[governance] new paper on the Hyderaband [sic] programme
Lisa Horner
lisa at global-partners.co.uk
Thu Jun 12 11:11:28 EDT 2008
Thanks for these clarifications Adam.
I'm sorry for not raising any of these concerns earlier - I haven't participated directly in the consultations owing to time constraints and wrongly assumed that other people would be carrying the 'rights flag'. I've resolved to engage more actively from now on.
Is there any opportunity for us to get involved in shaping the main workshops aside from the option of merging workshops? I do think it's important that rights aren't only seen as a security issue. However, there was an excellent workshop organized by unesco/osce on the intersection of security and rights last year - is anyone who was involved on this list?
Is there any interest within this caucus of presenting the under-representation of openness/rights issues within the main agenda to the secretariat as a shared concern? Either of the caucus as a whole, or of a group of us? Any ideas Vittorio? Obviously the bill of rights coalition would probably be interested too.
I realise that the caucus submitted comments on themes for the IGF in February, and it was proposed that openness should be a cross-cutting issue. It was also proposed that the IGF should focus on how to uphold the Geneva principles, and these reaffirm a commitment to human rights. So I don't think that going back and stressing a commitment to seeing openness and/or rights more substantively on the agenda, or stated explicitly as a cross-cutting theme, would be contradicting earlier proposals.
Thanks,
Lisa
-----Original Message-----
From: Adam Peake [mailto:ajp at glocom.ac.jp]
Sent: 12 June 2008 12:07
To: governance at lists.cpsr.org
Subject: RE: [governance] new paper on the Hyderaband [sic] programme
Lisa, Vittorio, you're right to be concerned. I'm
looking through the workshop proposals trying to
find possible civil society proposed/oriented
workshops that might merge to work on the main
session workshops, and there's not much there on
what should be the security/openness section. So
comments below are not meant to defend the MAG,
blame anyone, or defend how we've arrived at this
situation.
>I have to agree with Vittorio. Lumping openness and privacy together
>with security as a sub-theme under the banner of cyber-security and
>trust doesn't leave much hope for productive discussion about how human
>rights can be developed as foundational norms to underpin internet
>governance.
The way the IGF process works it needs someone to
introduce an issue, to argue for it so it gets
into the rolling documents (synthesis papers
etc), and the caucus hasn't done that for
"rights" (speaking for myself, no excuses, in the
MAG I simply hadn't considered it, I'd have
needed reminding.) Same answer really to
Vittorio's question about the Bill of Rights
coalition: I remember one statement read by
Carlos in February, but that was more a call to
join the coalition, not a contribution of themes
or suggestion for the agenda (and February was
the time for that.) Since then I can't remember
any contribution, nothing about the agenda or any
MAG document, no recommendation for a theme, not
even an independent workshop proposal. So
probably the concerns of the coalition won't be
part of the meeting unless the coalition pushes
them.
>I agreed that the main themes needed re-working, but the
>end result has been that rights are still subsumed under the generalized
>theme of openness, which in turn is framed as a trust and security
>issue.
Yes, they have been subsumed. However the
programme's been emerging since February, the
themes outlined in the summary of the February
MAG meeting
<http://intgovforum.org/AGD/MAG.Summary.28.02.2008.v3.pdf>
and the paper prepared for the May consultation
<http://www.intgovforum.org/cont_may08/Programme_Agenda_and_Format_of_the_Hyderabad_Meeting_.pdf>
are not so different from what's in the current
Hyderabad paper. And there's been no reaction
about this direction until now. I don't remember
any comments following the February MAG paper
saying hold on, this is the wrong direction we
want rights/openness/ etc back in there in this
particular way.
The February summary also says "The final
programme will be defined in light of the
proposals made for holding workshops..." Looking
back at the draft schedules in both those papers
and then the workshops proposed by CS led
organizing groups there aren't many that are a
good fit with some of those proposed themes,
particularly on the security/privacy/openness
area.
So now there's not much to work with to influence
the main session workshops under the Promoting
Cyber-Security and Trust heading. I don't see any
CS led workshops relating to "Are we losing the
battle against cyber-crime?", probably also
"Fostering security, privacy and openness", which
is a surprise as it was intended as a session
where the relationship (balance) between
security, privacy and openness would be explored.
Lisa, just seen your note replying to Linda where
you say "the human rights framework can help to
balance out many of the tensions we're facing in
the internet arena, for example between security
and openness", so there is room here to introduce
the rights framework you're talking about, but
not at the moment given the way the workshop
proposals are written.
We've been saying we support the idea of thematic
workshops feeding into or linked to the main
sessions, but we haven't thought how to propose
workshops that do that. CS led proposals are
certainly interesting (Global Partners and
Associates on mainstreaming human rights, APC on
sexual rights and the Internet/content regulation
and the caucus on a rights agenda) but they are
not well suited for moving over into the main
sessions or to help define those sessions as they
were developing from the February meeting.
Perhaps the caucus' rights agenda for Internet
governance could be re-worked so it could work
with the "Fostering security, privacy and
openness" workshop (though it would mean loosing
the right to hold it as an individual workshop.)
>I suppose that, if these themes are retained, our job as advocates for
>rights in internet governance is to ensure that each of the main panel
>sessions considers how each theme is in fact a rights issue.
Can write to the secretariat now expressing
concerns and make proposals for the final
programme. The programme will be discussed at the
September meeting, comments will be taken into
account (it's still a rolling document.)
If we feel issues have been overlooked and the
MAG can't find a balance of views in the group
arranging a main session workshop then we can ask
to bring in expertise from outside. An the
obvious place to start looking for expertise
would be the coalitions.
Thanks,
Adam
>For
>example, access and multilingualism are definitely rights issues, both
>working from the starting point of the universal declaration and from
>the starting point of 'development as freedom' (eg. enhancing rights and
>capabilities is the foundation of 'development', and the internet is a
>key means of achieving this).
>
>Thanks,
>Lisa
>
>-----Original Message-----
>From: Vittorio Bertola [mailto:vb at bertola.eu]
>Sent: 11 June 2008 10:45
>To: governance at lists.cpsr.org; Adam Peake
>Subject: Re: [governance] new paper on the Hyderaband [sic] programme
>
>Adam Peake ha scritto:
>> I don't see any CS theme being lost, just a re-working of the five
>> simple catch-all themes. They were getting tired, many comments asked
>> for something new. The main sessions in Rio were generally pretty
>dull.
>> So we have the new format of main workshops/main debates.
>
>The idea of "main workshops" is a good one, but I am afraid that given
>the summarization of themes there will be no rights-related workshop
>among the main ones... I assume that main workshops will be related to
>main themes, and if you consider the exploded list of issues:
>
>>>> - Reaching the next billion
>>>>
>>>> ** Access
>>>>
>>>> ** Multilingualism.
>>>>
>>>> - Promoting cyber-security and trust
>>>>
>>>> ** Are we losing the battle against cyber-crime?
>>>>
>>>> ** Fostering security, privacy and openness
>>>>
>>>> - Managing critical Internet resources
>>>>
>>>> ** Transition from IPv4 to IPv6.
>>>>
>>>> ** Arrangements for Internet governance - global and
>national/regional.
>>>>
>>>> - Taking Stock and the Way Forward
>>>>
>>>> - Emerging issues.
>
>there is zero instances of the word "rights", zero instances of the word
>
>"freedom", and there is just one mention of "privacy" and "openness"
>(still a pretty much undefined concept), as one half of a sub-item whose
>
>other half is "security", a traditionally opposite theme which is
>repeated again with different words as the first sub-item of the same
>group ("are we losing the battle...") and is repeated again twice
>("security" and "trust") in the main title of the group. I think that
>the message from the MAG is clear!
>
>Maybe it's just a matter of wording and won't change much in practice,
>but this really looks like a devastating defeat for those of us who have
>
>been spending the last three years trying to push a "rights agenda" for
>the IGF and the Internet, and now get an agenda that doesn't even have
>the words "rights" or "freedoms" in it, not even at the most minor
>level.
>
>Specifically, the Bill of Rights coalition, in the output of the last
>workshop, openly asked for "Internet rights" to become one of the main
>themes in India. This was recognized (also explicitly supported by some)
>
>in the concluding main session in Rio. We had a written declaration by
>two governments, one of which was the last host country, supporting this
>
>proposal. We had an international conference in Rome last September,
>with official delegations from 50+ countries and attendees from 70+
>countries, supporting this request. At both IGFs our workshop was among
>the most attended ones, and while there were different views on the
>instruments, everyone agreed that this is a fundamental issue for the
>future of the Internet.
>
>So could the MAG please tell us how our request was considered, why it
>was rejected, and why our themes were so much marginalized in the
>overall agenda?
>
>Thanks,
>--
>vb. Vittorio Bertola - vb [a] bertola.eu <--------
>--------> finally with a new website at http://bertola.eu/ <--------
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