Extending Rights to the Internet: (Was RE: [governance] Example

[Anriette Esterhuysen]

Hi all

It is good to be having this discussion. If we want to make a convincing
argument to have a greater focus on rights at the next IGF we should
have good proposals for how to unpack and approach the issue by the Feb
2010 consultations.

I would suggest there are three main threads here.. and then different
strategies and tacties, depending which terrain one is working on.

Thread one is (as expressed well by Meryem and Michael) is that in order
to excercise basic rights such as freedom of expression, freedom of
association, and more (rights which are already reflected in global
instruments like the UDHR) all people should have access to the
internet.

This raises the challenge of how to express affordable access to the
internet for all as a basic right. We can't avoid this. Whether you call
it a 'new right' or a pre-condition for excercising existing rights, we
have to work harder to address the access gap. 

An analogy would be the right to education (Articla 26 of the UDHR). In
practice, realising this rights requires access to schools, and is
enforced through global directives for education to made compulsory at
national level. Interesting to look at:
http://www.right-to-education.org/ 


Thread two relates to what kind of access people have. Is it
unrestricted, does it supports basic rights such as freedom of
expression, association etc.. If not, then access does not effectively
enable you to excercise basic human rights. Re. the important work of
the OpenNet Initiative. Open standards can also impact on the type of
access. E.g. a case in South Africa where the electoral commission's
website during the 2009 national election was only viewable with
Internet Explorer. An open source advocate made a complaint against the
commission with the Human Rights Commission.

The work of the IRP coalition is trying to capture these two threads in
the form of basic principles and rights that can be used as a point of
reference in global internet governance. 

Thread three is Parminder's point which is that it is not just
intervention by national governments (e.g. filtering, surveillance,
censorship) that limits the kind of *free* access needed to excercise
one's human rights, it is also the market structure of the internet
industry. He is arguing that one needs global regulation of some kind to
limit this.

Thread four is consumer rights which come into play when you are not,
putting it bluntly, 'getting what you are paying for' in terms of
content and quality of service and support. In some cases these rights
need to be defended against a particular service provider (e.g. Telkom
in South Africa my ADSL provider grrrrr!!!) or, against an
industry/sector, e.g. to use another South African example, mobile
operators overcharging consumers for interconnection/termination fees
between different operators.

Parminder, what I think you argument can be strengthened by is a clearer
sense of WHO to hold accountable for WHAT RIGHTS.

There is no point in lobbying for global regulation unless you consider
who will enforce that regulation.

We need to distinguish between global regulation and globally agreed on
regulatory guidelines which inform national regulation. Or are you
actually (asking Parminder) proposing the establishment of a global
regulator of some kind?

In APC's work on trying to get West Africa regulators to be more
empowered in relation to the multi-nationally owned and controlled SAT3
undersea cable it was alarming that some of them did not sufficiently
grasp that they had the power to regulate SAT3 pricing under their
national jurisdiction.

I agree with you that global guidelines are needed to prevent
anti-competitive behaviour. But we need to remember that to enforce them
you need to work at national level. Many of us have been doing that of
course, particularly at the level of advocacy and research in ICT policy
and regulation.

What we have not been doing enough of (I think) is supporting consumer
rights campaigns, and tackling actual anti-competitive behaviour through
raising issues with competition tribunals. There already fairly
reasonable anti-competitive clauses in global telcoms regulation
guidelines. The difficulty is that they are not being enforced or
implemented effectively at national level.

My point is that the discussion of global rights and principles is very
useful to distil our thinking about rights and the internet, but, if we
want to bring about change in how people have access and how they can
use the internet we have to work in a more holistic way at national
level, and, tackling anti-competitive behaviour which harm consumer
rights in ways that limit the expression of their human rights.

One of the primary reasons that civil society organisations in many
parts of the world are not working in this important area is because of
the often (in my opinion) immobilising debate on market vs. state roles
and responsibilities. 

We tend to work on macro policy issues (which are important) and then
(particularly in developing countries) we are not active in how these
policies translate into day to day experience of users.

Surely there is general consensus that the role of the state
(regulators) is to ensure that market structure is open, with low entry
barriers for small players, competitive, ensure accountability by
providers to consumers.. and so on.  There will be nuts and bolts issues
to argue about, e.g. licensing fees, universal access funds, state
supported public access, incentives/barriers for foreign investors,
equity issues, local language and content quotas and so on. 

Am I wrong in feeling that we are, in a manner of speaking, scratching
the surface with ideological discussions and not delving into detail
enough?

Anriette

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