[governance] Is This An Issue for Internet Governance/Internet Human Rights?

[John Curran]

On Aug 3, 2011, at 1:01 PM, Paul Lehto wrote:

> 1. Where do you get your political legitimacy for your non-democratic
> forms of governance?  Do you deny that non-democratic forms of
> governance are illegitimate when the concern fundamental questions of
> public policy on the internet?  (We are not concerned so much here
> about true freedom to contract between equals, but the ability of
> contractual parties to get together, like say Verizon and google, and
> agree to terms that profoundly affect OTHERS rights, others who have
> never signed nor negotiated any contract, even presuming such
> negotiation could be fair and meaningful.)

Paul - 
 
 For sake of clarity, could you clarify "non-democratic forms of
governance"?  By that phrase, do you mean any organization which 
does not have a democratically-elected governance structure, or 
any form of governance which is not inherently a component of the 
political governing body?

 For example, the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) develops
technical standards that have profound impact on the nature of the 
Internet, but such standards are developed by an open and transparent 
process, and are ultimately developed under the supervision of those
who are democratically elected to specific IETF governance bodies 
(the IAB and the IESG).  Is such an organization a "democratic form 
of governance" or "non-democratic form of governance" per your use
of the phrase?  My goal is to better understand your premise, not 
to advocate for any specific interpretation. 

Thanks!
/John

____________________________________________________________
You received this message as a subscriber on the list:
     governance at lists.cpsr.org
To be removed from the list, visit:
     http://www.igcaucus.org/unsubscribing

For all other list information and functions, see:
     http://lists.cpsr.org/lists/info/governance
To edit your profile and to find the IGC's charter, see:
     http://www.igcaucus.org/

Translate this email: http://translate.google.com/translate_t