[Imc-finance] Re: Request For Shipping Computers to .....anywhere IMC + lists process, etc

[Petros Evdokas]

I'd like to add my voice to what Red Kitten is saying.

She wrote: "Bureaucracy is what's happening now:
members of the finance list are asked to say 'YES' or
'NO' to something they don't know about ... Let's make
thing more clear, or decide that, finally, a bunch of
people can decide about it ... ".

In addition to our members being "asked to say 'YES' or
'NO' to something they don't know about", we also have
more compound problems: we have not yet agreed on what
Criteria will guide our group decisions. We need to ask
"what priciples will guide these financial
allocations?" And as we develop these criteria, we also
need to check, do they reflect our politics? And all
this is way too high of a priority to "just get on
with" and start pissing away the donations imc received
from our generous supporters. 

(And by the way, if our benefactors wannted to seed the
third world with equipment, they could have joined Bill
Gate's charity efforts - our network is about radical
politics; it's insulting that the Dominant Themes among
us keep being technology and equipment, as if they bear
an inherent sanctity.)

Red Kitten also wrote : "Democracy is summarizing,
showing the way, making it easier to people to be
involved and to participate." An excellent principle to
guide us. Why aren't more of our colleagues sharing
their views on *what exactly* is to be uniting us in
this effort to evaluate and allocate?

In the section titled "* OVERVIEW OF FINANCE *", Red
Kitten explained that we need to clarify for ourselves
(as a part of our decision- making process) the amounts
of money coming in (their regularity), the
dependability of our sources as to whether they are
stable (meaning do we expect similar donations in
roughly the same periods of time?), and similar
factors, before we decide how to spend the amounts we
are overseeing. The responsibility we shoulder here is
not about rubber-stamping everything that sounds
"radical" or "computerish".

Also, Red Kitten points out that we need to establish
"what other projects are on the way, how to make a
clear request for funding, what has to be specified in
it, what's possible and what's not, etc". We definitely
need to establish some procedures. She wrote that "if
we know all that, it's much more easier to make a
funding request and
also much more easier to make decision on this
request!" Wise words. We need to organise our group-
work along these lines, and more.

Of course the work of the imc- finances group is going
to be involivng terrible dilemmas, and we need to
accept that. The issue is not whether the imc projects
we are being asked to fund "deserve" the fundning or
not, or whether our colleagues whoare requsting the
money are nice people or not. It' not even aobut
whether the projects are good or not. Before we get
into any of those evaluations, we need to establish
oour criteria, and our procedures. In previous letter,
Red Kitten wrote that if we don;t do that, then "We
cannot make serious and aware decisions this way,
sorry. For the rest, this project sounds really nice,
that's not the point! =^_^=". And the truth is, many
projects will sound really nice. But we've agreed to
shoulder a financial group- decision making process
which is about being responsible, accountable, and
transparent to the entire imc network, to the global
liberation movement it serves, and to the principles 
which unite us here.

We need to spell them out. 

Thanks Red Kitten, and all of you for your reading
patience. Your thoughts and views?
Petros
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