AW: [governance] .xxx. igc and igf

[Lee McKnight]

Hi Karl,

Just catching up, from a critique of ICANN's administrative practices around .xxx we've morphed into the phantasmagoria of  alternate new internet governance beasts. Or inter-related global governance processes. 

Multi-stakeholder processes can be imperfect and can be captured, but I didn;t see the alternative you were preferring - certainly not just states, or just businesses ie a pure trade association model?   Neither would work here I believe there is general consensus on that. And while debating global governance in general is fun, we have a more limited objective here. 'Only' global Internet governance ; ).  

Which yes may set a model for other international areas, but that's not for us to say.  And yeah in political science it is considered that corporatism led to fascism but except for occasionally intemperate emails here I don;t see multistakeholder as more prone to abuse than other interational  processes.  In fact looks a lot more transparent, and potentially, accountable.

I also  recognize the multi-stakeholder elephant in the room, ICANN, which personally I also prefer to the state-centric mastodon some seem to yearn for.  Before ICANN learned regulation 101 there was regulatory capture theory 101 taught to some stakeholders locked out of some virtual rooms, tis true, but hey that's politics.  And ICANN has shown itself adaptive, so I for one don't underestimate ICANN's staying power as it evolves yet again into a somewhat different beast.

I also see the new, very lightweight, possibly shape-changing (after 2010) Internet Governance Forum. 

Neither is 'democratic' in the sense of a local or national election, but on the other hand we're not talking about local or national things here. And yes there is this minor detail of it being REALLY important to loads of businesses. governments, and individuals that the Internet work.  And compared to the state/UN-centric alternatives, no offense, but these beasts both look more lively and more attuned to changing interests - of civil society as well as the usual suspect government and business interests - in the Internet working.

Ok, if that's the zoo we got, the question on the virtual table is whether and  how to perform surgery on these beasts, what they may evolve into next, or whether instead to conjure up one or more additional Internet governance institutions. Since there seems a limited number of folks interested in debating these issues, my caution would be to make sure beasts 1 & 2 get along, before adding a further new species to the zoo. 

Hence the suggestion of coordinated discusions around  'ICANN at the IGF' or however this gets characterized by then.    

This doesn't replace the need for the Framework Convention which could be the design studio for as many democratic and representative Internet governance institutions - or current institutions transformed into ALSO internet governance bodies - as governments, businesses, and civil society determine are needed.   

Lee



Prof. Lee W. McKnight
School of Information Studies
Syracuse University
+1-315-443-6891office
+1-315-278-4392 mobile

>>> karl at cavebear.com 4/15/2007 3:34 PM >>>
Wolfgang Kleinwächter wrote:

> ICANN has made a step in the right
> direction by trying to be multistakeholder  ...

I have very severe reservations about that formulation.

"Multistakeholder" is a euphemism that means that many interests are 
excluded.  Most notably those people, groups, and countries that have 
fewer resources or a diffuse, but often cumulatively large interest.

Moreover, we have seen via ICANN how some groups can recast themselves 
at will to obtain multiple voices as multiple stakeholders - as for 
example how a business can be both a trademark stakeholder, a business 
stakeholder, a registry stakeholder, a registrar stakeholder, etc.

As I have urged elsewhere, I consider the "stakeholder" method of 
assigning weight and authority to be a kind of not-so-slow acting poison 
that will, sooner or later, transform and ossify a governance body into 
a body of industrial protection.

Aggregations and legal fictions that wish to express opinions are quite 
proper vehicles and they ought to have the right to speak and debate. 
But when it comes to measuring the weight of opinions, the measure 
should be of the opinions of the natural people that form such 
aggregations or legal fictions.

Yes, I know that this is contrary to the current vogue.  However, if we 
continue the method of giving weight and preference to organized 
industrial interests, under the euphemism of "stakeholder", we are going 
to end up with a system of collective industrial baronage not unlike 
that which obtained in the US during the period between 1870 and 1900, a 
system that had to be dismantled.

Do we really want to include a fatal gene into systems of interenet 
governance and create a genetic defect that will over time doom all of 
our efforts?

We can begin by abandoning the words "stakeholder" and 
"multistakeholder" and use a phrase that more properly encompasses what 
we want to achieve which is systems of internet governance that are 
considerate of and responsive to all concerns but that measure the value 
of their decisions on the basis of the effect on the entire internet 
community, present and future.

		--karl--




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