[governance] History of the IGF

Sun Aug 1 09:05:39 EDT 2010

Quite interesting recollection, Wolf. So it seems the seminal IG
proposals derive from the multilateral Beirut declaration of Feb.2003. 
For me was an interesting time, as I was joining the Brazilian Internet 
Steering Committee again (my first Icann meeting was the Rome one in 
March 2003 incidentally) after helping to build a proposal for a 
multistakeholder CGI.br to the new federal government (Lula), which was 
basically accepted. At the time, I had no idea of the Beirut meeting and 
got in contact with this new "universe" as my NGO also joined the WSIS 
process.

I think putting together the many historical pieces could result in an 
interesting story indeed.

frt rgds

--c.a.

On 08/01/2010 06:00 AM, "Kleinwächter, Wolfgang" wrote:
> Hi Avri, Milton, Bill&  Co.
>
> With regard to our Meissen discussion on the history of the IGF I
> found in my archives two statements long before Tunis which I made on
> behalf of the Civil Society Internet Governance Caucus and where
> "forum function" and "multistakeholderism" were key points. In the
> Paris Statement (July 2003) we called it the "Global Information
> Society Observation Council" (GISOC). The GISOC proposal more or less
> outlined functions which later reflected in the Tunis mandate for the
> IGF. The more formal proposal from the CS was drafted by Bill and me
> on behalf of the CS Internet Governance Caucus at PrepCom3 in
> September 2003 in Geneva, long before the WGIG was created and
> proposed the launch of the IGF.
>
> The whole IG discussion within WSIS was kick started during PrepCom2
> in June 2003 in Geneva when we had, inter alia, a Workshop "Civil
> Society and WSIS" in the official programme of PrepCom2 organized
> (and moderated) by Bertrand and me.  (21 February, 10:00-13:00 - ILO
> building - Workshop lll: CIVIL SOCIETY AND WSIS. see flyer>>  27 kB
> [English<http://www.itu.int/wsis/docs/pc2/inf/workshop/flyer3.doc>  ]
> ). http://www.itu.int/wsis/preparatory/prepcom/pc2/inf/index.html
> After the workshop we moved to the ILO rerstaurant where we discussed
> the need to establish an institutionalized platform which we called
> "CS Internet Governance Caucus" (IGC). Originally, Internet
> Governance was not a main issue in the WSIS. First priority for WSIS
> was bridging the digital divide, however the ITU was very interested
> to bring the IG debate under the WSIS umbrella as a counterplatform
> to ICANN, which as established in 1998 as an alternative to ITU
> efforts to get the control over the DNS and the A Root Server.
>
> The IG debate within WSIS was triggered by the the "Beirut
> Declaration" (February 2003), the regional ministerial conference for
> West Asia which includes the following paragraph "Securing national
> domain names: The responsibility for root directories and domain
> names should rest with a suitable international organization and
> should take multilingualism into consideration. Countries'
> top-level-domain-names and Internet Protocol (IP) address assignment
> should be the sovereign right of countries. The sovereignty of each
> nation should be protected and respected. Internet governance should
> be multilateral, democratic and transparent and should take into
> account the needs of the public and private sectors as well as those
> of the civil society."
>
> The rumor says that the ITU was not satisfied with the outcome of the
> other four regional ministerial conferences, where Internet
> Governance was sidelined. To get a "mandate" for IG, the Beirut
> conference was the last chance for the ITU to include it into the
> WSIS agenda as a high priority issue. I myself did not participate in
> the Beirut conference, but I was told that YJ Pak from Korea made the
> relevant statement which then was reflected in the "Beirut
> Declaration". If you compare the "Beirut Statenment" with the
> "Paris/Geneva statements" you see a difference. Insofar - looking
> backwards - it was not a surprise, that when YJ and I co-chaired the
> IGC in the first WSIS phase until December 2003, we had some internal
> disputes and it was not easy to reach consensus within the IGC from
> the very early day ;-(((.  However, the net result - seven years
> later - is that we avoided to bring DNS etc. under an
> intergovernmental control/oversight mechanism and we were able to
> launch a multistakeholder IGF. Nice history, isn´t it?
>
> Do other people have more documents in their archives? Probably it
> would make sense to write a short history of the IGF. Too late for
> the UN GA in 2010, but probably helpful for the forthcoming deeper
> IGF evalution forseen for 2011.
>
> Wolfgang
>
>
>
> Here is the key part of the Paris statement
>
> " In a broader context of ICT policy making and global governance, we
> invite the WSIS to consider launching a "Global
>
> Information Society Observation Council" which could serve as a
> meeting point for improved coordination, consultation
>
> and communication on ICT issues. Such a "Council" should be composed
> of representatives of governments, private
>
> industry and civil society. It could promote the exchange of
> information, experiences and best practices on issues from
>
> privacy to free speech on the Internet, from IPR to eCommerce, from
> Ipv6 to ENUM. Listening to the good experiences
>
> of others is a cheap investment and could become a source of
> inspiration for innovative policy development in the 21st
>
> Century. We will provide the WSIS secretariat with a new proposed
> language for the Items 33 and 44.
>
>
> WSIS Interesessional, Paris, July 2003
> http://www.itu.int/wsis/docs/pcip/plenary/internet_governance_group.pdf
>
>  Here is another Statement I made a year later in the GFC meeting on
> Multistakeholderism
>
> WSIS Group of the Friends of the Chair, Geneva, September 2004
> http://www.worldsummit2005.de/downloa
> d_en/Speech-Geneva-2004-10-Kleinwaechter.pdf
>
>
> Wolfgang
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-- 

Carlos A. Afonso
CGI.br (www.cgi.br)
Nupef (www.nupef.org.br)
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