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Message from Marilyn Cade (Commercial and Business Users Constituency) to Vint Cerf
24 February 2003
Subject: Upcoming discussion on By law corrections - a question on principles
Date: Mon, 24 Feb 2003
From: Cade,Marilyn S
To: Vint Cerf, Stuart Lynn, Alejandro Pisanty
CC: Louis Touton, Grant Forsyth, Philip Sheppard, BC List
Dear Vint and other members of the Board
The Commercial and Business Users Constituency officers have had a chance
to discuss an item of some concern to us related to one particular area
of the new by-laws, which we understand that you are discussing on Tuesday.
Of particular concern to us is current bylaw Article X.3.6, concerning
the election by the GNSO of two board seats. This raises a point of principle
and we would ask you to ensure that the Board is aware of this principle
before taking its decision.
The current by-laws say a winning candidate needs: "the affirmative
votes of a majority of all the members of the GNSO Council." On behalf
of the Constituency, we want the board to know that we believe that the
majority of the constituencies understood this to be an intentional distinction
from the application of weighted voting applying to policy. We understood
from discussions with the ERC that the concern and rationale for weighted
voting in policy development/approval was to ensure that unreasonable
policies are not imposed on contracted parties. We have always agreed
that that is important. However, another responsibility of the board is
to ensure the enforcement of contracts, and consensus policies, once approved.
We believe that the Board members elected by the GNSO should therefore
have the broadest possible support of the GNSO.
That leads us to believe that the fairer mechanism is to maintain the
concept of one representative, one vote, for the Board elections and other
relevant elections. The General Counsel has interpreted this differently
than we do, believing that weighted voting applies to everything and the
correction before the Board seeks to clarify this.
While the approach taken in policy development/approval within the Council
was not entirely satisfactory to our members, once approved, we have undertaken
to work within the new system of weighted voting for policy development
and approval. However, we recommend that for elections of the Board and
probably for other elections undertaken by the Council, that it is most
productive to ensure that candidates have the support of the broad majority
of the Council. We are concerned that this cannot be achieved by weighted
voting. Some might argue for a simple rule: let all votes be undertaken
alike. We do not believe this will achieve the desired outcome of the
broadest possible support for the GNSO elected board representatives.
We further note that making this distinction should not be a problem since
elections are not frequent occurrences.
Many thanks for your consideration of our concern.
Marilyn Cade, on behalf of the officers of the Commercial and Business
Users Constituency
cc: Commercial and Business Users List