23 October, 2006 Drafters: John Mathiason Concurring: Jeanette Hofmann Milton Mueller Lee McKnight Derrick Cogburn Hans Klein The Road to Rio and Beyond: Results-based Management of the UN Internet Governance Forum “If you don't know where you are going, you might not get there.” -- Berra (2002) The Internet Governance Forum (IGF) was given a five-year charter by the United Nations General Assembly in 2005. In 2010 the Forum’s effective- ness in implementing the objectives of the World Summit on the Informa- tion Society will be assessed by the Assembly. This paper argues that the road to the 2007 meeting of the Internet Governance Forum in Rio de Ja- neiro and beyond must be paved with effective management practices. Re- sults-based management principles employed elsewhere in reform of United Nations agency practices provide that base. Like all United Nations programs, the IGF should be subject to results-based management (RBM), in which a program is accountable for delivering re- sults to its stakeholders. The RBM approach is now central to all discus- sions of accountability in the United Nations system. The progress of the IGF from Athens to Rio and beyond could benefit from the same discipline that is being required of all other UN system programs. (Joint Inspection Unit, 2004, Mathiason, 2004) The essence of results-based management is that an end-state – a result – is expressed as the objective of the program. Then the intermediate things that have to happen to achieve that objective are set out. When this plan- ning is done properly, progress can be measured and results assessed. Granted, the Forum differs from a typical United Nations program, because its main function is to foster discussion. But discussions in the Forum are expected to have consequences, namely, to improve our understanding of the issues and to advance negotiations in other forums. The Forum can therefore define its expected results and use the RBM approach to deter- mine whether those results have been achieved. Where should IGF be in 2010? What result is the IGF supposed to achieve by 2010? Defining where to ar- rive is the first element of good results-based planning. The Tunis Agenda in Internet Governance Project c/o School of Information Studies, Syracuse University Syracuse, NY USA 13244 http://internetgovernance.org