Key markers in ISO's history

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ISO is the world largest standards developing organization. Between 1947 and
the present day, ISO has published more than 18 000 International Standards,
ranging from standards for activities such as agriculture and construction,
through mechanical engineering, to medical devices, to the newest information
technology developments.

Given the multi-sector scope of the organization, it would be hard to present a

historical perspective summarizing the challenges, the passion, the
outstanding achievements or, sometimes, the missed opportunities, in the
large variety of sectors covered by ISO’s technical work.

We have therefore chosen to highlight the key markers in the history of the
organization from a general perspective.

The ISO Story

Foreword

ISO is the world largest standards developing organization. Between 1947 and
the present day, ISO has published more than 16 500 International Standards,
ranging from standards for activities such as agriculture and construction,
through mechanical engineering, to medical devices, to the newest information
technology developments.

Given the multi-sector scope of the organization, it would be hard to present an

historical perspective summarizing the challenges, the passion, the
outstanding achievements or, sometimes, the missed opportunities, in the
large variety of sectors covered by ISO’s technical work.
We have therefore chosen to highlight the key markers in the history of the
organization from a general perspective.

Founding

ISO was born from the union of two organizations - the ISA (International
Federation of the National Standardizing Associations),. established in New
York in 1926, and the UNSCC (United Nations Standards Coordinating
Committee), established in 1944.

In October 1946, delegates from 25 countries, meeting at the Institute of Civil

Engineers in London, decided to create a new international organization, of
which the object would be "to facilitate the international coordination and
unification of industrial standards". The new organization, ISO, officially began
operations on 23 February 1947.

■The Founding of ISO, Willy Kuert, Swiss delegate to the London conference in
1946 (from: Friendship among equals)

■The Formation of ISO, JoAnne Yates (MIT Sloan School) and Craig Murphy
(Wellesley College)

The early years

In April 1947, a meeting in Paris produced a recommended list of 67 ISO

technical committees, about two-thirds of which were based on previous ISA
committees. By the early 1950s, ISO technical committees were starting to
produce what were known at the time as “Recommendations”.

The basic idea of postwar international standardization was to derive

International Standards from those already developed nationally, and then to
re-implement them nationally. ISO’s Recommendations were therefore only
intended to influence existing national standards.
■The early years, Roger Maréchal, Assistant Secretary-General of ISO, 1964-
1979 (from: Friendship among equals)

The first ISO General Assembly was organized in Paris in 1949. It was
inaugurated at a public meeting held in the grand amphitheatre at the
Sorbonne University.

As reported by Raymond Frontard, former Director-General of AFNOR, “a full

house, including the President of the French Republic, Vincent Auriol, and the
Director General of UNESCO, Jaime Torres-Bodet, listened to the speeches.
Then came the translations (consecutive of course - simultaneous
interpretation had yet to be invented). In English first, then in Russian …A
quiver of curiosity run through the enormous assembly.

"Young people today find it difficult to imagine how far we were, at that time,
from the global view that now seems so familiar. The earth was an archipelago
of distinct worlds.”

■Standards-related activities, Raymond Frontard, Former Director-General of

AFNOR (from: Friendship among equals)

Developing countries

In the course of the 1950s and 1960s, an increasing number of new ISO
member bodies came from the developing world.

The International Standards developed by ISO are of high value to developing

countries. They offer indeed practical solutions to a variety of issues related to
international trade and technology transfer because they represent a reservoir
of technological know-how and of product, performance, quality, safety and
environmental specifications.

However, to take advantage of International Standards and to participate in

their development, developing countries had to face substantial additional
problems in comparison with industrialized nations, ranging from the lack of
established industrial infrastructures and related technical components
(including national standards, metrology and testing institutions and facilities),
to the severe limitation of financial and technical resources.

The first landmark in ISO’s attempts to respond to the needs of these members
was the establishment in 1961 of the DEVCO Committee on developing country
matters (initiated on the basis of a memorandum to ISO Council from Mr. F.
Hadass of Israel). Other initiatives followed. In 1967, a developing countries
conference was held in Moscow and in1968 a new category of correspondent
member was established, so that developing countries could play a role in
ISO’s work without incurring the cost of full membership.

A further category of subscriber member was eventually added in 1992,

allowing very small economies to maintain a link with ISO for a minimum fee.

Since the 1960s, the membership and role of developing countries within ISO
has been continuously increasing. In parallel, the attention of the organization
to the needs of developing countries has substantially evolved, along with the
undertaking of programmes providing technical assistance and capacity
building and a variety of initiatives to facilitate developing countries'
participation in international standardization.

■ISO Action Plan for developing countries (PDF, 418 kB)

■ISO Online's Resources for ... Developing countries

ISO International Standards

According to ISO’s first-ever Annual Review in 1972, the underlying causes of

the acceleration of the pace of international standardization included “an
explosive growth in international trade” caused by a “revolution in
transportation methods”. By the mid-sixties a demand, not only a desire, for
International Standards had developed. The sources of this demand included
multinational companies, standards institutions in developing countries and
government regulatory authorities.
What had laid the foundation for the growth of the output of ISO during the
seventies was the turn in emphasis from national to International Standards
which took place in the late 1960s.

This change of emphasis was underlined by the decision in 1971 to begin

publishing the results of ISO’s technical work as International Standards rather
then Recommendations.

■The expansion of ISO, Olle Sturen, Secretary-General Emeritus of ISO (from:

Friendship among equals

The establishment of the GATT Standards Code

From 1948 to 1994, the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT)
provided the rules for much of world trade and presided over periods that saw
some of the highest growth rates in international commerce.

In the early years, the GATT trade rounds concentrated on reducing tariffs.
Then, the Kennedy Round in the mid-60s brought about a GATT Anti-Dumping
Agreement and a section on development. The Tokyo Round during the 70s
was the first major attempt to tackle trade barriers that do not take the form of
tariffs, and to improve the system. The eighth, the Uruguay Round of 1986-94,
was the last and most extensive of all. It led to the WTO (World Trade
Organization) and a new set of agreements.

■http://www.wto.org/English/thewto_e/whatis_e/tif_e/fact4_e.htm

The Agreement on Technical Barriers to Trade (the so-called GATT Standards

Code) introduced in 1979 aims at ensuring that regulations, standards, testing
and certification procedures do not create unnecessary obstacles to trade. The
Agreement also sets out a code of good practice for both governments and
non-governmental or industry bodies to prepare, adopt and apply voluntary
standards.

ISO grasped immediately the importance of the GATT Standards Code and
actively promoted the value of ISO’s International Standards to be used
worldwide as instruments facilitating the elimination of unnecessary barriers to
trade, and, whenever needed, as a suitable basis for technical regulations.

The Agreement on Technical Barriers to Trade (now WTO TBT) was eventually
amended in the Uruguay Round and turned into a multilateral commitment
accepted by all WTO members.

Since 1979, ISO has taken the commitment and implemented all the necessary
measures to ensure that ISO’s International Standards are fully compliant with
the requirements set by the Agreement on Technical Barriers to Trade of the
WTO.

■http://www.standardsinfo.net/isoiec/inttrade.html

Quality management standards

The vast majority of ISO’s International Standards were highly specific to a

particular product, material, or process. However, during the 1980s, ISO
entered into new areas of work, destined to have enormous impact on
organizational practices and trade.

The history of industrialization has seen many standards dealing with quality
issues.

A famous example concerns the military field: during the two world wars, a
high percentage of bullets and bombs went off in the factories themselves in
the course of manufacturing. In an effort to curb such causalities, the United
Kingdom’s ministry of defense appointed inspectors in the factories to
supervise the production process.

In the USA, quality standards for military procurement were introduced at the
end of the 1950s. During the 1960s, NASA developed its quality system
requirements for suppliers and NATO accepted the AQAP (allied quality
assurance procedures) specifications for the procurement of equipment.
In the 1970s, many major organizations (private and governmental) published
their own quality management standards, which introduced the idea that
confidence in a product could be gained from an approved quality
management system and quality manuals. The Canadian CSA Z 299 series of
standards were issued in the mid-1970s and the British standard BS 5750 was
issued in 1979. In December 1979, the USA issued ANSI/ASQC Z-1.15, Generic
Guidelines for quality systems.

Whilst the increase in international trade stimulated the development of

internationally-recognized quality management standards, it was feared that a
variety of different national standards would be a barrier to international trade.

The ISO technical committee (TC) 176, Quality management and quality
assurance, was therefore established in 1979. The first standard issued by
ISO/TC 176 was ISO 8402 (in 1986), which standardized quality management
terminology. It was followed in 1987 by ISO 9001, ISO 9002 and ISO 9003,
which provided the requirements for quality management systems operated by
organizations with varying scopes of activity, from those including an R&D
function, to those uniquely carrying out service and maintenance., These
standards were completed by ISO 9004, providing guidance on quality
management systems..

This accomplishment marked the beginning of a long journey - with the ISO
9000 family of standards set to become the most widely known standards ever.

■Management standards - understand the basics

■ISO 9000:2000 - business as usual...or a real challenge? by David Hoyle and

John Thompson (PDF, 804 kB)

Environmental management and other management standards

ISO's portfolio of generic management systems standards was extended

beyond quality during the 1990s.
In particular, the establishment of the ISO technical committee ISO/TC 207,
Environmental management, was the result of a sequence of activities, leading
to a coordinated world response to common environmental challenges.

The United Nations Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED),

also known as the Earth Summit, was a major conference held in Rio de Janeiro
from 3-14 June 1992, attended by 110 heads of State and a total of 172
governments. Some 2 400 representatives of non-governmental organizations
(NGOs) attended, with 17 000 people at the parallel NGO Forum who had so-
called "consultative status".

UNCED issued the Rio Declaration on Environment and Development, a set of

principles for achieving sustainable development, along with Agenda 21, a
comprehensive policy guidance document, and a number of agreements -
including the Framework Convention on Climate Change which in turn led to
the Kyoto Protocol.

Environmental concerns were not new in ISO. For example, ISO technical
committees developing standards for air and water quality were established in
1971.

However, the focus on environmental standards intensified in the preparatory

period leading up to the 1992 Earth Summit, in which ISO and its partner IEC
(International Electrotechnical Commission) became directly involved. UNCED
wanted to ensure that business was fully engaged in the process. The World
Business Council for Sustainable Development (WBCSD) was established as a
result of these efforts. This WBCSD approached the two international standards
organizations to see what they were doing in the area of environmental
management and to encourage them to become more active.

This request from WBCSD came at a time when work was already in progress
within the ISO/IEC Presidents' Advisory Board on Technical Trends and other
instances of the two organizations. As a result, in August 1991, ISO and IEC
formally established the Strategic Advisory Group on the Environment (SAGE)
to study the situation and make recommendations.
The SAGE process had two major end products:

1.a series of ISO/IEC recommendations on environmental management, which

were submitted to the UNCED preparatory conference in January 1992; and

2.in October 1992, a recommendation to create a new ISO technical committee

to develop standards in the area of environmental management.

The recommendations to UNCED became a key element of the major

documents that came out of that conference, Agenda 21, and the Rio
Declaration.

The recommendation to ISO and IEC led to the creation in 1993 of ISO/TC 207,
Environmental management, which held its inaugural plenary session in
Toronto in June of 1993. Its first standard, ISO 14001, Environmental
management systems -- Specification with guidance for use was published in
1996 (ISO/TC 207 News article, PDF, 132 kB).

The tremendous impact of ISO 9001 and ISO 14001 on organizational practices
and on trade has stimulated the development of other ISO standards and
deliverables that adapt the generic management system to specific sectors or
aspects.

■Food safety

■Information security

■Supply chain security

■Medical devices

■Local government

■Education

The ISO timeline

About ISO
ISO (International Organization for Standardization) is the world's largest
developer and publisher of International Standards.

ISO is a network of the national standards institutes of 163 countries, one

member per country, with a Central Secretariat in Geneva, Switzerland, that
coordinates the system.

ISO is a non-governmental organization that forms a bridge between the public

and private sectors. On the one hand, many of its member institutes are part of
the governmental structure of their countries, or are mandated by their
government. On the other hand, other members have their roots uniquely in
the private sector, having been set up by national partnerships of industry
associations.

Therefore, ISO enables a consensus to be reached on solutions that meet both

the requirements of business and the broader needs of society.

How ISO develops standards

How ISO decides to develop a standard

ISO launches the development of new standards in response to sectors and

stakeholders that express a clearly established need for them.

An industry sector or other stakeholder group typically communicates its

requirement for a standard to one of ISO's national members. The latter then
proposes the new work item to the relevant ISO technical committee
developing standards in that area. New work items may also be proposed by
organizations in liaison (see below) with such committees. When work items do
not relate to existing committees, proposals may also be made by ISO
members to set up new technical committees to cover new fields of activity.
To be accepted for development, a proposed work item must receive the
majority support of the participating members of the ISO technical committee
which, amongst other criteria, verifies the "global relevance" of the proposed
item – this means that it indeed responds to an international need and will
eventually be suitable for implementation on as broad a basis as possible
worldwide.

In addition to the technical committees that address standardization in a

specific field, ISO also has policy development committees addressing the
standardization needs of developing countries (DEVCO), consumers (COPOLCO)
and conformity assessment (CASCO). These may recommend the development
of new standards for their stakeholder groups, which are then submitted to the
approval process described above, or in the case of CASCO, develop new
standards itsel

Who develops ISO standards

ISO standards are developed by technical committees, (subcommittees or

project committees) comprising experts from the industrial, technical and
business sectors which have asked for the standards, and which subsequently
put them to use. These experts may be joined by representatives of
government agencies, testing laboratories, consumer associations, non-
governmental organizations and academic circles.

Proposals to establish new technical committees are submitted to all ISO

national member bodies, who may opt to be participating (P), observer (O) or
non-members of the committee. The secretariat (i.e. the body providing the
administrative support to the work of the committee) is allocated by the
Technical Management Board (which itself reports to the ISO Council), usually
to the ISO member body which made the proposal. The secretariat is
responsible for nominating an individual to act as chair of the technical
committee. The chair is formally appointed by the Technical Management
Board.
Experts participate as national delegations, chosen by the ISO national member
body for the country concerned. National delegations are required to represent
not just the views of the organizations in which their participating experts work,
but those of other stakeholders too. National delegations are usually based on
and supported by national mirror committees to which the delegations report.

According to ISO rules, the national member body is expected to take account
of the views of all parties interested in the standard under development. This
enables them to present a consolidated, national consensus position to the
technical committee.

International and regional organizations from both business and the public
sector may apply for liaison status to participate in developing a standard, or to
be informed about the work. Such “organizations in liaisons” are accepted
through voting by the relevant ISO committee. They may comment on
successive drafts, propose new work items or even propose documents for
“fast tracking” , but they have no voting rights.

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 two-thirds 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.

Detailed stages of the development of International Standards

An International Standard is the result of an agreement between the member

bodies of ISO. It may be used as such, or may be implemented through
incorporation in national standards of different countries.

International Standards are developed by ISO technical committees (TC) and

subcommittees (SC) by a six-step process
■Stage 1: Proposal stage

■Stage 2: Preparatory stage

■Stage 3: Committee stage

■Stage 4: Enquiry stage

■Stage 5: Approval stage

■Stage 6: Publication stage

See the stage code table for a visual representation of the development stages.

If a document with a certain degree of maturity is available at the start of a

standardization project, for example a standard developed by another
organization, it is possible to omit certain stages. In the so-called "fast-track
procedure", a document is submitted directly for approval as a draft
International Standard (DIS) to the ISO member bodies (stage 4) or, if the
document has been developed by an international standardizing body
recognized by the ISO Council, as a final draft International Standard (FDIS,
stage 5), without passing through the previous stages.

The following is a summary of each of the six stages:

For greater detail on how an International Standard is developed, refer to the

publication ISO/IEC Directives, Part 1, Procedures for the technical work. For
work in the information technology area, see the ISO/IEC Joint Technical
Committee 1 Directives.

Stage 1: Proposal stage

The first step in the development of an International Standard is to confirm that

a particular International Standard is needed. A new work item proposal (NP) is
submitted for vote by the members of the relevant TC or SC to determine the
inclusion of the work item in the programme of work.
The proposal is accepted if a majority of the P-members of the TC/SC votes in
favour and if at least five P-members declare their commitment to participate
actively in the project. At this stage a project leader responsible for the work
item is normally appointed.

Stage 2: Preparatory stage

Usually, a working group of experts, the chairman (convener) of which is the

project leader, is set up by the TC/SC for the preparation of a working draft.
Successive working drafts may be considered until the working group is
satisfied that it has developed the best technical solution to the problem being
addressed. At this stage, the draft is forwarded to the working group's parent
committee for the consensus-building phase.

Stage 3: Committee stage

As soon as a first committee draft is available, it is registered by the ISO

Central Secretariat. It is distributed for comment and, if required, voting, by the
P-members of the TC/SC. Successive committee drafts may be considered until
consensus is reached on the technical content. Once consensus has been
attained, the text is finalized for submission as a draft International Standard
(DIS).

Stage 4: Enquiry stage

The draft International Standard (DIS) is circulated to all ISO member bodies by
the ISO Central Secretariat for voting and comment within a period of five
months. It is approved for submission as a final draft International Standard
(FDIS) if a two-thirds majority of the P-members of the TC/SC are in favour and
not more than one-quarter of the total number of votes cast are negative. If the
approval criteria are not met, the text is returned to the originating TC/SC for
further study and a revised document will again be circulated for voting and
comment as a draft International Standard.

Stage 5: Approval stage

The final draft International Standard (FDIS) is circulated to all ISO member
bodies by the ISO Central Secretariat for a final Yes/No vote within a period of
two months. If technical comments are received during this period, they are no
longer considered at this stage, but registered for consideration during a future
revision of the International Standard. The text is approved as an International
Standard if a two-thirds majority of the P-members of the TC/SC is in favour
and not more than one-quarter of the total number of votes cast are negative.
If these approval criteria are not met, the standard is referred back to the
originating TC/SC for reconsideration in light of the technical reasons submitted
in support of the negative votes received.

Stage 6: Publication stage

Once a final draft International Standard has been approved, only minor
editorial changes, if and where necessary, are introduced into the final text.
The final text is sent to the ISO Central Secretariat which publishes the
International Standard.

Review of International Standards (confirmation, revision, withdrawal)

All International Standards are reviewed at the least three years after
publication and every five years after the first review by all the ISO member
bodies. A majority of the P-members of the TC/SC decides whether an
International Standard should be confirmed, revised or withdrawn.

ISO deliverables

In addition to International Standards, ISO can also offer other forms of

normative agreements for situations where speedy publication is important,
has developed a schematic representation of the different types of deliverable
available. A description of each deliverable can be obtained either by clicking
directly on the diagram, or on the links below.

■ISO Standard

■ISO/PAS Publicly Available Specification

■ISO/TS Technical Specification

■ISO/TR Technical Report

■IWA International Workshop Agreement

■ISO Guide

Initiatives

Kids' ISO 14000 Programme

The Kids' ISO 14000 Programme aims to harness the energy of children and
young people around the world to tackle environmental challenges.

Created and operated by the Japanese non-profit, non-governmental

organization ArTech, it employs a simplified version of the Plan-Do-Check-Act
methodology used in ISO's highly successful ISO 14001 environmental
management system standard, which is implemented by public and private
sector organizations in 155 countries.

The programme, developed by ArTech -a NGO - was launched in Japan in 2000

with 500 participants. It has been implemented in Japan and spreaded through
the United Nations University (UNU), UNEP, ISO, and UNESCO as UN-DESD to
many other countries in the world. By 2009, more than 210,000 children and
young people aged 10 to 18 have completed the programme, demonstrating
measurable increases in environmental awareness.

In addition to lending the name of ISO 14000 to the programme, ISO

encourages its worldwide dissemination via supporting communication
initiatives.

ISO/CS training courses

The following ISO/CS training courses are presented in this brochure.

1.Procedures for ISO secretaries

2.Enhanced participation in international standardization

3.Drafting standards in accordance with the ISO/IEC Directives, Part 2, using

the ISO STD template

4.Using the ISO STD template: practical tips

5.ISO Global Directory and the NMC extension

6.Introduction to ISO eServices

7.eServices for ISO secretaries

8.ISO expert in international standardization management (eLearning course)

9.Marketing and promotion of ISO International Standards

10.Good standardization practice

The brochure Training in standards development - Services offered by the ISO

Central Secretariat 2010 gives more information on each training course and
how to participate. All courses are based upon modular content. This facilitates
potential customization - including omission or expansion of topics - according
to the specific requirements of the participants.