[governance] NY article expresses surprise at US walkout in Dubai

[Marilia Maciel]

This is a good article because every story can be interpreted in many ways
and all of them deserve to be told. NYT presents some interesting
reflections, at least to balance a very monolithic media analysis so far.

Marilia

On Sun, Dec 16, 2012 at 11:23 AM, parminder <parminder at itforchange.net>wrote:

>
>
>
> [image: New York Times]
> Message, if Murky, From U.S. to the World
>
>    - *by* ERIC PFANNER
>    - ** Dec. 14, 2012 **
>
> **
>  ** **
>
> At the global treaty conference on telecommunications here, the United
> States got most of what it wanted. But then it refused to sign the document
> and left in a huff.
>
> What was that all about? And what does it say about the future of the
> Internet — which was virtually invented by the United States but now has
> many more users in the rest of the world?
>
> It may mean little about how the Internet will operate in the coming
> years. But it might mean everything about the United States’ refusal to
> acknowledge even symbolic global oversight of the network.
>
> The American delegation, joined by a handful of Western allies, derided
> the treaty as a threat to Internet freedom. But most other nations signed
> it. And other participants in the two weeks of talks here were left
> wondering on Friday whether the Americans had been negotiating in good
> faith or had planned all along to engage in a public debate only to make a
> dramatic exit, as they did near midnight on Thursday as the signing
> deadline approached.
>
> The head of the American delegation, Terry Kramer, announced that it was
> “with a heavy heart” that he could not “sign the agreement in its current
> form.” United States delegates said the pact could encourage censorship and
> undermine the existing, hands-off approach to Internet oversight and
> replace it with government control.
>
> Anyone reading the treaty, though, might be puzzled by these assertions.
> “Internet” does not appear anywhere in the 10-page text, which deals mostly
> with matters like the fees that telecommunications networks should charge
> one another for connecting calls across borders. After being excised from
> the pact at United States insistence, the I-word was consigned to a
> soft-pedaled resolution that is attached to the treaty.
>
> The first paragraph of the treaty states: “These regulations do not
> address the content-related aspects of telecommunications.” That convoluted
> phrasing was understood by all parties to refer to the Internet, delegates
> said, but without referring to it by name so no one could call it an
> Internet treaty.
>
> A preamble to the treaty commits the signers to adopt the regulations “in
> a manner that respects and upholds their human rights obligations.”
>
> Both of these provisions were added during the final days of haggling in
> Dubai, with the support of the United States. If anything, the new treaty
> appears to make it more intellectually challenging for governments like
> China and Iran to justify their current censorship of the Internet.
>
> What’s more, two other proposals that raised objections from the United
> States were removed. One of those stated that treaty signers should share
> control over the Internet address-assignment system — a function now
> handled by an international group based in the United States. The other,
> also removed at the Americans’ behest, called for Internet companies like
> Google and Facebook to pay telecommunications networks for delivering
> material to users.
>
> Given that the United States achieved many of its stated goals in the
> negotiations, why did it reject the treaty in an 11th-hour intervention
> that had clearly been coordinated with allies like Britain and Canada?
>
> In a Dubai conference call with reporters early on Friday, Mr. Kramer
> cited a few remaining objections, like references to countering spam and to
> ensuring “the security and robustness of international telecommunications
> networks.” This wording, he argued, could be used by nefarious governments
> to justify crackdowns on free speech.
>
> But even Mr. Kramer acknowledged that his real concerns were less
> tangible, saying it was the “normative” tone of the debate that had
> mattered most. The United States and its allies, in other words, saw a
> chance to use the treaty conference to make a strong statement about the
> importance of Internet freedom. But by refusing to sign the treaty and
> boycotting the closing ceremony, they made clear that even to talk about
> the appearance of global rules for cyberspace was a nonstarter.
>
> It may have been grandstanding, but some United States allies in Europe
> were happy to go along, saying the strong American stand would underline
> the importance of keeping the Internet open.
>
> “This could be a watershed moment in the discussion of Internet freedom,”
> said Jochem de Groot, senior policy officer for the Internet and human
> rights in the Foreign Ministry of the Netherlands, which joined the United
> States in opposition to the pact.
>
> That the talks — convened by a United Nations agency, the International
> Telecommunication Union — took place in this economically liberal but
> socially and politically battened-down emirate underscored the symbolism of
> the United States boycott of the final treaty.
>
> “There were a lot of messages being sent to countries around the world,”
> said Moez Chakchouk, chief executive of the Tunisian Internet Agency, in an
> interview. “It’s a good message to start the debate.”
>
> Since the Arab Spring deposed the authoritarian government of President
> Zine el-Abidine Ben-Ali of Tunisia, that country has taken a strong stand
> in support of Internet freedom. Nonetheless, Mr. Chakchouk said his
> government would sign the telecommunications treaty because he was
> satisfied with the free-speech guarantees that had been written into it.
>
> “It’s important for all of us to work together,” he said. “It’s not good
> when one country doesn’t understand the issues.”
>
> Working together could become more challenging as the Internet —
> especially bandwidth-hungry video applications — accounts for an ever
> greater share of global telecommunications traffic, and as more people in
> developing countries go online.
>
> According to Hamadoun Touré, secretary-general of the telecommunication
> union, the goal of the treaty was not to take control of the Internet — as
> critics had contended — but to narrow the digital divide.
>
> While the United States was talking about the open Internet, Mr. Touré and
> developing countries were talking about opening the Internet to more of the
> 4.5 billion people around the world who remain offline.
>
> Mr. Touré emphasized treaty proposals for stimulating investment in
> broadband networks, for reducing cellphone roaming costs and for extending
> Internet access to disabled people in developing countries. The goal was to
> expand broadband at an affordable cost, not to regulate the content that
> travels on the Internet, he said.
>
> “What is the meaning of building cars if there are no highways for them to
> drive on?” Mr. Touré said at a news conference on Friday, where the
> telecommunication union tried to put a positive spin on the messy pileup of
> the previous evening.
>
> As developing countries gain better access, the numbers game will continue
> to tilt against the United States and other developed countries that have
> championed the cause of an open Internet. The Internet population of China
> — 538 million as of June, according to the Chinese government — is already
> nearly double that of the United States.
>
> Mr. Kramer said that as Internet use expands in developing countries,
> governments and citizens of these countries might also grow more tolerant
> of it.
>
> “It is clear that the world community is a crossroads in its view of the
> Internet and its relationship to society in the coming century,” Mr. Kramer
> said.
>
> By Friday evening, 89 of 144 countries that were eligible to vote had
> signed the document and about two dozen had indicated that they would not,
> Mr. Touré said, with the rest still undecided or undeclared. Holdouts could
> change their minds and sign later. Mr. Touré said he was hopeful that the
> United States would eventually do so, though Mr. Kramer said this was
> unlikely.
>
> Otherwise, the events in Dubai raise the curious prospect of a treaty
> largely negotiated to suit the United States’ position and applying mostly
> to developing countries, many of which seemed perfectly happy with the
> outcome.
>   **
>
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-- 
Centro de Tecnologia e Sociedade
FGV Direito Rio

Center for Technology and Society
Getulio Vargas Foundation
Rio de Janeiro - Brazil
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