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

[Ian Peter]

Just picking up on one thread here -

> 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.

The historical basis we can pick up is the right to communicate - the belief
that, in the event of any media becoming ubiquitous, lack of access to it
results in (at least) the lack of a fundamental opportunity, if not a right.

The right to communicate was advanced with the UNESCO MacBride report in
1983 - a contentious document. However the concept does go back to 1974, and
is the subject of quite a lot of literature since then.

A good summary is at http://www.righttocommunicate.org/

I would dearly love to see the right to communicate revised. Forget whether
its called the Internet or something else or what it morphs to - the lack of
access to any ubiquitous media is a denial of a fundamental human right and
opportunity.

Ian Peter 

 




> From: Anriette Esterhuysen <anriette at apc.org>
> Organization: Association for Progressive Communications
> Reply-To: <governance at lists.cpsr.org>, Anriette Esterhuysen <anriette at apc.org>
> Date: Mon, 30 Nov 2009 05:52:59 +0200
> To: "governance at lists.cpsr.org" <governance at lists.cpsr.org>
> Subject: RE: Extending Rights to the Internet: (Was RE: [governance] Example
> 
> 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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