[governance] Inputs for synthesis paper

Tue Sep 9 03:29:53 EDT 2008

>>But giving the above analysis of positive rights you may be falling in the
trap of Milton's simplistic rhetoric of caricaturing positive rights - like
right to livelihood or >>work, which he see as the right of everyone and
anyone to insist on employment with IT for Change, though of course we would
gladly employ Milton :-).

>I would argue for or against what Milton says, for or against what you or
Ian say, but wouldn't make it personal. Have you run >out of arguments
against Milton? Is >that the reason why you have picked up on him as a
person?  ( not that I know Milton or >fallen in Milton's "trap". It is very
imaginative to have thought of a >Milton's trap ) 

Siva

I didn't say anything personal to Milton. He wrote twice, give me a
guaranteed job at ITfC when I spoke of positive rights. I did not reply
because I thought it was a diversion. But it is a straight forward thing to
call it a polemical trap, which it most definitely is. I see nothing wrong
in it, and don't think even Milton does. BTW, you may have missed that
Milton said yesterday that I may be being dishonest, and also that I was
trying rhetoric. Do you think it is personal? (Though I am not complaining.)

You now do say 'I wrote nonsense to hint at the.' whereby you are agreeing
that you caricatured the cited 'right'. I said that such caricaturing
approach is problematic, and argued cited other positive rights - just my
view..

> My apologies to All for going into the basics when it is about time to
conclude

Not at all. Basics are important in this debate.

> The Internet has worked, is working and will work - on its own.

What has happened with the Internet is of course extra-ordinary. But if
'working on its own' was all that is needed we are all here on a civil
society policy discussion/ advocacy forum are wasting our time, aren't we. 

>., not by declaring rights or demanding enforcement of rights.

It is fine that you hold the view that a rights-based approach is not useful
in this area, and give your arguments.

>Google Translate happened, more out of Google Community participation than
by the users demanding Translation as a matter >of right.

Lets hope that the same will automatically and spontaneously happen on and
about Google with regard to privacy, and freedom of expression of different
viewpoints and sources of knowledge (commercial and non-commercial, those
under-privileged with less 'voice' and those with dominant presence etc
etc.) But yes, this discussion is certainly useful.

Parminder 

  _____  

From: Sivasubramanian Muthusamy [mailto:isolatedn at gmail.com] 
Sent: Tuesday, September 09, 2008 12:03 PM
To: Parminder
Cc: governance at lists.cpsr.org; Ian Peter; Milton L Mueller
Subject: Re: [governance] Inputs for synthesis paper

Hello Parminder, Ian an All,

On Tue, Sep 9, 2008 at 11:23 AM, Parminder <parminder at itforchange.net>
wrote:

Siva

While I do agree with your earlier proposition that care must taken that
governments do not wrongly exploit the language of right, I cant agree with
the basis of your above understanding of 'rights'. 

A 'right' isn't an electrical switch, which if pressed and full outcome is
not realized, the 'right' can be said to be meaningless. (This is true of
all right - negative and positive.) 

You may want to try your above analysis of 'meaninglessness' of linguistic
rights on the Internet to the 'right of education' enshrined in the
Universal Declaration of Human Rights. This was done in 1948, however
universal primary education is far from being completely realized. However,
the existence of this 'right' gives civil society the basis and strength for
making a strong political claim to universalisation of education policies, a
struggle which is being keenly fought in India right now, when the right to
education bill in final stages, while neoliberal influences in the
government, who are more worried over India's corporate performance, are
actively trying to stall it by citing funding problems. 

Another example; India's trade minister recently justified India's tough
stance at the WTO negotiations on safeguards aimed at protecting vulnerable
farmers in India, stated that he cannot back down on this issue because it
is not about commercial interests of India, on which negotiations are
possible, but it is about right of livelihood of Indian people. You can see
how a 'rights' claim differentiates and makes for higher and stronger basis
than a mere ordinary political claim, like protecting India' commercial
interests.

....... 

>"right to have an Internet in ones own language"

>What if I say, "I speak Tamil at home, this discussion is an important
public discussion, I demand an instant Tamil version in my mail box of all
messages that >everyone writes"  or what if I say "I want all
intgovforum.org <http://intgovforum.org/>  and all the collateral resources
translated in Tamil in a Tamil website before this IGF is allowed to
>progress any further"? And what if I demand the proceedings of the IGF
simultaneously interpreted in Tamil and all documents officially transcribed
and published >in Tamil? And in Spanish and Portuguese and American Spanish
and Brazilian Portuguese and in Toda, the language of the Ooty mountains, in
Sanskrit, in Tulu, in >Assamese, in Kannada?

If it not obvious, what I wrote as above is nonsense. I wrote nonsense to
hint at the shape of demands to come if we are to take the rights based
approach.

My apologies to All for going into the basics when it is about time to
conclude. 

"right to have an Internet in ones own language" as an example sentence:

No one woke up Eric Schmidt with thunderous slogans in the middle of the
night to demand Google to translate. And no one wrote to his or her
parliamentary representative to raise a question in parliament to initiate a
debate to pass a resolution to direct the Government to instruct the
Ambassador to the United Nations to introduce a draft resolution,
diplomatically maneuver to get it voted upon resolving that the General
Assembly calling upon the Government of United States to direct the US
Department of Commerce to arm twist Google into translating search results
and web pages. Google Translate happened, more out of Google Community
participation than by the users demanding Translation as a matter of right.

The Internet has worked, is working and will work - on its own. The Internet
is not machines or wires, it is people. The Internet is 1.3 billion people
today, would be 6 billion people tomorrow. People create and participate.
That is the magic of Internet.

Internet  relies on collaboration and on processes that are local,
bottom-up, open and accessible to individuals around the world. This model
clearly works and works well. 

Progress has happened, is happening and will happen on the Internet, not by
declaring rights or demanding enforcement of rights. The Internet
organizations largely grew up organically, and work together in a
collaborative manner, respecting each other's needs, roles and expertise.
They are not hierarchically organized, and all understand and respect the
interdependencies and inherent needs 

Progress and Innovation happens not by public, collective or individual
"demand" but by public, collective and individual participation in the
processes.

The common vision is that of an open, accessible and global Internet. So far
it has been happening, not on demand, not by declaring and clamoring for
rights, b participation. The Internet - the people - participate, discuss
and cause everything desirable to happen.

What worries me is this: Take a look at a title such as a "peace keeping
coalition force". What does it do? It goes to war. Think along these lines.
What would happen if you debate about rights and draw up a "Declaration of
Internet Rights"? You will end up creating rules. 

But giving the above analysis of positive rights you may be falling in the
trap of Milton's simplistic rhetoric of caricaturing positive rights - like
right to livelihood or work, which he see as the right of everyone and
anyone to insist on employment with IT for Change, though of course we would
gladly employ Milton :-).

I would argue for or against what Milton says, for or against what you or
Ian say, but wouldn't make it personal. Have you run out of arguments
against Milton? Is that the reason why you have picked up on him as a
person?  ( not that I know Milton or fallen in Milton's "trap". It is very
imaginative to have thought of a Milton's trap ) 

Parminder 

  _____  

From: Sivasubramanian Muthusamy [mailto:isolatedn at gmail.com] 
Sent: Tuesday, September 09, 2008 9:32 AM

To: governance at lists.cpsr.org; Ian Peter

Cc: Milton L Mueller
Subject: Re: [governance] Inputs for synthesis paper

Meant to be addressed to: Hello Ian and All, (Milton's opinions are well
respected. But this message is technically isn't a reply to Milton)

On Tue, Sep 9, 2008 at 9:22 AM, Sivasubramanian Muthusamy
<isolatedn at gmail.com> wrote:

Hello Milton,

"right to have an Internet in ones own language"

What if I say, "I speak Tamil at home, this discussion is an important
public discussion, I demand an instant Tamil version in my mail box of all
messages that everyone writes"  or what if I say "I want all intgovforum.org
and all the collateral resources translated in Tamil in a Tamil website
before this IGF is allowed to progress any further"? And what if I demand
the proceedings of the IGF simultaneously interpreted in Tamil and all
documents officially transcribed and published in Tamil? And in Spanish and
Portuguese and American Spanish and Brazilian Portuguese and in Toda, the
language of the Ooty mountains, in Sanskrit, in Tulu, in Assamese, in
Kannada?

There is so much to be DELETED in this draft.

Sivasubramanian Muthusamy
India

On Tue, Sep 9, 2008 at 8:56 AM, Ian Peter <ian.peter at ianpeter.com> wrote:

Well there might be different emphases in a womens rights movement Milton
and I don't think we need to demand the emphases be exactly the same. But
that and many other issues here can wait till another day.

The important thing is that we seem to agree on the main thrust of the
submission. I've enjoyed seeing the differing points of view here but
perhaps now we need to collectively concentrate on getting the text together
- next week the ongoing debate can happily continue.

Ian Peter

Ian Peter and Associates Pty Ltd

PO Box 10670 Adelaide St  Brisbane 4000

Australia

Tel (+614) 1966 7772 or (+612) 6687 0773

www.ianpeter.com

  _____  

From: Milton L Mueller [mailto:mueller at syr.edu] 
Sent: 09 September 2008 08:17
To: governance at lists.cpsr.org; Ian Peter

Subject: RE: [governance] Inputs for synthesis paper

  _____  

From: Ian Peter [mailto:ian.peter at ianpeter.com] 
Sent: Monday, September 08, 2008 3:42 PM
To: governance at lists.cpsr.org
Subject: RE: [governance] Inputs for synthesis paper

So womens rights is a collective right? Indigenous land rights is a
collective right?  

No, unless you believe that the rights of woman are completely different
from the rights of men. In other words, patriarchal (or matriarchal)
societies that assign superior or different rights based on gender believe
in collective rights. Liberal societies that afford men, women and the
transgendered equal rights based ontheir status as individuals are based on
individual rights. So now tell me where you count yourself.  ;-)

Indigenous land rights are more complicated. An individualist approach would
certainly recognize the ability of groups (e.g., publicly owned corporations
or even political communities) to own land, but see these as extensions of
individual rights (as Tapani pointed out). However, the property rights of a
very different culture may not be recognizable to a modern legal regime, and
vice-versa, and so it may be better to handle those situations as a kind of
special sovereignty. However, a collectivist approach to property rights can
just as easily work against indigenous minorities as for them. I am sure you
know the history.  

But for the sake of this submission, we obviously need to reflect differing
opinions. Can't we find a simple way forward here? Isn't it as simple as a
statement such as "while differing opinions on individual and collective
rights exist" within the context of the general request, which is to make
rights a main theme for Cairo? (which doesn't seem to be disputed)

That's what I thought my original edit did. I'd be happy to delete the line
about how state-provided internet access might be used to violate other
rights, even though I think the point is true and salient, I recognize that
it may be a bit too in-your-face. 

Internal Virus Database is out of date.

Checked by AVG - http://www.avg.com
Version: 8.0.138 / Virus Database: 270.6.0/1602 - Release Date: 8/9/2008
1:22 PM

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