[governance] Internet Governance Debate (Silence and Fatigue)

[Carlos Afonso]

Jovan, what an excellent overview! It helps explain why most civil 
society organizations are getting further away from the IG debate as 
well. There remain the dwindling "usual suspects", some of which 
(usually the same ones!) from time to time launch flames and pick up 
fights...

We need to rethink this, as method and even as etiquette, and I hoped 
the process leading to IGF Rio would help. But who would want to get 
involved when reading the infighting of the very few who supposedly are 
keeping high the flag of the IG debate?

On ICANN, it is interesting to notice that the board seems to finally be 
putting on the table the discussion on internationalization, at the 
suggestion of an internal committee. Let us see how seriously they will 
pick this up.

frt rgds

--c.a.

Jovan Kurbalija wrote:
> Dear Wolfgang,
> 
> You are right that IG is no longer on the radars of governments worldwide
> (if it ever was). There are many reasons for this. First--and the most
> important--is that the world has changed substantially between 2003, when IG
> was put on the WSIS agenda, and  2007. 
> 
> Back in 2003, the IG-debate was, to a large extent, "collateral damage" of
> the Iraq war. Today, the situation has substantially changed. In the US,
> there is strong political opposition to the Iraq war and a gradual move back
> to multilateralism (even in the field of environment!). 
> 
> Beside the suspicion about the US foreign policy, the second reason for
> initiating the IG-debate was the story that "a country can be removed from
> the Internet by the US government." It was a powerful trigger and it created
> concern among diplomats and policy-makers. It was the most frequent question
> I was asked by diplomats in Geneva. The story led to a crisis (at least in
> perception). 
> 
> After that... you know what has happened.... WGIG... discussion became
> substantive... there was an extensive learning process.... Ultimately, it
> became clear that the theoretical possibility of removing a country's domain
> from the root zone file is not real possibility for various reasons,
> including decentralized root-servers and the possibility of creating
> parallel roots, etc. 
> 
> In fact, the power over the root server is an example of the paradox of
> power. The possibility of removing a country from the Internet can hardly be
> described as a power, since, effectively, it can never be used. The central
> element of power is forcing another side to act in the way the holder of
> power wants. The use of US power over the root could create a different
> outcome--that countries and regions establish their own Internets. The US
> would then be a bigger loser than the other players in a possible
> disintegration of the Internet. The US would face the loss of the
> predominance of US-promoted values on the Internet, English as the Internet
> lingua franca, and the global market for US-based Internet companies
> (Google, e-Bay, Yahoo,...).  
> 
> All in all, the two elements that shaped discussion back in 2003 do not
> exist any more (strong suspicion about US foreign policy, misperception of
> the possibility of removing countries from the Internet).
> 
> Today? It is not very likely that the IG-debate will gain momentum. The
> reason is simple... there is no crisis. The Internet was created to survive
> a major “crisis” (nuclear war). The potential major failure of the Internet,
> which could trigger a strong policy reaction, is not likely to happen.
> Moreover, in the most recent crises (9/11, London terrorist attack,
> Tsunami), the Internet has proven itself the most reliable communication
> structure. The latest example of Internet robustness was the cut of the
> Asian telecom cable. While it slowed down Internet traffic and attracted a
> bit journalistic attention at Christmas, it did not create a major crisis. 
> 
> Without a crisis-driven process (fertile context for simplifications and
> stereotypes), ICANN and the US government have a unique chance to introduce
> a new and innovative global governance model, which should address a few
> open issues including involvement of other governments and internalization
> of ICANN’s status. They are no longer under "siege" as they were during the
> WSIS. It should provide them with more space for creative and
> forward-looking solutions.  A promising sign was ICANN’s presidential debate
> on the future of ICANN. A potential problem is that there is no external
> pressure for reform.  This list and GIGANet should help in discussing and
> proposing some policy solutions. In my “batch-processing” of latest
> messages, I will also reflect on the Framework Convention and
> Triangle/Variable Geometry of IG.
> 
> Best, Jovan  
> 
> 
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Kleinwächter, Wolfgang
> [mailto:wolfgang.kleinwaechter at medienkomm.uni-halle.de] 
> Sent: Saturday, April 21, 2007 09:03
> To: governance at lists.cpsr.org; Alejandro Pisanty; Ian Peter
> Cc: governance at lists.cpsr.org
> Subject: AW: [governance] Framework convention
> 
> Alejandro:
> 
> Not to speak of the once-held idea that there are a large number of
> organizations with a claim for relevance in Internet governance which do not
> comply with the WSIS criteria about which no-one has even started a
> discussion here.
> 
> Wolfgang:
> 
> The challenger in the WSIS process were members of the governmental
> stakeholder group. The EU wanted to have a new cooperation model with
> governments on the top ("on the level of principle"). Brazil wanted to have
> an Internet Convention. South Africa, Saudi Arabia, Iran, Syria, India and
> until PrepCom3 also the government of the Peoples Republic of China wanted
> to have an "Intergovernmental Internet Council". The ITU wanted to overtake
> some functions from ICANN and to play a greater (probably leading) role.
> WIPO, UNESCO, WTO, UNCTAD, ILO and other IGOs which have a stake in IG in
> its broader understanding (like multiligualism in UNESCO or IPR in WIPO) had
> a wait and see position with no big ambitions. The USG, supported by a broad
> range of private sector members and some civil society groups, opposed a
> broader role for governments.
> 
> The result was the agreement to start a proces of enhanced cooperation (both
> on the intergovernmental level as well as among governmnetal and
> non-governmental stakeholders) but neither the form, the content, the
> procedure nor the final objective of the process was defined. Janis
> Karkelins, president of PrepCom of WSIS II and now the GAC chair, said three
> weeks after Tunis during the ICANN meeting in Vancouver that he does not
> understand what the governments (representing the heads of states of about
> 180 countries) decided in detail and he speculated that obviously even the
> governments have no clue what they want to do. When Nitin Desai started
> informal consultations on enhanced cooperation in May 2006, he told
> governments (and others) that they have to come with ideas how to bring
> butter to the sandwich. But nothing happend (in the public). There is
> (public) silence.  
> 
> No initiative from the EU. The only word came from Madame Reding when she
> applauded the JPA as a right step towards a new cooperation model. In May
> 2007 there is a meeting of the "High Level Internet Governace Working Group"
> of the EU and there had been consultatitons with the USG under the German EU
> presidency. But these meetings are closed shops. No agenda, no communique.
> 
> 
> Brazil has given up obviously its idea of an Inernet Convention? Or do they
> plan something for the Rio 2007 IGF? What about the supporters for the
> "Intergovernmental Internet Council" (look into the WGIG report)? Silence
> from South Africa to India to Iran. Did they give up? The Chinese government
> was happy with the Tunis Agenda which recognized "national soveriegnty" of
> the national domain name space. An own Internet root with TLD Root Zone
> files with Chinese characters (where the authorization of the publication of
> these zone files is done by the MII and not by the DOC) would obviously
> qualify for "national domain name space". So why the Chinese government
> should become active? They got what they wanted to have. They will also wait
> and see. (BTW does somebody know whether ICANN will have its fall 2007
> meeting in Taipeh and does somebody know what the position of the Chinese
> government, which more or less ignores up today the GAC, is in this
> question?)
> 
> The ITU has started just recently a consultatiton with its members on
> enhanced coopweration according to reolsution 102 from Antalya. But the New
> ITU SG has made clear in his very first statements that he will not continue
> to push for ITU leadership in IG as Mr. Utsumi did. ITU under Toure wants to
> become the leader in Cybersecurity and Infrastructure, two important
> elements of IG in the broader understanding. And it will make contributions
> to iDNS, NGNs, ENUM, IPv6 etc. but not in competition to ICANN. But Toure,
> at the end of the day, is the voice of the member states. So lets wait and
> see whether the cancellation of his planned visit to the ICANN meeting in
> Lisbon in March 2007 was indeed for "technical reasons" only. WIPO, UNESCO,
> WTO etc. did not change their mind. They are waitng. If somebody will ask
> them to write a report what they have done in their field of competence for
> IG they will write the report, probably not more than five to ten pages. If
> nobody asks them, they will do nothing. But who has a mandate to ask for
> such a report? 
> 
> What can we learn and conclude from this, in particular with regad to IGF
> 2007? Shjuld we support the silence? Is there space for discussion? Any
> direction? 
>   
> Best regards
> 
> Wolfgang
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-- 

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Carlos A. Afonso
diretor de planejamento
Rede de Informações para o Terceiro Setor - Rits
http://www.rits.org.br
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

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