[bestbits] Fwd: Is the Internet Really Free of US Control?

Marianne Franklin m.i.franklin at gold.ac.uk
Mon Oct 17 09:46:14 EDT 2016 

Dear Parminder, Others (am also copying in the IRPC list).

There is clearly still lots to debate, on the macro level of past and 
future ownership and control of the strategically important aspects of 
the internet's infrastructure (content being another matter altogether). 
To date the debates about ICANN, positions for/against and all other 
shades, have occurred on lists with well informed, and committed 
participants.

To date there is little out there for an informed, wider public. This is 
why comments on the Prakash piece 
<https://www.opendemocracy.net/digitaLiberties/pranesh-prakash/jurisdiction-taboo-topic-at-icann>, 
or indeed others on this page that may relate to the spectrum of issues 
that keeps all these lists alive and actively arriving in our in=boxes, 
would help inform that wider audience.

It is a key reason why I have been working with openDemocracy to present 
these issues to a wider readership so all comments welcome to the ICANN 
piece.

Other articles, including a critical analysis of a UK-based initiative 
for digital rights by Paul Bernal available at 
https://www.opendemocracy.net/hri.

warm wishes

MF

On 17/10/2016 14:07, parminder wrote:
>
>
>
> On Monday 17 October 2016 05:20 PM, Marianne Franklin wrote:
>>
>> Dear Parminder
>>
>> Thanks for sending over this piece in a growing literature on ICANN 
>> and it future.
>>
>> Just to note that Pranesh's less than celebratory analysis for the 
>> ICANN transition has been published on the openDemocracy series, 
>> Human Rights and the Internet, at 
>> https://www.opendemocracy.net/digitaLiberties/pranesh-prakash/jurisdiction-taboo-topic-at-icann. 
>>
>>
> Thanks Marianne,
>
> Yes, absolutely not at all celebratory! I had read it a few months 
> back, and should have had it in my mind when I made that comment. But 
> then, isnt it surprising that when two of the very few CS groups in 
> India consider that not much has happened with the so called 
> 'transition' in terms of loosening of US control over ICANN, there is 
> simply no murmurs in the CS community globally to actually take this 
> issue up - in a political manner, like making a statement and so on. I 
> may repeat what I have said so many tomes earlier - in all the 
> multistakeholder meetings that I saw organised in India in the 
> transition processes it was always concluded that there are two key 
> issues to sort out - an 'external' oversight mechanism, and 
> jurisdiction issue. What we have is an oversight which is hardly 
> external, and the jurisdiction issue is being completely buried. But 
> still it seems that everyone -- more or less --  is just celebrating 
> the 'transition' with no critical take being adopted.
>
> As Pranesh's article points out, seeking a host country agreement or 
> in other words jurisdictional immunity for ICANN from the US was the 
> demand of Internet Governance Caucus in 2005. The all round social- 
> political importance of the domain name system has only greatly 
> enhanced in the last 10 years, and so the US's jurisdictional control 
> over it should be ever less acceptable -- but why is no major civil 
> society group today able to get up and say the same thing which IGC 
> said and asked for in 2005? Especially when a process is actually 
> taking place which is formally examining the jurisdiction question. I 
> sometimes participate in that ICANN WG on jurisdiction, where every 
> effort is on to bury this question - and i finds almost no civil 
> society voice there.
>
> People here may want to ponder this question - has the US stranglehold 
> on the IG discourse actually tightened since then - meaning WSIS in 
> 2005? Or perhaps there could be other reasons, which I did not think 
> of, and others can enlighten me on. (not addressed to you Marianne :), 
> it is general)
>
> Parminder
>
> PS: Excuse me to cc this to IGC list, where a similar discussion is 
> on... Those who respond may exercise discretion whether they want to 
> respond to both elists or one of them.
>
>
>> best
>>
>> MF
>>
>>
>> On 15/10/2016 15:48, parminder wrote:
>>>
>>> -------- Forwarded Message --------
>>> Subject: 	Is the Internet Really Free of US Control?
>>> Date: 	Sat, 15 Oct 2016 20:11:26 +0530
>>> From: 	parminder <parminder at itforchange.net>
>>> To: 	governance at lists.igcaucus.org <governance at lists.igcaucus.org>, 
>>> &lt <" bestbits\""@lists.bestbits.net>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Hi All
>>>
>>> I wrote this commentary piece in the Economic and Political Weekly 
>>> of India on ICANN's oversight transition. For such an important and 
>>> multi-faceted event, it is surprising that I have come across no 
>>> article that is other than absolutely celebratory about it, and 
>>> catches properly the different nuances that are involved. Such a 
>>> monochromatic discourse in the global IG space is not a good 
>>> indication. There is an especial lack of views from a progressive 
>>> and social justice perspective, and from the geopolitical South, 
>>> both of which I have tried to catch in this brief article.
>>>
>>>
>>>   *Internet Governance: Is the Internet Really Free of US Control?*
>>>
>>> "The recent decision of the United States government to cede its 
>>> control over the internet’s naming and addressing system to the 
>>> Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN), a 
>>> US-based international non-profit body, is heralded as a significant 
>>> step towards the globalisation of internet’s core infrastructure. 
>>> But with ICANN having no special jurisdictional immunity and subject 
>>> to the whims of the judicial and legislative branches of the US 
>>> government as well as many of its executive agencies, the decision 
>>> seems more symbolic than meaningful."
>>>
>>> http://www.epw.in/journal/2016/42/web-exclusives/internet-governance.html
>>>
>>> Comments are welcome.
>>> parminder
>>>
>>>
>>> ____________________________________________________________
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>>
>> -- 
>> Marianne Franklin, PhD
>> Professor of Global Media and Politics
>> Convener: Global Media & Transnational Communications Program
>> Goldsmiths (University of London)
>> Department of Media & Communications
>> New Cross, London SE14 6NW
>> Tel: +44 207 9197072
>> <m.i.franklin at gold.ac.uk>
>> @GloComm
>> http://www.gold.ac.uk/media-communications/staff/franklin/
>> Chair of the Global Internet Governance Academic Network (GigaNet)
>> Steering Committee/Former Co-Chair Internet Rights & Principles Coalition )
>> www.internetrightsandprinciples.org
>> @netrights
>>
>> Special Series Editor, Human Rights and the Internet
>> https://www.opendemocracy.net/hri
>>
>> Digital Dilemmas: Power, Resistance and the Internet (Oxford University Press)
>> http://global.oup.com/academic/product/digital-dilemmas-9780199982707?cc=nl&lang=en&q=Digital%20dilemmas&tab=reviews#  
>>
>> Championing Human Rights on the Internet (I-VI)
>> https://www.opendemocracy.net/marianne-franklin/championing-human-rights-on-internet-part-six-summing-up-too-much-or-not-enough
>>
>> “What does (the Study of) World Politics Sound Like?”
>> co-authored with Matt Davies in World Politics and Popular Culture: Theories, Methods, Pedagogies
>> http://www.e-ir.info/2015/04/22/edited-collection-popular-culture-and-world-politics/    
>

-- 
Marianne Franklin, PhD
Professor of Global Media and Politics
Convener: Global Media & Transnational Communications Program
Goldsmiths (University of London)
Department of Media & Communications
New Cross, London SE14 6NW
Tel: +44 207 9197072
<m.i.franklin at gold.ac.uk>
@GloComm
http://www.gold.ac.uk/media-communications/staff/franklin/
Chair of the Global Internet Governance Academic Network (GigaNet)
Steering Committee/Former Co-Chair Internet Rights & Principles Coalition )
www.internetrightsandprinciples.org
@netrights

Special Series Editor, Human Rights and the Internet
https://www.opendemocracy.net/hri

Digital Dilemmas: Power, Resistance and the Internet (Oxford University Press)
http://global.oup.com/academic/product/digital-dilemmas-9780199982707?cc=nl&lang=en&q=Digital%20dilemmas&tab=reviews#

Championing Human Rights on the Internet (I-VI)
https://www.opendemocracy.net/marianne-franklin/championing-human-rights-on-internet-part-six-summing-up-too-much-or-not-enough

“What does (the Study of) World Politics Sound Like?”
co-authored with Matt Davies in World Politics and Popular Culture: Theories, Methods, Pedagogies
http://www.e-ir.info/2015/04/22/edited-collection-popular-culture-and-world-politics/

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