[governance] [bestbits] Rousseff & Chehade: Brazil will host world event on Internet governance in 2014 (more)

[John Curran]

On Oct 19, 2013, at 5:17 AM, Mishi Choudhary <mishi at softwarefreedom.org> wrote:

> Question: Can this multi-stakeholder (whatever it is, as we are still discussing that) make rules that
> subject listeners to the rule of law at home, and prohibit the massive
> monitoring of other peoples' societies abroad?  
> 
> Question: Can this multi-stakeholder (organization/network) impose all ports,
> all services neutrality on network operators so corruptly in bed with
> governments around the world that no one knows how to tease out all
> the criminal connections?  
> 
> Question: Can this multi-stakeholder  decide whether
> "sharing services" are allowed to use monitoring technology that makes
> supposedly private sharing the material for "customized advertising"
> and "personal endorsement"?  Is fairness regulation in the economies
> of the world irrelevant to the future of the Net, or are
> "multi-stakeholder" organizations going to get more regulatory power
> than national governments are presently prepared to exercise on behalf
> of their citizens?
> 
> Question: How are these multi-stakeholder organizations planning to
> deal with governments that refuse to accept their decisions?  Is a
> future ICANN going to manufacture its own blue helmets, and send them
> into Saudi Arabia or China?

Mishi -

I acknowledged that a solely multi-stakeholder based approach to several of 
the above situations will not prove sufficient to address the question, but 
that is to be expected, as some of the above questions are indeed expressed 
in terms focused on the role of governments in the determining and enforcing 
of public policy mandates...

However, please recognize that even the presence of a wonderful multi-lateral 
treaty for addressing such questions over the Internet won't actually mean
that you will necessarily have any relief to these problems, as governments 
have been known to take reservations to protect their own interests (e.g. for 
"national security or sovereignty reasons") and/or to yield on points that 
may be less important to their immediate needs (even if important to civil 
society) in exchange for progress on other unrelated agendas of the day. 
Additionally, it is worth noting in many countries the role of industry and  
its ample lobbying efforts in influencing outcomes from such structures.

I am not saying that "we should not have governments involved"; to the contrary, 
I strongly believe there is an entire class of problems that are well beyond 
the ability of a multi-stakeholder, predominantly self-regulatory approach to 
meaningfully address. One can look at the lack of existing progress in Internet 
areas such as rights of privacy, freedom of expression, and access to due process 
for cybercrime as clear evidence of the limits of today's approach.  Governments 
could help today in addressing these issues within their own scope if there were 
common agreement on the applicable Internet public policy norms and corresponding
globally-interoperable mechanisms and practices.

Some strengths of the current multistakeholder approach is that has shown more
consistent acceptance of inputs from all parties (including civil society and 
governments) and while that process may have fallen short of folks aspirations, 
it also has still managed to keep the Internet coordinated and operating globally,
all while maintaining maximal flexibility and openness to innovation.  Many of the 
things that happen today on the Internet that enable all people to have a voice 
and let them to share their views openly exist only because anyone can innovate 
and create new ways of using the Internet (without asking first any authority for 
a license or permission), and we must not lose that openness in this next phase 
of Internet evolution. 

So, the questions that I have are a little different - they are whether we can 
do the following:

 - Add governments to the discussion of a better Internet, one which meets 
   common public policy norms, without the discussion becoming completely
   government-led, closed to most of us, "bought" by the few, or fragmented
   into considering solutions of less than global scope

 - Work with governments so that they have recognition of the value of their
   cooperating in a globally connecting well-functional Internet and that 
   the benefit received will likely exceed the value of their other objectives

 - Get the technical community to recognize that governments working openly 
   with the rest of us can actually be a valuable ally in overall Internet 
   coordination and operation, even to the point of potentially gaining some 
   traction on problems (such as privacy and cybercrime) which have been 
   historically hard to tackle from a predominantly self-regulating model.

 - Get civil society to continue work with both industry/technical folks (who 
   have always provided civil society a voice, but not always heavily weighed 
   due to voluntary nature of past Internet coordination) and governments 
   (who may have agreed with civil society's public policy concerns, but never 
   had a ready way to engage to get these needs addressed on a global basis.)

If the above can be done, then the answer to your each earlier questions is the 
same answer: "Yes, that situation can be addressed based on norms developed by 
us all, via mechanisms and practices which are global in scope but implemented
locally, and facilitated by governments as needed."

Best wishes,
/John

Disclaimers:  My views alone.  Feel free to use or discard as desired.