[governance] ITU participation by CS (was: IG questions ...)

[Dan Krimm]

At 12:38 AM -0500 12/13/07, Avri Doria wrote:

>BTW: I though I was discussing not arguing.  I do not believe that
>the age of
>the decentralised Internet is going away, though there will be many
>areas of the
>Internet that have some degree of local control.    And there will
>always be some
>services that for some period of time are at the core and which seem
>susceptible
>to centralised take over. Personally I still believe it can't happen.
>
>But more importantly, I think we should assume that it shouldn't
>happen and should
>participate everywhere possible to make sure it doesn't, just in case
>i am wrong
>about that.


I'm glad to see your hedge here, because I don't quite understand why you
believe that centralized takeover "can't happen."  I see threats on the
horizon in all directions.  (Jon Zittrain's current work in fact addresses
some of the ones currently peeking over the horizon, and I look forward to
his new book next spring after seeing him speak about it live.)

The fundamental reason for my alarm is the knowledge that, while technology
development in principle should be independent of political dynamics, in
practice it is quite possible for politics to decide to impose itself on
technology development just as much as it can impose itself on any other
societal endeavor.  The USG created the Internet development project in a
positive sense, and it can impose national regulations in a negative sense.
International political venues can do it on a global scale.
_____

As a bit of personal history about where I'm coming from here, I took an
interesting course in college about "scientific worldview in antiquity and
the middle ages" from a scholar whose primary focus was analyzing the role
of institutions in the practice of science from the inception of recorded
history (this course took us up through the beginning of the enlightenment).

The key take-away from that course was an understanding of how profound the
effects of religion and other cultural power dynamics were able to
constrain the practice of science.  In short: context governs content, or
in other words, science is ultimately subservient to institutional
constraints, including political dynamics of the levers of institutions of
power.

In the last few centuries, science (and its progeny, technology) has had a
privileged position in the hierarchy of knowledge in western culture, but
in the last few decades in the US, and especially since the millennium,
there has been a coordinated and strategic attack on the position of
science as "the best way to discover truth" in our civilization.  The most
prominent example of this is the systematic opposition of science with
regard to climate change, followed by the completely unnecessary debate
about "intelligent design" in evolution.

In this framework of cultural attack, technology is not treated as a "free
marketplace of innovation" but rather as a resource for political and
economic control (and these two forms of control are increasingly losing
their distinction over time -- the public sector and the for-profit sector
continue to build their bonds, in a political environment that allows them
to do so without significant limit or oversight).
_____

The Internet in particular arose in a context of independent development,
partly because the cultural change sought by the plutocracy had not settled
in as far as today, and partly because the unintended consequences (which
were accelerated in the 90s by a more populist USG administration) were yet
unrecognized, so USG did not impose significant political oversight on the
project.

My belief is that this "free pass" was a temporary state of political
affairs that inhered at the outset, but given that the profound societally
disruptive potentials of an open network are now quite clearly seen at all
levels of society (especially now at the highest levels of political
power), this free pass has been irrevocably revoked, it seems to me.

Once political power sets its sights on a tool for control, it is unlikely
to be distracted from a mission to constrain it to its own ends.

The trends toward political control over information are crystal clear in
the US, at this point, and I believe they are quite well established in
many other countries as well, particularly the developed countries.  The
history of the IP lobby's maximalist agenda over the last 20-30 years is
also well established in international venues.  Coincidence?  You decide,
but don't take too long.
_____

Bottom line, while I do not claim that "centralized takeover" is
inevitable, I do think that avoiding it will take every possible effort
(most prominently by some sub-sectors of civil society, particularly the
ICT and media public interest advocacy organizations) to resist it.  And,
it may be that those who do not believe in that possibility present the
greatest threat to its resistance because the natural tendency in that
mindset is to ignore warnings until it is far too late to do anything
effective about them.

And, it is clear that the forces of (political, information) control
"invest in a diverse regulatory portfolio" by being present and pushing
their agenda at any and all political venues possible (and because they
have considerable resources they are in a lot of venues), and ideally CS
should be present at all of them to push back everywhere possible.  So to
that extent I would certainly approve of CS presence at ITU, and can
understand Bill and Avri's position.

However, CS has somewhat more constrained resources overall than the
plutocrats, and thus CS may have to focus a lot more attention on picking
the most effective battles possible.  So in this sense I have a great deal
of sympathy for Milton's position.  CS as a whole doesn't seem to have the
luxury of battling everywhere all at once.  We simply don't have the
resources available to do that.  And in cases where we do decide to
participate, we should most certainly be as careful as possible to ensure
that we participate effectively so that the net gain outweighs any
potential for loss.

Bottom bottom line:  If you're going to do it, then make sure you do it
right, and don't run a significant risk of making things worse by doing
things only part-way.  So, make sure you are certain of *what it will
require* to "do it right" because an abortive or ineffective attempt at
participation may leave us worse off than doing nothing.

The real issue here is clearly evaluating the risk of net loss, rather than
assuming that there can only be zero to net positive gain, and this is what
I see as Milton's ultimate point.  On this point, rational minds may
disagree, because it requires an accurate assessment of what the risks are,
and that may not be completely obvious.  Clearly Milton sees some
substantial risks.  I hope that anyone who decides to participate addresses
those worries systematically and incorporates them into their strategy with
a clear eye.

CS can't afford a whole lot of unintended consequences.  Due diligence is
in order, here.

Dan

PS -- Case in point about limited resources: I won't be here in the IG
community indefinitely unless I can find a paid job addressing these
matters.  I'm living on borrowed time, and if the job I find (as opposed to
the job I prefer) does not address IG as a priority, my participation here
will be as an occasional passive observer at best.  If anyone here has
leads on paid ICT policy advocacy, analyst, and/or researcher roles I could
perform from the San Francisco Bay Area, I'd appreciate knowing about them.
Sorry for the abject self-promotional appeal, but my clock is running down
and I need to try all avenues.
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