center. It's uncomfortable to acknowledge that technical decisions have ethical implications and vice versa; that I understand.

On the assumption that this is indeed the main issue here, isn't an RG exactly the ideal place to deal with these messy interactions, and isn't providing *advisory* RFCs exactly the ideal result?

Jens

> ----------------------------------------
> From: Andrew Sullivan <[e-mail]>
> Date: Apr 13, 2023, 7:49:21 PM
> To: <[e-mail]>
> Subject: Re: [hrpc] HRPC recharter
> 
> 
> Dear colleagues,
> 
> Noting my usual disclaimer about my employer (the Internet Society) and not speaking for them, I want to note something Vittorio has put his finger on:
> 
> On Thu, Apr 13, 2023 at 07:45:50AM +0200, Vittorio Bertola wrote:
> 
> >I am also troubled by a fundamental uncertainty that, I think, underlies the entire charter: is this meant to be a research group, or is this meant to be a policy advisory group?
> 
> I think this is exactly the difficulty that I have had with this proposed charter and, really, some of the output of the RG since its formation.
> 
> When the RG was formed, I was a supporter of formation with the proviso that the RG be chartered pretty narrowly to look at the interactions of protocol design and human rights, with some sort of specification of which rights we were talking about.  That seemed to me to be a pretty big but since well-scoped research space.
> 
> While I believed at the time that the charter created such a careful distinction, I cannot say I think the RG has really paid attention to that line since its formation.  Some of the output of the group has seemed to me to be very nearly prescriptive in what it says, and I occasionally get the impression that people want to use "it's an RFC" as part of the well-worn rhetorical path of claiming some kind of important status for the documents that the group produces.  The decision to depend on RG rough consensus often seemed to me to be part of the same rhetorical move.
> 
> More challenging, in my view, is that the proposed charter seems to be at least a little coy about what _research_ is happening.  Sentences like, "This research group is a discursive resource for the community to support the development process in recognizing these potential public policy impacts as well assist to address those impacts adequately," do not suggest research, but rather suggest a partial means of developing policy.  Similarly, only one of the four objectives listed in the Objective section really seems to entail research (this was a problem with the previous charter too).
> 
> I might have more comments on the charter were I convinced that this fundamental issue could be solved.
> 
> Best regards,
> 
> A
> 
> -- 
> Andrew Sullivan
> [e-mail]
> 
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