Section 5.3 of PDP (was: [AfriNIC-rpd] Updated Version of the "IPv4 Soft Landing Policy" now Available Online)

[Andrew Alston]

Hi There,

Yes, I would like this proposal on the agenda for Dar Es Salaam, as at
this point, as I say, I do not believe there is currently sufficient
consensus based on discussions on the list in February.

I still however believe that we need to specify in the PDP that should a
proposal fail consensus during last call that the proposal should either
be considered withdrawn, or should be modified and consensus requested
of the list again, or failing that should go back to a public meeting.
This should be specified to avoid ambiguity, and it still leaves the
face saving option of withdrawl or modification open, but it also gives
the author the ability to take it back to a public meeting should he
strongly believe in what he is saying and believe that he can advocate
for it better in person.

Thanks

Andrew
 

> -----Original Message-----
> From: sm+afrinic at elandsys.com [mailto:sm+afrinic at elandsys.com]
> Sent: Tuesday, May 03, 2011 5:54 PM
> To: Andrew Alston
> Cc: AfriNIC List
> Subject: Section 5.3 of PDP (was: [AfriNIC-rpd] Updated Version of the
> "IPv4 Soft Landing Policy" now Available Online)
> 
> Hi Andrew,
> At 06:42 03-05-2011, Andrew Alston wrote:
> >I have a question about this policy development process.
> 
> I'll comment as an individual.
> 
> >As per section 5.3:
> >
> >A final review of the draft policy is initiated by the Working Group
> >Chair(s) by sending an announcement to the Resource Policy Discussion
> >mailing list. The Last Call period shall be at least two weeks. The
> Working
> >Group Chair(s) shall evaluate the feedback received during the Public
> Policy
> >Meeting and during this period and decide whether consensus has been
> >achieved.
> >
> >If consensus is NOT achieved under last call, the current PDP does
not
> >explicitly state what occurs.  I would assume that it gets referred
> back to
> >another public meeting and the process begins again, am I incorrect
in
> >assumption?
> 
> In another Internet community, someone will say:
> 
>    "We have discussed this before; nothing has changed since then.
Why
> do
>     you think that the outcome will be different this time?"
> 
> The current PDP does not state what occurs.  I'll mention two
> reasons.  From Section 5.1:
> 
>    "A draft policy expires after one calendar year unless it is
>     approved by the AfriNIC Board of Directors as a policy."
> 
>    "A draft policy can be withdrawn by the author(s) by sending a
>     notification to the Resource Policy Discussion mailing list."
> 
> The last sentence can be used to describe a face-saving device or to
> avoid wasting time discussing a proposal when we can guess what the
> outcome will be.
> 
> If the author of a proposal believes that it is worthwhile to put
> back a proposal in the loop, I am fine with that.  That is however
> not going to happen by default.  I will ask the author of the
> proposal to explicitly state his preference.
> 
> >(In fact the current PDP by my reading not only excludes an explicit
> >statement of what happens if something doesn't pass last call, it is
> >completely silent on the matter)
> 
> It is not a good idea to regulate some practices because you end up
> with rules that do not fit the circumstances.  The PDP is mainly
> about three principles, openness, transparency and fairness.  Section
> 6 of the PDP provides you with the means of redress if you believe
> that the Chairs reached the wrong decision.
> 
> >If I am correct in this assumption and it is determined that
consensus
> has
> >NOT been reached in last call, can this be moved back into the agenda
> for
> >Dar Es Salaam.  I ask this because time is running short, IP space is
> being
> >depleted and if this IS going to go back to a public meeting, then it
> would
> >make sense for it to do so in Dar Es Salaam, before we end up in a
> situation
> >WITHOUT the policy because of lack of consensus under last call and
> lack of
> >it being on the Tanzanian agenda.
> 
> If you want to out this proposal on the agenda for Dar Es Salaam, I
> am fine with that.
> 
> This proposal was first submitted in January 2009.  There has been a
> few revolutions since then, (IANA) IPv4 exhaustion and a Royal
wedding.
> 
> Regards,
> S. Moonesamy