The International Orientation team is now one large step closer to being in place and ready for action. By the April 1 deadline (1999), 445 allies had sent in their votes of confidence, indicating their trust in up to ten people from the list of 109 candidates to be part of the International Orientation Team. As they made their choices, allies were asked to keep in mind the diversity of the Alliance, particularly along the lines of gender, age, geographic region, and background.

It has been recognised from the beginning in January 1998 that the process of collective organization of the Alliance is far from being perfect, and that the challenge of inventing a "coordinating structure" that would be true to the nature of the Alliance would be no small one. As imperfect as this process is however, let us move ahead. And let us begin by offering our congratulations and thanks to the fifteen people who received the most votes in this process. They are the following:

When, as the ad hoc coordinating team, we first saw these results, we quickly noticed that while it was encouraging to see that there was a relatively good balance along the lines of gender and age, the results did not reflect the diversity that had been sought in terms of geographical regions. After several days of intense and difficult long-distance consultations among the ad hoc team and a few other people, it was decided that the team should consist of the four people from each region who had received the most votes (for a total of 16 members rather than 15). According to this scenario, two candidates from Europe and two from the Americas (those who had received the fewest votes in these two regions) had to be replaced by four candidates from Africa and one from Asia, as below:

Several disadvantages were obvious in both scenarios. However, the ad hoc team felt that some decision needed to be reached quickly, in order to inform other allies of results as quickly as possible and in order for the new team to be able to move ahead quickly to prepare for its first meeting. The team proceeded to inform these sixteen people that they were now part of the International Orientation Team, and to inform the four people from the original list of 15 who were not on the list of 16 that this change had been made.

The ad hoc coordinating team has since recognized that this was an error and we would like to apologize for this. The second scenario was presented as being a "decision" rather than a "suggestion," and things were done far too hastily due to an unnecessary sense of urgency. Moreover, it was quickly obvious that this second list of team members, although it did ensure an African presence in the team, was not balanced as well. For example, Latin America found itself very under-represented, and the candidate from the United States was actually a French citizen who had been living in the United States for a few months (Lydia Nicollet), but who has since moved back to France. Similarly, two of the allies living in Asia are actually Algerian, and in fact one of them has now moved on to Spain (Nadia Leila Aissaoui). Other elements of the Alliance – for example, agriculture, fishing and the arts – were not present in this team. There was also the question of balance by thematic group and workshop to be taken into account – every bit as important as geo-cultural balance -- as well as the realisation that four of the elected candidates were salaried employees of the Foundation for the Progress of Humankind.

A very interesting discussion was therefore sparked (through e-mail) between the fifteen people of the first list and the five who were consequently added on by the ad hoc coordinating team. This group has decided to take a bit more time to allow the questions at hand to ripen and lead to a more legitimate collective solution about the final make-up of the team. It should be pointed out that the discussion that has been happening over the past few weeks has been rich and nourished by the kind of respect and goodwill that makes the Alliance unique.

This group of twenty people will continue to deliberate on the concrete steps that should be taken in order to constitute, by consensus, a balanced International Orientation team, and on the time, place and nature of its first meeting. Please send any input that you may have to:

Kerry Ann Cochrane
7056, Champagneur
Montréal(Québec)
H3N 2J5 Canada
E-mail: kac@alliance21.org
fax (between 8 a.m. and 10 p.m. Montreal time only): 1 (514) 272-5008

Finally, the members of the ad hoc coordinating team would like to extend warm thanks to all who have participated in this process by offering to be candidates, and by participating in the vote, particularly those people who sent personal notes, postcards, brochures and messages in with their votes; there are so many that it will be impossible to answer each one of them. To all our thanks.

Best wishes

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