Subject: role of the confirming body

From: James Galvin <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 16 Mar 2013 15:54:13 -0400

-- On March 13, 2013 10:45:11 AM -0800 Melinda Shore 
<[email-masked]> wrote regarding Re: Consensus on the 
responsibility for qualifications? (Was: Re:	Nomcom is responsible for 
IESG qualifications) --

> On 3/13/2013 10:27 AM, Dave Crocker wrote:
> >    4. Nomcom makes its own decision about the criteria it will use
> >    for selecting nominees; as such, it really is defining the
> > /actual/ requirements for positions.
>
> I think we need to acknowledge that the confirming body (IAB)
> effectively has veto power over those criteria/requirements,
> since it can reject candidates who were selected by evaluation
> against those criteria.

I do not acknowledge this.

Currently, RFC 3777 is clear that the criteria/requirements are set by 
the NOMCOM.  Certainly we can discuss this and choose to change it 
because we believe the process needs to evolve but that would be a 
fundamental shift in how the process was designed to work.

The fundamental principle on which RFC 3777 is based is that all 
responsibility for the selection of the leadership and how that 
leadership is comprised belongs to the community.  The community 
selects a set of representatives, the NOMCOM, to execute on that 
responsibility.

This means the NOMCOM sets the criteria/requirements.

To do this any other way, e.g., allowing the confirming body or the 
body with openings to be filled to set the criteria/requirements, risks 
the leadership itself becoming a self-selecting and perpetual set of 
candidates.

Those who were around when the NOMCOM process was first created will 
remember that one of the primary motivations for its creation was 
expressly to get the IETF out of precisely that situation.

It seems to me that the real question here is what is the role of the 
confirming body?  Should its role be biased towards a review (however 
deep) of the work of the NOMCOM or should its role be biased towards 
ensuring the NOMCOM has followed the process in selecting its slate of 
candidates?

Jim

---

From: Dave Crocker <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 16 Mar 2013 17:00:48 -0400

On 3/16/2013 3:54 PM, James Galvin wrote:
> <[email-masked]
> wrote regarding Re: Consensus on the
> responsibility for qualifications? (Was: Re:    Nomcom is responsible
> for IESG qualifications) --
>

Jim,

One of the challenges for a topic like this is to distinguish between 
objective fact, personal preference, and rough consensus.

Oddly, the intent of RFC 3777's authors is not the controlling factor 
here.  We have the community's reading of the actual text and we have 
many years of actual practice.  Knowing what the authors had in mind can 
be useful input, but it isn't controlling.

RFC 3777's statement concerning the nature and scope of the confirming 
body's decision on whether to confirm is:

         "The confirming bodies conduct their review using all
          information and any means acceptable to them, including but not
          limited to the supporting information provided by the
          nominating committee, information known personally to members
          of the confirming bodies and shared within the confirming body,
          the results of interactions within the confirming bodies, and
          the confirming bodies interpretation of what is in the best
          interests of the IETF community."

In other words, there is nothing in 3777 that meaningfully restricts 
what the confirming body can decide to use as its criteria.  "using all 
information and any means acceptable to them" is quite explicitly a 
blank check.

And indeed, confirming bodies and nominating committees often have a 
negotiation on this issue.  The normal form is the debate between a 
confirming body's merely assessing the nominating committees process, 
versus conducting an entire reassessment of a candidate (thereby 
second-guessing the work of the nominating committee...)

> leadership is comprised belongs to the community.  The community selects
> a set of representatives, the NOMCOM, to execute on that responsibility.

Strictly speaking, "the community" does not select Nomcom, given the 
actual mechanisms used to populate it. The community authorized that 
mechanism, but it looks like no other mechanism that the IETF uses that 
would be called "community selection or community decision-making.

> This means the NOMCOM sets the criteria/requirements.

What we've heard on this list over the last week (or was it longer?) is 
that different Nomcom's had different interpretations of RFC 3777 
concerning Nomcom's authority to set criteria/requirements.

My own reading of the postings is that there appears to be a reasonable 
convergence on having Nomcom in fact set the criteria, which is why I'm 
trying to formulate language to make this part of RFC 3777 sufficiently 
clear that every Nomcom will see itself having the same authority every 
year. (How it exercises that each year is an entirely different matter...)

> ensuring the NOMCOM has followed the process in selecting its slate of

We're somewhere around 20 years of practice.  The scope of confirming 
body concern has remained a fluid issue.

But it also hasn't been one that's occupied folks much this week, that 
I've seen.

So I disagree with Melinda that we need to discuss it now...  Better to 
focus on one issue at a time.

d/

-- 
  Dave Crocker
  Brandenburg InternetWorking
  bbiw.net

---

From: Arturo Servin <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 16 Mar 2013 18:19:13 -0300

On 3/16/13 4:54 PM, James Galvin wrote:

<snip>
> ensuring the NOMCOM has followed the process in selecting its slate of

Towards the NOMCOM has followed the correct procedure and there were no
anomalies.

If the confirming body starts rejected candidates because it does not
like them or thinks that they do not have the proper qualifications,
then we have a problem with our procedures.

/as

---

From: Brian E Carpenter <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 17 Mar 2013 08:06:39 +0000

Jim,

Thanks for the change of subject. More below...

On 16/03/2013 19:54, James Galvin wrote:
> To do this any other way, e.g., allowing the confirming body or the body
> with openings to be filled to set the criteria/requirements, risks the
> leadership itself becoming a self-selecting and perpetual set of
> candidates.
> 

Let me repeat something I said a few days ago, that probably got lost
in the noise:

I don't think it is at all clear that the confirming body should be allowed
to mess with the criteria suggested by the IESG (or IAB or IAOC as the
case may be) and then interpreted and tuned by the NomCom. On the contrary,
it is *only* the NomCom that has full information, including confidential
information, and that is the point of Dave's proposed change.

I think we should be more explicit that the confirming body's role is
limited to verifying that the NomCom has done its job and made its
nominations in a fair and balanced way. I don't think it's for the
confirming body to say (inventing an absurd example) "We need two
intellectual property lawyers in the IAOC, so we are rejecting the
slate."

IMHO, the confirming body should be a guardian of the process, not
part of the process.

   Brian

---

From: John C Klensin <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 17 Mar 2013 11:20:38 -0400

--On Sunday, March 17, 2013 08:06 +0000 Brian E Carpenter
<[email-masked]> wrote:

>...
> I don't think it is at all clear that the confirming body
> should be allowed to mess with the criteria suggested by the
> IESG (or IAB or IAOC as the case may be) and then interpreted
> and tuned by the NomCom. On the contrary, it is *only* the
> NomCom that has full information, including confidential

Actually, if I correctly read the intent of 3777 (and its
predecessors going back to 2027) at the time and now, part of
the reason for having confirming bodies at all is to provide a
backup against a Nomcom screw up.  That is especially important
in these days in which Nomcoms typically have to rely on
questionnaires and solicited feedback that are unlikely to be a
thorough representation of community knowledge.  If the
confirming body knows things about a candidate that were not
available to the Nomcom, then it should apply that knowledge.
And, if the confirming body sees something in whatever the
Nomcom chooses to tell it about qualifications/expectations that
seems wrong (e.g., criteria that would permit selecting only an
incumbent or other single candidate), then it should respond
with vigor.  Both assume that the confirming body may have
access to information that the Nomcom does not, not that the
Nomcom is assumed to have full information.

Without compromising anything that might be confidential because
it involves specific candidates or years, I have seen confirming
bodies say (approximately) "did you know X about candidate Y?"
and then go ahead and confirm on a "yes, we knew and considered
that" answer and to push back aggressively with a "no" one.
That is often a reasonable way to proceed, but is not the only
one, especially if the concerns are different.

> I think we should be more explicit that the confirming body's
> role is limited to verifying that the NomCom has done its job
> and made its nominations in a fair and balanced way. I don't
> think it's for the confirming body to say (inventing an absurd
> example) "We need two intellectual property lawyers in the
> IAOC, so we are rejecting the slate."

I don't either.  I would expect confirming bodies to recognize
anything close to that absurd and not do it.  I think that
trying to write rules to exclude cases like that would just get
us into more trouble by seeming to encourage decisions that were
almost equally absurd by not excluding them.  If we are
concerned about confirming bodies having consensus is to be
stupid and irresponsible (or even to decline to have good-faith
discussions with the Nomcom), then, IMO, the best recourse
probably lies in strengthening the recall procedure so it can be
used more effectively and, as such, so the possibility of its
use provides a better control on behavior.  In particular, we
might change the recall rules so that Nomcoms and their members
were allowed to initiate recalls and, if necessary, to share
confidential material with the recall committees.

> IMHO, the confirming body should be a guardian of the process,
> not part of the process.

I think what I outline above is consistent with "guardian of the
process".    I believe confirming bodies should vigorously
debate whether any particular decision falls within that
guideline or, e.g., it trying to specify particular candidates
(in my experience, many have and have not always reached the
same conclusions, which should be ok).  For me, a confirming
body would definitely be crossing the line if it said "the only
candidate we will ever confirm for position X is Jane Doe,
submit her name if you don't want this to go on forever" or even
"we've looked at the candidate list and Betty is more qualified
than Alice, so we aren't going to approve Alice".  We have to
recognize that a sufficiently malicious confirming body could
disguise even those extreme cases as something else, so we
ultimately have to rely on them to be responsible.  Again, if we
can't, there is something broken enough about either the system
or the membership of the confirming body that we need to adjust
the ways we deal with that class of problem, not about
fine-tuning the rules about what they are supposed to limit
themselves to considering.

best,
    john

---

From: Doug Barton <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 17 Mar 2013 15:52:29 -0700

On 03/17/2013 08:20 AM, John C Klensin wrote:
> If the
> with vigor.

I agree with you in principle, but if members of the confirming body 
have this knowledge, shouldn't they share it with the nomcom early in 
the process? Such as when the nomcom sends out the periodic messages 
along the lines of, "Here's who we are considering, please speak your 
piece about them."

So it seems more a matter of, "Confirming body should act in those cases 
where the nomcom chose to disregard negative information about a 
candidate already provided to it."

Doug

---

From: John C Klensin <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 17 Mar 2013 19:48:52 -0400

--On Sunday, March 17, 2013 15:52 -0700 Doug Barton
<[email-masked]> wrote:

>> Nomcom chooses to tell it about qualifications/expectations
>> that seems wrong (e.g., criteria that would permit selecting
>> only an incumbent or other single candidate), then it should
>> respond with vigor.
> 
> I agree with you in principle, but if members of the
> confirming body have this knowledge, shouldn't they share it
> with the nomcom early in the process? Such as when the nomcom
> sends out the periodic messages along the lines of, "Here's
> who we are considering, please speak your piece about them."
> 
> So it seems more a matter of, "Confirming body should act in
> those cases where the nomcom chose to disregard negative
> information about a candidate already provided to it."

In principle, yes.  But the confirming body can't know exactly
what information the nomcom has been given unless it came from
one of its members.  And forcing those people to disclose what
they told the Nomcom just because they are members of the
confirming body would seem to violate several other principles.
So, in practice, the cases I used as examples and your
description above may not be much different.

   john

---

From: Doug Barton <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 17 Mar 2013 17:23:07 -0700

> description above may not be much different.

Fair enough.

Doug