OASIS Mailing List ArchivesView the OASIS mailing list archive below
or browse/search using MarkMail.

 


Help: OASIS Mailing Lists Help | MarkMail Help

tgf message

[Date Prev] | [Thread Prev] | [Thread Next] | [Date Next] -- [Date Index] | [Thread Index] | [List Home]


Subject: RE: [tgf] Issue 37 - Challenges facing government. Lines 19-23. Content - open


Hi:

I’ve not said anything so far on this issue, as I want to keep my editor role clear and distinct.

However I do want to chip in now as an individual TC member, so here goes:

 

Firstly, minor typo: ‘a billion’ not ’22 billion’ living on less than a dollar a day (copy/paste problem from the pdf file, that included the line number, 22)

 

I understand the desire to be sensitive to some governments’ positions but I think we have to be careful: the problem with cultural/political relativism is that you end up not believing in anything! ;-)

The sticking point with the original text is probably that it reads like a supposedly and universally agreed set of policy goals – whether we like it or not there are policy makers and governments out there who, for example, deny climate change and think taxation is evil rather than a social good.

I think we have two choices:

-          either to draw a line and commit to a series of explicit policy goals that we believe are part-and-parcel of the TGF ‘mission’ (implying that ‘if you believe transformational government is good, then you will also believe in…’);

-          or we redraft the statement to find some consensus that everyone would be comfortable with.

Personally, I favour the first and, outside of a standards setting, I would argue strongly for this.

As an editor (and we are in a standards setting!), I think that we should go with the second.

 

However (and yes, there is always a sting in the tail) the proposed revised wording from Joe and John now incorporates as axiomatic that governments all want to ‘reduce the size of the administration’ and ‘reduce taxes and fees’. There are many countries and governments (and little old me) who will equally disagree with this, even in the current climate.

 

Taking the original wording as my starting point I would propose:

“All around the world, governments at national, state, and local levels face huge pressure to do “more with less”.

Whether their desire is: to raise educational standards to meet the needs of a global knowledge economy; to help their economies adjust to financial upheaval; to help lift the world out of poverty when more than a billion people still live on less than a dollar a day; to facilitate the transition to a sustainable, inclusive, low-carbon society; to reduce taxation; or to cut back on public administration; every government faces the challenge of achieving their policy goals in a climate of public expenditure restrictions.”

 

Peter

 

From: John Borras [mailto:johnaborras@yahoo.co.uk]
Sent: Thursday, 03 March, 2011 01:01
To: 'Joseph D. Wheeler'
Cc: 'TGF TC List '
Subject: RE: [tgf] Issue 37 - Challenges facing government. Lines 19-23. Content - open

 

Joe

 

Thanks, now I understand the issue and I agree it is a relevant one we should work round.   So how about the following slightly amended version of your proposal:

 

All around the world, governments at national, regional, state, and local levels face huge challenges as a result of often seismic economic, political, social, environmental, and other changes.  These governments are called on to make transformative changes in short timeframes.  For example, national governments are being called upon to make changes such as raising educational standards to meet the needs of a global knowledge economy, helping our economies adjust to financial upheaval, lifting the world out of poverty when more than a 22 billion people still live on less than a dollar a day, facilitating the transition to a sustainable, inclusive, low-carbon society, and delivering these improvements while reducing the tax burden on our economies.  Whilst at the regional, state and local levels of government the focus is more on reducing the size of the administration, reducing taxes and fees, maintaining front line services, etc.

Views?

 

John

 

From: Joseph D. Wheeler [mailto:jdw@mtgmc.com]
Sent: 02 March 2011 19:46
To: John Borras
Cc: 'TGF TC List '
Subject: RE: [tgf] Issue 37 - Challenges facing government. Lines 19-23. Content - open

 

State, local, and federal government leaders in the US would not line up behind all of the changes listed.  To some, climate change does not exist.  TO others, world poverty is not their problem.  Some think that the financial upheaval should be left to market forces.  We would turn these leaders off at this point.  They may be looking for changes such as reducing the size of government or reducing taxes, fees, etc. 

 

My offering tries to soften any negative reaction in the current US culture by making changes listed simply examples. 

 

j

Joe Wheeler

MTG Management Consultants, L.L.C.

www.mtgmc.com

(206) 442-5010 Phone

(206) 849-7772 Mobile

 

Helping our clients make a difference in the lives of the people they serve.

 

The information transmitted is intended only for the person or entity to which it is addressed and may contain confidential and/or privileged material.  If you received this in error, please contact the sender and delete the material from any computer.

 

From: John Borras [mailto:johnaborras@yahoo.co.uk]
Sent: Wednesday, March 02, 2011 1:05 AM
To: Joseph D. Wheeler
Cc: 'TGF TC List '
Subject: RE: [tgf] Issue 37 - Challenges facing government. Lines 19-23. Content - open

 

Joe

 

Which exact words in the current version are the ones that are causing you the problem?  If we could focus on those then we might find a quick solution.

 

John

 

From: Peter F Brown [mailto:peter@peterfbrown.com]
Sent: 02 March 2011 00:14
To: 'Joseph D. Wheeler'
Cc: 'TGF TC List '
Subject: [tgf] Issue 37 - Challenges facing government. Lines 19-23. Content - open

 

Joe:

This could be a tough one, as you state yourself, and finding the right balance isn’t going to be easy. You’re right to bring it up.

 

Open for comment and discussion

 

Peter

 

From: Joseph D. Wheeler [mailto:jdw@mtgmc.com]
Sent: Tuesday, 01 March, 2011 13:47
To: TGF TC List
Subject: [tgf] New Issue: Challenges facing government. Lines 19-23. Content.

 

Lines 19-23:  Given the political trends in the US, this paragraph may be unpalatable to the political leaders that may control adopt of this standard.  I offer the following suggestion:

All around the world, governments at national, state, and local levels face huge challenges as a result of often seismic economic, political, social, environmental, and other changes.  These governments are called on to make transformative changes in short timeframes.  World-wide, governments have been called on to make changes such as:  

·         Raising educational standards to meet the needs of a global knowledge economy;

·         Helping our economies adjust to financial upheaval;

·         Lifting the world out of poverty when more than a 22 billion people still live on less than a dollar a day;

·         Facilitating the transition to a sustainable, inclusive, low-carbon society; and

·         Delivering these improvements while reducing the tax burden on our economies. 

 

 

Joe Wheeler

MTG Management Consultants, L.L.C.

www.mtgmc.com

(206) 442-5010 Phone

(206) 849-7772 Mobile

 

Helping our clients make a difference in the lives of the people they serve.

 

The information transmitted is intended only for the person or entity to which it is addressed and may contain confidential and/or privileged material.  If you received this in error, please contact the sender and delete the material from any computer.

 

From: Peter F Brown [mailto:peter@peterfbrown.com]
Sent: Monday, February 21, 2011 10:15 PM
To: TGF TC List
Subject: [tgf] Editorial Processes - keep this mail for reference

 

Hi all:

Following on from last week’s TC meeting, the editors (Chris and myself) together with John, have had a couple of further rounds of editing and discussion. We will proceed now as follows:

 

1.       Once we have received the formal template from the OASIS TC Administration, I will prepare a first formal draft of the ‘TGF Primer’. We aim to submit this to the TC by the end of this week;

2.       This first draft will contain ‘everything and the kitchen sink’ at this early stage and contain a clear disclaimer that it is an early draft and that some/much of the content will probably be moved to a separate, standards-track, document as work progresses;

3.       This first draft will not include material that I am preparing for a ‘full’ terminology nor the draft of a reference model – we already know that this is more likely to go in the ‘core’ standard deliverable, so I will leave it out of the Primer, and come back to it at a subsequent TC meeting.

4.       The editors’ drafts will be paragraph and line-numbered and drafted in Word;

5.       The editors’ drafts will be posted to the TC document repository in PDF only and all TC members will be notified by mail;

6.       Any TC member working on a substantial section of this or any deliverable will be sent a copy of that section in an editable file (.doc, .docx, or .odf) and be asked to conform with some filenaming rules. The editors will maintain complete overview of all editable files and ensure that all stable versions are uploaded

7.       TC members will be invited to comment on the text (and every new draft thereafter) by submitting a ‘New Issue’. All new issues should indicate the line number(s) concerned; give a short title in the subject line (helpful for threading subsequent discussions); and ndicate the nature of the issue (typo, editorial, conceptual, textual, etc). All new issues will be captured in a simple spreadsheet, the editors will comment and invite further feedback/discussion from the originator and the TC; Detailed guidance will be sent out with the first TGF Primer draft.

8.       Based on other TC’s, a large portion of issues are dealt with easily between submitter and editors between meetings – this means that TC meetings can concentrating on discussing and resolving the major issues of concern.

9.       The editors will submit the issues list, updated, to each TC meeting, with recommendations for discussion.

10.   Generally, a new draft will be prepared in the days following each TC meeting and the cycle above will repeat.

 

I hope this helps!

 

Cheers,

Peter

 

Peter F Brown

Independent Consultant

Description: Description: Description: cid:image002.png@01CB9639.DBFD6470

Transforming our Relationships with Information Technologies

Web         www.peterfbrown.com

Blog          pensivepeter.wordpress.com

LinkedIn  www.linkedin.com/in/pensivepeter

Twitter     @pensivepeter

P.O. Box 49719, Los Angeles, CA 90049, USA

Tel: +1.310.694.2278

 



[Date Prev] | [Thread Prev] | [Thread Next] | [Date Next] -- [Date Index] | [Thread Index] | [List Home]