How ISO standards are developed

The national delegations of experts of a committee meet to discuss, debate and argue until they reach consensus on a draft agreement. The “organizations in liaison” also take part in this work. In some cases, advanced work within these organizations means that substantial technical development and debate has already occurred, leading to some international recognition and in this case, a document may be submitted for "fast-track" processing. In both cases, the resulting document is circulated as a Draft International Standard (DIS) to all ISO's member bodies for voting and comment.

If the voting is in favour, the document, with eventual modifications, is circulated to the ISO members as a Final Draft International Standard (FDIS). If that vote is positive, the document is then published as an International Standard. (There is no FDIS stage in the case of documents processed through the fast track procedure of the joint technical committee ISO/IEC JTC 1, Information technology.)

Every working day of the year, an average of seven ISO technical meetings takes place around the world.In between meetings, the experts continue the standards' development work by correspondence. Increasingly, their work is carried out by electronic means, which speeds up the development of standards and cuts travel costs.

Public access

Most ISO members have some form of public review procedures for making proposed work items and draft standards known and available to interested parties. The ISO members then take account of any feedback they receive in formulating their position on the proposed work item or on the draft standard.

Draft standards are also available for sale to interested members of the public who can provide input through the ISO member in their country. The public can purchase International Standards through the ISO Web Store or through ISO's national members.

Consensus

Because ISO standards are voluntary agreements, they need to be based on a solid consensus of international expert opinion. Consensus, which requires the resolution of substantial objections, is an essential procedural principle. Although it is necessary for the technical work to progress speedily, sufficient time is required before the approval stage for the discussion, negotiation and resolution of significant technical disagreements.

"Consensus" is officially defined (in ISO/IEC Guide 2) as "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". The definition notes, "Consensus need not imply unanimity".

Voting

For a document to be accepted as an ISO International Standard, it must be approved by at least twothirds of the ISO national members that participated in its development and not be disapproved by more than a quarter of all ISO members who vote on it.

Appeals

ISO national member bodies have the right of appeal to a parent technical committee on the decision of subcommittee, to the Technical Management Board on a decision of technical committee and to the ISO Council on a decision of the Technical Management Board. Appeals may relate to procedural, technical or administrative matters. The appeals process relating to ISO's standardization work in general and to JTC 1's work in particular is described respectively in the ISO/IEC Directives and in the ISO/IEC JTC 1 Directives.