[governance] Re: [bestbits] NTIA announcment

[Jeanette Hofmann]

Hi Anriette,

why do you think we need to rethink the agenda for NetMundial? Hasn't 
the future of the IANA functions always been part of it?

jeanette



> Personally I think that the really interesting, but also challenging
> outcome of this is that it means we need to rethink the NetMundial
> Agenda and what we really want to get out of it.
>
> What is so good though is that the conversation with governments, and
> private institutions, the technical community etc. can now focus on the
> substance of how decisions are made, and how participation is ensured,
> and accountability and transparency maintained, and what principles are
> used in making these decisions.
>
> The location of ICANN in the US and the relationship with the US has
> been a bottleneck in talking about 'enhanced coopration' etc. etc. This
> is not going to make it easier.
>
> The challenge of dealing with governments who desire more control, and
> those nongovernmental institutions involved in inernet governance who
> are not sufficiently accountable, and not operating based on commonly
> understood public interest and rights-based principles, remain.. and is
> even greater actually. And a further challenge will be to ensure that
> ICANN, while I think has been positively proactive, and in some senses
> opportunistic (which is not a bad thing) since the NSA revelation, does
> not, riding on increased legitimacy, unduly expand its scope, reach, power.
>
> Anriette
>
>
> *DRAFT Best Bits welcomes NTIA announcement on transition of key
> internet domain name functions*
>
> Members of the Best Bits coalition welcome the announcement made by the
> United States Commerce Department’s National Telecommunications and
> Information Administration (NTIA) of its ‘intent to transition key
> internet domain name functions to the global multi-stakeholder community
> <http://www.ntia.doc.gov/press-release/2014/ntia-announces-intent-transition-key-internet-domain-name-functions>.'**
>
> NTIA’s responsibility under current agreements means it has served as
> the “historic steward” of the DNS (internet domain name system). The
> fact that a single government currently plays this role, even if it has
> not been a particularly “hands-on” role, has been cause for concern and
> debate among governments and other stakeholders for more than a decade.
>
> We commend the NTIA for committing to the transition to a
> multi-stakeholder process that needs full involvement of civil society,
> governments, business and the internet technical community (to mention
> just some of the current stakeholders affected by internet decision
> making) and for requiring that the resulting transition plan maintains
> the openness of the internet.
>
> This is however not trivial, as mechanisms for democratising internet
> governance, and ensuring really effective and inclusive participation of
> all who are affected by  internet policy making and standard setting are
> still evolving. A transition away from US government oversight does not
> in itself guarantee inclusion, transparency and accountability or
> protection of the public interest in the management of DNS and the root
> zone.  Nevertheless, this is a very constructive step, definitely in the
> right direction, and a unique opportunity to make progress in the
> evolution of the internet governance ecosystem. This is particularly
> important for stakeholders from developing countries.
>
> We recommend that ICANN (the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and
> Numbers), to which the NTIA is entrusting the development of the
> transition plan, look beyond its own internal multi-stakeholder
> processes in bringing together the larger community for the necessary
> consultations on how this transition should be undertaken. We also
> recommend that ICANN consider the submissions about how this transition
> can take place that were made to the upcoming NetMundial: Global Meeting
> on the Future of Internet Governance ‒ www.netmundial.br
> <http://www.netmundial.br/> ‒ to be held in Brazil in late April 2014.