[governance] ITU vs. ICANN

[Karl Auerbach]

On 10/08/2010 12:51 PM, Lee W McKnight wrote:

> But notion that ITU could decide something that is treated as
> mandatory is not far-fetched at all.

In the US the quesiton of whether a treaty is domesticated to have force 
with or over local (national) law is a rather complex question.

And in this instance that question is made more complex by the fact that 
we are not talking about a treaty itself but, rather, a decision made 
subsequent to a treaty.

(Of course, we'd have to begin by asking "which treaty".  And examine 
the terms and conditions, if any, that the US attached when agreeing to it.)

Can an international body created under a treaty (to which the US is a 
signatory) could have veto power over the decisions of a private 
corporation in the US?

My own sense if that that there are a lot of intermediate hurdles that 
would have to be overcome before that would happen.

I suspect that the US would as a matter of national policy strongly 
fight the notion of automatic domestication of treaty-based powers.  So 
would most countries as auto-domestication amounts to a reduction in the 
sovereign powers of a nation.

And if it were done I suspect it could pour gasoline onto the funeral 
pyre that a lot of conservative groups ("tea party") want to make for US 
participation in the UN and other international bodies - yes, that 
position, once held only by the fruitcake fringe, is now moving towards 
mainstream US politics.  Sigh.

And, of course, there is the fact that ICANN acts by virtue of being the 
vertex of a pyramid of contracts.  That vertex exists only because we 
use a single DNS root.  We use a single root merely for convenience; 
there is no technical reason that blocks others.  Too much pressure from 
overbearing governments and international bodies and the single-root 
will become multiple roots - and governments and international bodies 
will have to try to heard a herd of angry cats rather than one somewhat 
docile ICANN cat.

	--karl--


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