gendispatch S. Hoffmann
Internet-Draft M. Blachut
Intended status: InformationalUK Dept. for Science, Innovation & Technology
Expires: 11 January 2024 10 July 2023
Policy experts are IETF stakeholders
draft-hoffmann-gendispatch-policy-stakeholders-02
Abstract
The IETF’s work has significance for wider societal, economic, and
political communities, though gaps and barriers to engagement with
the IETF exist for policy experts. This informational draft
introduces a problem statement and gap analysis of existing
initiatives related to policy expert engagement in the IETF. It also
poses questions we hope to work through with others in the IETF
community regarding how to better enable policy expert engagement in
IETF standardisation, and on how we can build a culture which better
supports technical and policy experts working together to develop
more robust standards.
Status of This Memo
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This Internet-Draft will expire on 11 January 2024.
Copyright Notice
Copyright (c) 2023 IETF Trust and the persons identified as the
document authors. All rights reserved.
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This document is subject to BCP 78 and the IETF Trust's Legal
Provisions Relating to IETF Documents (https://trustee.ietf.org/
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Please review these documents carefully, as they describe your rights
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Table of Contents
1. Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2
2. Context in the IETF . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
3. Problem statement . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
3.1. Communication and engagement . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6
3.2. Education . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6
3.3. Community . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
3.4. Coordination . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
4. Identifying solutions and ways forward . . . . . . . . . . . 7
5. Security Considerations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
6. IANA Considerations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
7. Informative References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10
Appendix A. Acknowledgments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
Authors' Addresses . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
1. Introduction
The openness of processes is one of the defining characteristics of
the IETF and its work to develop and improve the Internet. The
success of IETF standards is underpinned by the ability of the
community to bring together diverse individuals with a range of
relevant expertise - including stakeholders from industry, academia,
civil society, and government.
Across various parts of the IETF community, and over time, the
challenge of putting this into practice has been noted, for example:
in the IETF mission statement [RFC3935] and the openStand principles
signed up to by the IETF and IAB [OPENSTAND]; the charter and work of
the Education, and Outreach directorate[EODIR]; in the Tao of the
IETF [TAO]; in [RFC8890]: The Internet is for the end user; by
members of the community [I-D.draft-gont-diversity-analysis]; The
Human Rights and Protocol Considerations Research Group in the
IRTF[HRPC]; and in other groups that participate in and around the
IETF, such as The Public Interest Technology Group[PITG].
These all recognise the wider context of standardisation, and the
value in involving a diverse set of inputs as part of open processes.
The decisions made in the IETF have the potential to create ripple-
effects across the globe. We are increasingly reliant on the
Internet for virtually every facet of life, and many stakeholders are
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actively working to increase access to the Internet. The success of
the Internet is built on open standards. Increasingly, the decisions
we take when developing Internet standards are also policy decisions.
Multistakeholder approaches help to develop standards in ways that
reflect a balance of various considerations, on the basis of relevant
expertise. Alongside technical expertise in domains like routing,
security, or operations, wider expertise and experience with regard
to the societal, economic, and geopolitical impacts of
standardisation can fruitfully contribute to the IETF’s work.
“Policy experts” are individuals who have expertise in domains
relevant to public policy and actively engage in support of the
public interest. “Policy communities” include a wide range of
stakeholder groups and experts, such as industry, academia, civil
society and government. The best policy approaches to Internet
issues are developed through multistakeholder processes, such as the
Internet Governance Forum. Multistakeholder processes exemplify the
diverse and unique contribution of policy and technical experts from
civil society, academia, industry and governments.
The IETF already carries out work with great significance for policy,
societal and economic outcomes, but there is still more to do in
improving ways of working between policy experts and technical
experts.
Policy communities bring a distinct, relevant, and useful perspective
to the IETF’s work, but face a unique set of challenges in
contributing to standards development. On this basis, the IETF
community should consider how to better draw on the expertise of, and
engage, policy communities in standards development.
The aim of this draft is to document the problem space and identify
potential solutions or ways forward to foster better technical and
policy discussions within the IETF and potentially strengthen ways of
working in the process. The exact shape of those ways forward are
yet to be determined. We elaborate non-goals to help guide further
discussions on the problem statement and ways forward.
2. Context in the IETF
The participation of policy communities is not new, and there are
instructive examples of positive engagement and contribution over the
history of the IETF.
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The Internet Society runs a Policymaker Program which started in 2012
and upskills policymakers on topics such as how the Internet works,
how the technical standards underpinning the Internet are developed,
and how these standards have been implemented. After a brief hiatus,
the Program was reinstated at IETF 116.
Regulators are also regular participants at IETF. As bodies tasked
with upholding regulation with an interest in the efficient and safe
working of technologies, they hold useful insights into legal and
regulatory environments, and the practical development and deployment
of technical standards.
HRPC brings together a range of stakeholders from the policy
community, and importantly gives a research-focused space for civil
society, academia, and others to discuss human rights issues related
to IETF standards. The work of participants resulted in RFC 8280.
Ongoing rechartering discussions [HRPCCHARTER] could see this group
incorporate other areas of policy and public interest, which would be
a beneficial development towards engaging a wider range of policy
experts and discussion of relevant policy research issues for the
IETF community.
IETF leadership and other participants also engage in policy and
technical fora outside of IETF meetings, such as ICANN, the Internet
Governance Forum, and other standards development organisations
(SDOs). This type of engagement is critical to ensuring joined-up
policy and technical conversations across a number of relevant fora,
recognising the specific remit, roles and responsibilities of each.
More recently, there have been an increasing number of explicit
discussions about public interest and policy topics and how they are
dealt with in the work of the IETF. There is also increased
discussion in fora such as the United Nations and the Internet
Governance Forum on the intersection of policy, human rights, and
technical standards. For example the UN Office of the High
Commissioner on Human Rights recently published a report and
recommendations [OHCHR] on the relationship between human rights and
technical standards-setting processes, which the IAB and others
within the community responded to. OHCHR is initiating a project to
contribute to the implementation of the recommendations. Given the
relevance of these discussions and potential impact on the IETF and
its standards development, there is a need to be able to leverage
policy expertise within the IETF to efficiently identify and respond
to public discourse on the intersection of policy and standards.
At IETF 115 the Internet Society and the UK Government held a side
meeting on policymaker engagement with the IETF, in discussion with
chairs of the IETF, IRTF, and IAB along with other members of the
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community. The session discussed the rationale behind policymaker
engagement in the IETF, including the societal, economic, and
geopolitical implications of IETF standards and of the importance of
the multistakeholder evolution of the Internet built on open
standards. Incorporating policy expertise into the standardisation
process helps create more robust standards for the benefit of all.
While the session focused primarily on the perspective of
policymakers in governments, the conversation affirmed the valuable
role of policy expertise across other stakeholder groups. Other side
meetings were held at IETF 115 which focused on wider connections
between policy issues and IETF standardisation [CDT-A19].
Ensuring these technical and policy discussions and outputs are
coherent and complementary requires concerted effort by the involved
experts. More can be done to better coordinate and leverage the
distributed policy-related discussions and expertise across the IETF.
3. Problem statement
We start from the premise that the IETF benefits in two main ways
from the incorporation of non-technical expertise. One is the IETF’s
important contribution to the ecosystem of global Internet governance
through the development of the Internet’s open standards. There is a
need to strengthen the IETF in this critical role as other standards
bodies and actors look to use different fora to develop and influence
Internet protocol standards, at the risk of undermining the
Internet’s openness and interoperability.
Another is the need to better understand the real-world impact of
those standards. Learning from other multistakeholder processes and
better incorporating a wider range of expertise can help make IETF
standards more robust, identify global deployment barriers, and raise
the IETF’s profile, making the IETF community better connected
globally.
How do we ensure we are benefitting from the contributions of
individuals with policy expertise in the IETF? There are a range of
challenges to be addressed, including: (1) improving communication
between the IETF and policy communities outside the IETF, (2)
education and upskilling of policy experts to meaningfully engage in
the IETF, (3) building community and a culture that enables policy
and technical experts to work together, and (4) the bringing together
of a number of separate but related initiatives within the IETF,
IRTF, and IAB in support of these aims.
Together these aspects of this problem statement aim to highlight the
need and potential approaches to address a number of related issues,
including:
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* Earlier identification of issues and opportunities
* Enabling dialogue and strengthening institutional relationships in
and around IETF work
* Building a culture which effectively brings technology and policy
discussions in and around the IETF
* Better leveraging and coordinating a range of related outreach,
capacity building, and policy initiatives
3.1. Communication and engagement
The interaction between standards, regulation, policy, and other
initiatives can sometimes create issues where stakeholders are not
aware of proposals that may have significant impacts on their work.
This can be addressed through early communication and regular
channels for dialogue. Likewise, the broader ecosystem of SDOs and
global Internet governance fora only functions effectively if
initiatives and work are coordinated and aligned, avoiding
duplication and staying informed of developments in relevant areas.
Communications and engagement from relevant bodies such as ICANN,
other SDOs, UN agencies, or multistakeholder governance fora are
other important sources of coordination and collaboration.
Communication and engagement mechanisms vary, but formal liaison
process remain an important tool for join-up of policy and technical
discussions. These processes with bodies such as ICANN, the Internet
Governance Forum, and UN agencies are, to an extent, currently
reliant on individuals engaging across a range of fora, rather than
ingrained as business as usual. Effective and timely communication
into and projected out from the IETF, IRTF and IAB to the wider
community can be strengthened and would help reinforce the important
role of the IETF.
3.2. Education
There are clear barriers to productive contribution of policy
expertise in the IETF. Challenges for policy experts wishing to
engage in the IETF have been identified through various work
including in HRPC and the IETF 115 policymaker engagement side
meeting. Such difficulties include knowing when to engage in
emerging standards work and how to identify issues with significance
for policy, as well as wider barriers to engagement in the IETF.
These can include difficulty in understanding ways of working, lack
of technical knowledge and where and how to engage effectively.
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Opportunities for policy and technical communities around the IETF to
mutually build a better understanding of the intersection between
technology and policy have also been noted as an area to strengthen.
This included clear opportunities to collaborate directly with
stakeholders such as the Internet Society and the IAB in their
respective roles.
3.3. Community
Each SDO or fora has its own specific ways of working and culture.
In practical terms the IETF has a number of interlinked communities
to understand and work within. This includes: the IETF, IRTF, IAB,
IESG, and other organisations such as ISOC and IANA. Without a clear
inroad to bring relevant policy-related discussions to the
interlinked communities, and ultimately standards development, this
creates added complexity for those looking to strengthen communities
of technical and policy experts and enable meaningful engagement.
With related but separate work ongoing to build a stronger culture of
collaborative working between technical and policy experts, it would
be beneficial to pull these efforts together to be more coordinated
and improve policy input into standards development.
3.4. Coordination
There are a number of related initiatives, as outlined in the next
section, which are working towards similar if not mutually agreeable
aims. This includes upskilling policy experts, improving insights
and knowledge on policy issues, and incorporating this knowledge into
the IETF standards process. There is an opportunity to raise the
profile of policy-related engagement outside the IETF, drawing on the
wide range of policy expertise within the IETF. However, if these
efforts are not effectively coordinated there is a risk that we will
not see the return on our collective efforts. These separate but
related initiatives could be better coordinated and more effective.
Doing so would create a clearer pull-through path for experts, from
education and outreach and external communications to research
insights and meaningful engagement in standards development. Work
can be done to better understand the boundaries and linkages and
would be beneficial to understanding how to leverage the different
work.
4. Identifying solutions and ways forward
With these challenges in mind, it is also important to recognise what
is currently working. These aspects guide our non-goals:
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* In tackling the above challenges we are not seeking special
treatment or privilege to be given to the views of one stakeholder
group over another.
* The challenges identified above reflect experiences engaging
across different technology issues, and work to solve them does
not promote or seek to influence any single policy, technology or
standards issue.
* In describing the challenges faced by engaging on policy issues,
we see commonalities across experiences from many stakeholder
groups and should not scope this work to be solely concerned with
government participation at the IETF.
There are a range of initiatives within and around the IETF that are
addressing particular aspects of the above points. Some of these are
venues for considering the intersection of policy and technology,
some of these are mechanisms for improving communication, or bringing
together relevant stakeholders. Below is a non-exhaustive list of
identified workstreams relevant to this problem space, as a starting
point for identifying remaining gaps.
We have identified the following groups and initiatives:
(1) HRPC RG: The Human Rights and Protocol Considerations research
group in IRTF has served as a venue to consider a range of policy-
relevant topics related to human rights, and has brought valuable
expertise into the IETF. The group is discussing rechartering as
“Human Rights and Policy Considerations” [HRPCCHARTER].
(2) ISOC Policymaker Program [ISOC]: The educational program, co-
located at IETF meetings, serves to train and introduce government
policymakers to Internet standards.
(3) IAB-ISOC coordination group: A new coordination group has been
set up to better facilitate liaison between the IAB and ISOC
[IAB-ISOC]. This is in the context of a longer standing practice of
collaboration.
(4) RASP RG: A new research group in the IRTF has been chartered to
look at Research and Analysis of the Standards Process, including
diversity of participation and engagement, and interaction with
external communities [RASPRG].
(5) EODIR Directorate: The Education and Outreach directorate is
chartered to increase the diversity and inclusiveness of the IETF,
and oversees a variety of relevant initiatives [EODIR].
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(6) IAB Liaisons: Overseen by the IAB are a set of liaison
relationships with other SDOs and fora facilitated by individuals
within the community. The IAB also responds to various consultations
and external initiatives.
Building off of what exists, how can we best support this activity:
(1) Are there other relevant initiatives not listed here that could
address aspects of the problem statement? (3) Are there ways to use
existing initiatives in new ways that could offer high returns?
Sharing information to identify further initiatives, and
collaborating to better understand the overlaps and gaps between this
collection of work, will be key to addressing the identified problem
statement.
Addressing this problem space over the long-term will require a range
of activities and contributions from the wider IETF community. It is
expected that part of this work will support existing initiatives,
but new initiatives or ideas may also be needed. For example, it is
not clear that any of the existing initiatives will help create a
clear touchpoint for those with policy expertise and it is unclear
how they bridge the gap between technology and policy experts working
on IETF standardisation.
From an initial review of the landscape, a few gaps have been
identified. For instance, improved liaisons/communications, written
contributions from policy experts, identification of key stages in
the standardisation process for policy engagement, a touchpoint for
policy experts within the IETF, and better join-up between policy
experts, technical experts and standardisation, and coordination of
related IETF initiatives. There are opportunities to learn from
existing initiatives in IRTF and other organisations in the wider
Internet governance ecosystem that bring together policy and
technical expertise.
Moving forward, a new venue could serve to bring together policy
stakeholders and other interested individuals within the IETF
community to refine this problem statement and progress potential
solutions.
5. Security Considerations
This document has no security considerations.
6. IANA Considerations
This document has no IANA actions.
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7. Informative References
[CDT-A19] "Center for Democracy & Technology and Article 19,
Connecting Internet protocols and standards with policy",
2022, <https://cdt.org/event/cdt-and-article-19-
connecting-internet-protocols-and-standards-with-policy/>.
[EODIR] "Education and Outreach Directorate", 2023,
<https://datatracker.ietf.org/group/eodir/about/>.
[HRPC] "Human Rights and Protocol Considerations Research Group",
2023, <https://datatracker.ietf.org/rg/hrpc/about/>.
[HRPCCHARTER]
"Human Rights Protocol Considerations", 2023,
<https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/charter-irtf-
hrpc/01-01/>.
[I-D.draft-gont-diversity-analysis]
Gont, F. and K. Moore, "Diversity and Inclusiveness in the
IETF", Work in Progress, Internet-Draft, draft-gont-
diversity-analysis-01, 27 January 2022,
<https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/html/draft-gont-
diversity-analysis-01>.
[IAB-ISOC] "IAB-ISOC coordination group", 2023,
<https://datatracker.ietf.org/iabasg/iabisoc/about>.
[ISOC] "Internet Society Policymakers Program", 2023,
<https://www.internetsociety.org/policy-programs/
policymakers-program-to-ietf/>.
[OHCHR] "Relationship between human rights and technical standard-
setting processes for new and emerging digital
technologies and the practical application of the Guiding
Principles on Business and Human Rights", 2023,
<https://www.ohchr.org/en/hr-bodies/hrc/regular-
sessions/session53/list-reports>.
[OPENSTAND]
"OpenStand principles", 2017,
<https://open-stand.org/about-us/principles/>.
[PITG] "Public Interest Technology Group", n.d.,
<https://pitg.gitlab.io/>.
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[RASPRG] "Research and Analysis of Standard-Setting Processes
Proposed Research Group", 2023,
<https://datatracker.ietf.org/rg/rasprg/about/>.
[RFC3935] Alvestrand, H., "A Mission Statement for the IETF",
BCP 95, RFC 3935, DOI 10.17487/RFC3935, October 2004,
<https://www.rfc-editor.org/rfc/rfc3935>.
[RFC8890] Nottingham, M., "The Internet is for End Users", RFC 8890,
DOI 10.17487/RFC8890, August 2020,
<https://www.rfc-editor.org/rfc/rfc8890>.
[TAO] "Tao of the IETF", 2023, <https://www.ietf.org/tao.html>.
Appendix A. Acknowledgments
We are grateful for the many discussions that have influenced this
draft, including with the participants of the IETF 115 side meeting,
the gendispatch working group at IETF 116, and others.
Authors' Addresses
Stacie Hoffmann
UK Dept. for Science, Innovation & Technology
Email: stacie.hoffmann@dcms.gov.uk
Marek Blachut
UK Dept. for Science, Innovation & Technology
Email: marek.blachut@dcms.gov.uk
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