[governance] IGC statement REVISION 3.0: consensus call comes

Tue Feb 16 14:30:53 EST 2010

Hello Katiza

ITU is an anomaly that deviates from the ancient wisdom behind the dictum
that "a nation's capital should be situated as farther away from the sea
shore as possible": (merchants congregate near the sea; if the capital is
close to the sea, merchants would have proximity to the members of the
Government, so there is greater likelihood of the merchants corrupting the
politicians). Telecom corporations have the rare advantage of being seated
alongside Government at the ITU. This anomalous position makes it possible
for the telecoms to exercise an undue influence on governments, unnoticed by
the Governments.

The ITU was established because telegraphic communication needed to be
standardized for interoperability across continents. ITU established
standards for telegraphic and phone communication.

Governments chose to be part of the ITU when Governments owned telecom
corporations. Over time, most Governments have withdrawn their stakes in
their telecommunication corporations, but haven't ceased to be a part of
this business cartel. The result is that we are now left with a
business-government nexus, of which unwittingly Governments are a part.

This status is a unique status, not conferred upon the business unions of
any other industry. ITU has been in a position to influence national and
global policies related to all communication. ITU's core concern is that it
should govern and control all business of communication. The ITU sets
policies and rules in all communication: Telegraphs, telephones, mobile
phones and it also manages the RF spectrum and satellite communications with
the exception of the Internet.

ITU's idea of an Internet was a networking solution provided by telecom
companies on a commercial business model. ITU tried to take charge of the
Internet in the early days of Internet. This did not happen as the Internet
took shape as a free and open medium. The Internet evolved to be way beyond
the purview of the ITU and it shape as a world on its own.

In its recent attempts to impose itself in Internet Governance, it couldn't
succeed because the mutli-stakeholder approach has rendered the Civil
Society as a powerful force in any policy debate (if not decision) related
to the Internet.

This must have made the ITU very uncomfortable and as an organization with
its anachronistic status as a UN Agency, the ITU The Internet threatened the
business models of telecom companies as technologies such as email, VOIP
began to be adopted worldwide. The ITU also found a new breed of phone
companies like Skype that didn't obey the ITU rules becoming phenomenally
successful and an emerging threat to phone company revenues.

The freedom of the Internet is because of the open architecture of the
Internet and due to such principles as the end to end principle, all of
which could be easily redefined if the task of Internet architecture and
Internet standards comes under the ITU umbrella. So the ITU tried to
interject itself in the Internet Standards process. The Critical Internet
Resources could be brought under the ITU umbrella by taking over a
vulnerable corporation called ICANN. That could ensure a technical dominance
of the Internet by the ITU. But for overall control, ITU needs to take over
Internet Governance with the argument that easily fools at least a few
policy makers: that the ITU is a well organized, 145 year old organization
that has 191 national governments as its members. It attempts to derive a
position in policy making (which is otherwise in the realm of Governments)
by interjecting itself in the policy arena as a UN Agency, while it is in
reality a business union.

The ITU organizes the World Telecommunication Policy Forum in an attempt to
position itself / retain its position in the policy arena. The ITU asserts
its position in policy making in subtle ways. For instance, at the IGF in
Sharm el Sheikh, an ITU representative said " We have no intention
whatsoever to do the business of the ICANN, what the ICANN is doing
best...everybody doesn't want the ICANN to do what is the mandate of the ITU
of policy-making, public-policy issues and so on”

That was subtle. The ITU representative had managed to assert that policy
making is ITU's birthright and that the ITU has a legitimate and unequaled
role in policy making. This inappropriate statement was somehow allowed to
slip in without a challenge at the IGF.

At Egypt, ITU's representatives raised questions about IPv6 allocation
system, in an attempt to bring the ITU into the function of allocation of IP
addresses. This was mild compared to a blatant speech by the Secretary
General at ICANN Cairo, which almost amounted to a bid to take over ICANN.

ITU's constant attempts to gain a "controlling interest" in Internet
Governance is resisted by the Internet Community. This is what causes the
'tensions'.

Sivasubramanian Muthusamy

On Thu, Jan 21, 2010 at 10:21 PM, Katitza Rodriguez <
katitza at datos-personales.org> wrote:

> Greetings:
>
> Can someone explain me the ITU-IGF tension? I do not follow ITU.
>
> Thanks.
>
>
>
> On Jan 21, 2010, at 11:42 AM, Yehuda Katz wrote:
>
>  My constructive dissection:
>>
>>  None of these suggestions would fundamentally alter the IGF as an
>>> institution;
>>>
>> for example, we are content that it remain formally convened by the UN
>> Secretary General, with an independent budget and a Secretariat under
>> contract
>> with the United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs
>> (UNDESA).  We
>> do not see any benefit to the IGF in moving underneath a different UN
>> body.
>>
>> I take it that: "... We do not see any benefit to the IGF in moving
>> underneath
>> a different UN body. ..." addresses the ITU's position.
>> Myself, I see no insult in addressing the ITU's position more directly.
>> (Spit
>> it out)
>>
>> Add something like this: And it is genraly felt that if the IGF is to be
>> subsumed by the ITU, then IGC members would prefer the IGF remain
>> independent
>> of the UN umbrella.
>>
>> I am suggesting to leave open 'The-Thought' of an Independent IGF for
>> serval
>> reasons,
>> 1. There may be Other UN Branches (Other than the ITU) that want to hose
>> the
>> IGF
>> 2. It may be that the IGF can be Independent and 'First among Equals'
>> (among
>> all the UN Branches) in respect to Internet Policy, underwritten by the
>> MDG and
>> WSIS Declarations.
>> 3. if the IGF is in fact slated to conclude, the statement establishes the
>> IGC's commitment to the IGF's ongoing Independence.
>> ...
>> Don't be Shy, the Chair at the ITU certainly is not. Give them (Dese &
>> Markus)
>> the fuel to fight.
>> I don't feel you'll insult anyone by being Frank & Direct, in fact now is
>> the
>> time to do just that, the delicate 'Modalities' as Bertrand de La Chapelle
>> puts
>> it can come later.
>>
>> Else where in your statement, you should add something a-kin too "Piercing
>> the
>> corporate Veil", that is make reference to the 'Invisibility' of the UN
>> Umbrella Insider negotiations (UN inside modalities) regarding the
>> determination of the IGF's composition, that should be made real-time and
>> transparent to All.
>>
>> I use the 'Piercing the corporate Veil' analogy because I feel They (the
>> UNSG/UNDESA/ITU/IGF Chairs) have broken their contract with US, in regards
>> to
>> Transparency of the final negotiations. Last Year's transactions/actions
>> were
>> evidence of the fact.
>> ---
>>
>> * Piercing the corporate Veil
>> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Piercing_the_corporate_veil
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