[governance] NYT opinion by Vint Cerf: Internet Access is not a HR

[Avri Doria]

Hi,

I agree with those who beleive that Vint's Opinion piece is problematic.  I think he misses the point on several levels though I think he does make one critical point that hits the mark.

- As some have pointed out the Internet is not technology, the Internet may be enabled by technology but it is a whole lot more than that, most especially it is the content one can publish and consume using the technology.  The Internet is more like the published word, than it is like a horse.  The Internet is not technology, it is not even totally shaped by technology as the techno-policy aspects are greater in many respects than the bit and bytes of the protocol designs and implementations.  To say that people have a right to Internet access is a lot like saying people have a right of access to published material.

- Another point he misses is contained in: "Civil rights, after all, are different from human rights because they are conferred upon us by law, not intrinsic to us as human beings."  While I am glad that he does not go all the way to define where intrinsic rights come from, for all intents and purpose Human Rights and Civil Rights are defined by the same set of basic rights documents: the UDHR <http://www.un.org/Overview/rights.html>, the ICCPR <http://www.unhchr.ch/html/menu3/b/a_ccpr.htm> and the ICESCR <http://www.unhchr.ch/html/menu3/b/a_cescr.htm>.  To set these things as somehow separate and coming from different origins takes us back to the battle between Natural and Legal rights.  The documents referred to above, an UNGA resolution (soft law) and two binding treaties (binding law), sometimes referred to as the International Bill of Human Rights, moved us beyond that argument putting both Human and Civil rights on a legal basis.  It is a category error to place them in opposition to each other.

Unfortunately the most important point he makes is almost swallowed by the problematic background of the paper: That technologists need to  focus on the creation of rights-enabling technology as opposed to rights-disabling technology.  This is, in my opinion the critical thing to take from this piece, problematic aspects aside.  Personally I think a lot of the technology that has gone in enabling the Internet has indeed being rights-enabling. In recent years, however, much has been done by technical companies to create a great amount of rights-disabling technology.  And this is the big warning I take from the piece.  Technology companies have to stop endangering people's rights in their quest of profits and government approval.

I hope those reading this piece among the technology purveyors and technical developers pay attention and stop creating the technology that disables the right-enabling characteristic of the Internet.  It is good that someone as revered as he is by many in our corner of the world, should make this sort of statement.

avri



On 5 Jan 2012, at 07:03, Ginger Paque wrote:

> http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/05/opinion/internet-access-is-not-a-human-right.html?nl=todaysheadlines&emc=tha212
> 
> Interesting opinion piece from Vint Cerf. I am copy/pasting it here for those who may not be able to access it:
> January 4, 2012
> Internet Access Is Not a Human Right
> By VINTON G. CERF
> Reston, Va.
> 
> FROM the streets of Tunis to Tahrir Square and beyond, protests around the world last year were built on the Internet and the many devices that interact with it. Though the demonstrations thrived because thousands of people turned out to participate, they could never have happened as they did without the ability that the Internet offers to communicate, organize and publicize everywhere, instantaneously.
> 
> It is no surprise, then, that the protests have raised questions about whether Internet access is or should be a civil or human right. The issue is particularly acute in countries whose governments clamped down on Internet access in an attempt to quell the protesters. In June, citing the uprisings in the Middle East and North Africa, a report by the United Nations’ special rapporteur went so far as to declare that the Internet had “become an indispensable tool for realizing a range of human rights.” Over the past few years, courts and parliaments in countries like France and Estonia have pronounced Internet access a human right.
> 
> But that argument, however well meaning, misses a larger point: technology is an enabler of rights, not a right itself. There is a high bar for something to be considered a human right. Loosely put, it must be among the things we as humans need in order to lead healthy, meaningful lives, like freedom from torture or freedom of conscience. It is a mistake to place any particular technology in this exalted category, since over time we will end up valuing the wrong things. For example, at one time if you didn’t have a horse it was hard to make a living. But the important right in that case was the right to make a living, not the right to a horse. Today, if I were granted a right to have a horse, I’m not sure where I would put it.
> 
> The best way to characterize human rights is to identify the outcomes that we are trying to ensure. These include critical freedoms like freedom of speech and freedom of access to information — and those are not necessarily bound to any particular technology at any particular time. Indeed, even the United Nations report, which was widely hailed as declaring Internet access a human right, acknowledged that the Internet was valuable as a means to an end, not as an end in itself.
> 
> What about the claim that Internet access is or should be a civil right? The same reasoning above can be applied here — Internet access is always just a tool for obtaining something else more important — though the argument that it is a civil right is, I concede, a stronger one than that it is a human right. Civil rights, after all, are different from human rights because they are conferred upon us by law, not intrinsic to us as human beings.
> 
> While the United States has never decreed that everyone has a “right” to a telephone, we have come close to this with the notion of “universal service” — the idea that telephone service (and electricity, and now broadband Internet) must be available even in the most remote regions of the country. When we accept this idea, we are edging into the idea of Internet access as a civil right, because ensuring access is a policy made by the government.
> 
> Yet all these philosophical arguments overlook a more fundamental issue: the responsibility of technology creators themselves to support human and civil rights. The Internet has introduced an enormously accessible and egalitarian platform for creating, sharing and obtaining information on a global scale. As a result, we have new ways to allow people to exercise their human and civil rights.
> 
> In this context, engineers have not only a tremendous obligation to empower users, but also an obligation to ensure the safety of users online. That means, for example, protecting users from specific harms like viruses and worms that silently invade their computers. Technologists should work toward this end.
> 
> It is engineers — and our professional associations and standards-setting bodies like the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers — that create and maintain these new capabilities. As we seek to advance the state of the art in technology and its use in society, we must be conscious of our civil responsibilities in addition to our engineering expertise.
> 
> Improving the Internet is just one means, albeit an important one, by which to improve the human condition. It must be done with an appreciation for the civil and human rights that deserve protection — without pretending that access itself is such a right.
> 
> Vinton G. Cerf, a fellow at the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, is a vice president and chief Internet evangelist for Google.
> 
> Ginger (Virginia) Paque
> Diplo Foundation
> www.diplomacy.edu/ig
> VirginiaP at diplomacy.edu
> 
> Join the Diplo community IG discussions: www.diplointernetgovernance.org
> 
> 
> ____________________________________________________________
> 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
> 

____________________________________________________________
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