Washing The Process of ICT.

I responded to an email today, and I reread it... and decided to post it here, since it is applicable to so many things. The context is one of the Caribbean, CARICOM and ICT - but it's malleable, and probably fits the world you live in too.

Many people fail to realize that we - the people on the internet - are a multi-lateral cooperative approach to the internet. It's the governments and other agencies that were designed prior to the internet that are having problems, and by just creating more agencies of similar structure we continue digging the hole.

The first thing we're supposed to do when we realize that we are in a hole is stop digging.

Now I've heard that I should be gentler with ICT Ministers, and lower expectations... which is along the line of lowering the passing grade of test scores so that more people can pass the test (not that this hasn't happened anywhere we know of...). Let me explain that in the present context:

If I were asked to do a job for an ICT Minister, let's say to wash their car on a Saturday. But let's say that I can't make it Saturday. So, the reasonable - and *ethical* - thing for me to do would be to let them know that I cannot wash their car on Saturday. So, if I were to do this and that ICT Minister really wants their car cleaned, they would probably get someone else to do the job. This should make sense.

We need our car washed. That's where I am coming from. Further, when you have your car washed... do you inspect the job, or do you hop in the car accepting whatever you get?

Now... where I don't blame the ICT Ministers is simple: They are the product of a process which is so old that the cobwebs are on a retirement plan. The process needs changing. But who will change that process? Maybe some politicians, in a bout of conscience, may do so. We can fill their desks with papers, and we can make fine speeches and even put on our best clothes ('Waiting for the Barbarians', Cavafy) - but we're still waiting for the solutions. We've defined the problems so well and for so long that we identify more with the problem than the solution. We have grown to love these problems, I think. What would we ever do without these problems? They employ so many people, fill our ears with monologues designed to make us feel that by spending money we will simply solve the problem - and by this logic, we should simply shove money into our gas tanks. I wouldn't be surprised if people start trying that.

Democracy. Democracy isn't about *voting* - it never was. It's about participation - which is why Daniel Pimienta clarifies what he means when he says 'participative democracy'. Democracy is supposed to be participative. We have the technology to make it participative. But old power structures resist... and even the UN is an old power structure which has been so brutalized in recent years that people outside of the UN - and inside the UN - should be asking hard questions. The UN is, it is said, but nobody knows if they are only exercising the mental muscle that they are used to exercising instead of the mental muscle that they need to exercise. The weaker muscle. And the brutalization is nothing new: http://www.knowprose.com/node/1144

When I go to a Caribbean Internet Governance Forum and see 40 people and less than 10 laptops, I have to wonder what sort of process allows people without computers in front of them to discuss computers in front of other people. Is that fair representation? That's not even a jury of peers which is deciding whether or not issues related to Internet Governance be executed. Maybe I could be gentler. Maybe I should be gentler. But we need our car washed, and if we cannot demand higher standards from our representation... I wonder... how do we expect to move forward?

Sometimes the hand we hold is the hand that holds us down.

The process by which we select people to modify the process... needs to be modified, because the process needs to be modified. Otherwise, it's just the same thing with a fresh face.

This is a subliminal footnote. The image at top is courtesy Sean McCormick of Digiteysed.com. Visit him. Buy stuff. Wear sunscreen.