ISO/DIS 26000

Guidance
on Social Responsibility

Voting options and

deliberations
(October 2009)

Guido Gürtler, ICC Observer to ISO/TMB WG SR,

Member of the WG SR Industry Stakeholder
Group
guido.guertler@t-online.de
 Outline
 Three levels of acceptance
 Voting is hard work
 Votes are based on “consensus”
 Voting options
 A vote may be in favour, if…
 An abstention is appropriate, if..
 A vote may be against, if…
 Deadline
Three levels of acceptance
2
(1/5) 3
ISO Global
1 member
WG SR
acceptance
market
bodies’
acceptanc acceptanc
400+ e e
members 106 ISO Millions of
of WG member organizatio
SR bodies ns

These levels are

independent of
each other: The acceptance at one
level does not necessarily
lead to acceptance at the
next level.
 Three levels of acceptance
(2/5)
WG SR ISO Global
acceptanc member
market
e bodies’
acceptanc acceptanc
e e
DIS
Working
drafts and
CD
After several working
felt good drafts and a CD, WG SR
enough?
members felt the one of
NO YES
August/September 2009
good enough to be
CD Committee Draft
launched as a DIS for
DIS Draft International Standard comment and vote.
 Three levels of acceptance
(3/5)
ISO Global
WG SR member
acceptance
market
bodies’
acceptanc acceptanc
e? e
IS
WG SR actions on DIS
DIS vote(s) There is no
improvements * point of
NO felt good return on this
enough? route!
YES
*According to ISO
NO FDIS Rules there may be
Vote YES several DIS versions till
one is felt good
enough.
Three levels of acceptance
ISO (4/5) Global
WG SR member
acceptance
market
bodies’
acceptanc acceptanc
e e?
Majority of users’ view

The NO felt good YES

enough?
bad end
would be bad good
a disaster end end
for ISO.
Three levels of acceptance
(5/5)
Just imagine the disaster for ISO and the global
promotion of social responsibility if arguments remained
valid like:

 too pedagogic  possibly good for larger organizations

 not encouraging  not applicable to small and medium
 too few practical organizations
examples  definitely not applicable to micro
 industry biased organizations
 rather creating business for
consultants
 allowing misuse by auditors and
certifiers, to the detriment of
particularly smaller organizations
 etc.
Voting is hard work (1/2)
Voting is not emotional: feelings for
hard work in the working group, for intensive
negotiations to find compromises etc. are not
relevant for voting
Voting is independent:
ISO member bodies take
their decisions in full
sovereignty
Voting is rational:
ISO member bodies judge the result,
i.e. the DIS, its applicability and
usefulness, regardless of how it has
been developed
Voting is hard work (2/2)
Responsible voting is hard work : including

- Making the DIS broadly available, in national

language if needed
- Studying the DIS
- Evaluating the fulfillment of the NWIP
requirements,
the applicability and usefulness
- Asking representative national users for their
view
- As a pilot project applying the DIS to the ISO
member body itself as one of the potential
users
- Drafting national comments
 Votes are based on
“consensus”
The ISO/IEC (1/2)
Directives Part 1, edition
6, page 27, define consensus:

consensus: General agreement,

characterized by the absence of
sustained opposition to substantial
issues by any important part of the
concerned interests and by a process
that involves seeking to take into
account the views of all parties
concerned and to reconcile any
conflicting arguments.
 Votes are based on
“consensus” (2/2)
If only one of the
important parties
sustains opposition to a
substantial issue, there
is no consensus.
Therefore:
consensus is a high
achievement!
 Voting Options
In favor: supports Abstention:
the document as it is; member feels too
comments may be small, didn’t find
made consensus etc.;
abstentions don’t
Against: does not support count
the document as it is;
comments must be made,
otherwise the vote does not Not voting:
count is not a good
option!!
A vote may be in favour, if…
…an ISO member body believes that

 it (the member body) fairly represents its constituency;

 the work in preparing the vote has been properly
performed (see one of the preceding slides);
 it comprises true representatives of national
society/societies;
 each party’s voice has been correctly taken into
account;
 the DIS meets the requirements of its Design
Specification (N049) and the New Work Item Proposal
contained therein, particularly that
 the DIS is easy to understand and easy to use, and
that
 it is applicable to all types and sizes of organizations,
globally;
 there are no other valid and substantial objections and
 at the end a fair consensus on a YES vote has been
An Abstention is appropriate
if...
…an ISO member body believes
that
 the country is very small and does not represent a
significant portion of global society*;
 not all parties concerned (“stakeholders”) are
members of the national committee;
 no consensus was achievable because one
important party sustained opposition to a
substantial issue, so that neither a YES vote nor a
NO vote was agreeable;

* as e.g. Lebanon respectfully abstained from voting on the CD

A vote may be Against, if…
…an ISO member body believes that

 the DIS does not meet the requirements of the Design

Specification (N049) and of the New Work Item Proposal
contained therein, particularly that
 it is not easy to understand and easy to use (so that it
may create an enormous business for consultants), and
that
 it is not applicable to all types and sizes of organizations
(particularly not for micro organizations);
 Important definitions are not understandable and not
usable
 the claim of ALL core subjects being relevant to ALL
organizations is not realistic;
 the composition of the Working Group did not adequately
include representatives of “society”; and
 a fair consensus for a NO vote has been found.
 A negative vote …
… is not emotional but as rational as any other
vote
… does not necessarily mean
that an International Standard
on social responsibility is not
wanted
… will, as described in accompanying
comments, aim at further improvements of
this draft DIS
… in seeking further
improvements is as
constructive as any other vote
 Deadline

Whatever the vote of an

ISO member body
will be, it should be sent to ISO
before 14 February 2010
by using the ISO electronic
balloting facilities.