[governance] Asia Pacific regional IGF - Tokyo, July

[parminder]

On Wednesday 25 April 2012 03:05 PM, parminder wrote:
> snip
>
> In general, as you know, I am quite against policy dialogue forums 
> (which I understand this meeting is supposed to be, taking from the UN 
> IGF) being organised primarily by the business sector, especially when 
> such a forum claims a monopoly and therefore authoritative position, 

I am sure that many of you will know of the famous words of Adam Smith, 
the father of free market thinking, about the relationship between 
business and policy making. In any case,  I will forward them since they 
seem so germane to the larger issue of my email.

(Personally, I would not have been able to use the kind of strong words 
that Adam Smith uses, but he is an acknowledged master and who am I to 
stand between his words and you :) )

Quoting Adam Smith

        People of the same trade seldom meet together, even for
        merriment and diversion, but the conversation ends in a
        conspiracy against the public, or in some contrivance to raise
        prices.... But though the law cannot hinder people of the same
        trade from sometimes assembling together, it ought to do nothing
        to facilitate such assemblies, much less to render them
        necessary. (Adam Smith)

Another one,

        To widen the market and to narrow the competition, is always the
        interest of the dealers...The proposal of any new law or
        regulation of commerce which comes from this order, ought always
        to be listened to with great precaution, and ought never to be
        adopted till after having been long and carefully examined, not
        only with the most scrupulous, but with the most suspicious
        attention. It comes from an order of men, whose interest is
        never exactly the same with that of the public, who have
        generally an interest to deceive and even oppress the public,
        and who accordingly have, upon many occasions, both deceived and
        oppressed it. (Adam Smith)


> which is implied in the name of 'the' 'Asia Pacific regional IGF'.
>
> Mine is a somewhat unpleasant task of raising what may appear to be 
> difficult question with regard to sincere and hard work being put in 
> by people like you and Peng Hwa, both of whom I greatly respect. But 
> all of us, most of all civil society, must be subject to 
> accountability and to hard questions when required. So, my apologies 
> for that. However, I do request an open discussion on the subject here 
> in the IGC.
>
> I do not think that you would much look forward to a time when the 
> policies that determine what education our children will have, and 
> how, will be determined by processes led by private companies in the 
> business of digital content, educational software etc. Do you? Or, to 
> a time when our health policies will be determined by processes led by 
> big pharma companies and private hospital chains. However, what is 
> being done in Internet governance today is precisely and inescapably 
> leading us towards such a model of governance and policy making. To 
> that extent, we will have to take responsibility for our actions. I am 
> merely trying to take responsibility for mine in raising these 
> questions at this time. And I look forward to your responses. 
> Apologies once again if this is inconvenient and/ or an incursion on 
> your busy time.
>
> regards, parminder
>
>
>
> On Friday 13 April 2012 06:51 PM, Izumi AIZU wrote:
>> Dear list,
>>
>> Asia Pacific regional IGF, APrIGF, 2012 will be held in Tokyo, July 
>> 18 - 20.
>>
>> The program committee is being organized and just starting its work.
>> We have not yet made the web-site for this year, but should be soon 
>> prepared.
>>
>> If you are interested in participating in the organizing work or any 
>> other
>> Information, please contact me or Prof. Ang Peng Hwa, cced here.
>> To contact the local organizer, the secretariat, Japan Internet 
>> Asociation,
>> JAIPA, please contact Mr. Toshiaki Tateishi, also cced here.
>>
>> Izumi
>>
>>
>>
>> -- 
>> >> Izumi Aizu <<
>>           Institute for InfoSocionomics, Tama University, Tokyo
>>            Institute for HyperNetwork Society, Oita,
>>                                   Japan
>>                                  * * * * *
>> www.anr.org <http://www.anr.org>
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