[governance] U.N. takeover of the Internet must be stopped, U.S. warns

[parminder]

Avri

Thanks for taking this dialogue forward.

Proactive work on means and models to internationalise CIR oversight, 
meaning ridding it from US control, is the same battle as not letting 
the ITU impose a new top-down, closed hierarchical CIR/ technical 
management architecture. These are not too different battles. If more 
and more developing countries are to be stopped from going for the ITU 
model (to put it roughly) they need to provided alternatives to the the 
unacceptable features of the present model. And we, civil society, need 
to do it. We cant just rue that no alternative has been presented. /We/ 
need to present it. And then write about (and fully publicise) our 
non-acceptance of US control model, and our proposed new model, to the 
US government and others, and take up active advocacy on it. In the same 
way as we so much like to often write to ITU, UN SG, CSTD chair etc. 
Apart from showing the right way forward, it will give the right image 
of neutrality and representing global public interest to civil society 
involved with IG, and also specifically to the IGC.

Going to the specifics; it is not true that no open and participative 
models outside the UN have been presented. Carlos Afonso presented a 
detailed model during WGIG ( found in the chapter written by him in the 
book 'Reforming Internet Governance' 
www.wgig.org/docs/book/WGIG_book.pdf ). I understand that this model had 
some kind of support from the Brazilian government. Why did we not 
pursue it, even if with modifications?

Carlos suggested a specific multistakeholder oversight mechanism. I have 
also been suggesting the outlines of a oversight mechanism which goes 
beyond typical inter-gov model. Why dont we consider such alternatives?

There are a few issues, as follows, that I have with people who have 
just expressed a general wish for multistakeholder without getting into 
specifics. We need to get into specifics. I am sure we can resolve these 
issues with discussion and clarifications.

1) It is easy to say things should be multistakeholder. The real problem 
comes when one has to recommend the specific way multistakeholder reps 
will be chosen. ITfC has always focussed on this as the key issue, 
becuase in such specifics alone one can know what one really means by 
such a new governance system. We made clear recommendations on how 
stakeholder reps should be chosen in our submission to WG on IGF 
improvements, which recs were also picked up by India's IGF reform 
proposal. We have long advocated the .Br model in this regard, and 
intend to hold a workshop on it at Baku. Somewhat surprisingly, all the 
most enthusiastic advocates of MS-ism on this list have always shied 
away from talking about such specifics. There can be no multistakeholder 
(MS) governance model if its votaries are not ready to talk about the 
specifics.

2) A connected point is, the role and influence of big business on 
Internet politics. For groups like ours, this is an extremely important 
issue, but when we see MS-ists pass it by lightly, we are indeed very 
concerned. Any MS governance model must make incorporate enough 
safeguards that its one and only objective is to increase public 
representativity, and not further increase the economic, social and 
political might of global big business. We must agree on this point and 
on due processes that will take care of this concern.

We need to come up with specific proposals that address these issues, 
and then advocate them seriously. When developing countries see us going 
even ahead of them in seeking due corrections in the global IG system, 
in a manner that is really effective, i e  by providing real alternative 
models, then they will know we are really neutral, and seek to serve the 
global public interest. Such a proactive stance then also helps us 
negotiate and get advantages and benefits in other areas, like, to start 
with, restraining ITU from gaining any undue role in global IG (while 
supporting the roles that are legitimate for ITU).

parminder

On Friday 01 June 2012 06:17 PM, Avri Doria wrote:
> Hi,
>
> I think Parminder makes good points on why ICANN must become independent of the US government.
>
> I personally beleive, and have believed for a long time, that it should have a host country agreement with an appropriate host country.
>
>    
>>> The simple truth is, many people here trust the US government more than they do the UN. I dont, and the overwhelming majority in the South doesnt. (Most people in the North may also not.)
>>>        
> Just to be clear I don't trust either.
> I am all in favor of the US efforts to stop anything that even hints at a UN takeover of any element of control, be it over IPv4/6, TLDs, ASNs or IETF numbers.
> But I also stand against continued US control over these things.
>
> I still maintain the point I made in WGIG with various others, we do not need any form of national or international governmental oversight for ICANN.  What we need is well established multistakeholder oversight (I think there were even several proposals at the time of WSIS and since as to how this could be established).
>
> The main operational problem with making a transition to a structure other than a US corporate structure is how maintain its contractual agreements until new form of regulatory control over Registries and Registrars can be established.  Currently those serving the GTLD market are 'regulated' via contract and these are specifically California based contracts.  One of the advantages of moving to a form of regulation that is not California contract based is that it will allow for regulation to be extended over the ccTLDs who rightly bristle at the notion of being regulated by a US corporation and thus are free to do whatever they please.  Unfortunately , however, I don't think anyone yet has made a coherent proposal for how that transition, from regulation via contract to international multistakeholder regulation could be made.
>
> avri
>
>
> On 1 Jun 2012, at 08:11, parminder wrote:
>
>    
>> On Friday 01 June 2012 04:47 PM, parminder wrote:
>>      
>>> Hi Wolfgang,
>>>
>>> The first argument against continued US oversight of the ICANN is political-democratic. I will respond to your specific points in another email.
>>>        
>> Now turning to some specific points.
>> You ask, what is our main problem with US oversight of ICANN. Well, the biggest one is, ICANN is a US nonprofit, subject to all laws of the US, big and small. In fact even if it wanted to, the executive branch of the government may not be able to protect ICANN from being made subject to all these US laws. Do you, or do you not, agree with this proposition? And as the Internet becomes the platform and infrastructure of such a big part of our global social, economic, cultural and political systems and structures, this situation is both completely untenable and unacceptable.
>> Anybody believing in democracy would not want to be subject to the laws in making of which s/he does not participate. At any time ICANN can be made to act as per US laws and US interest. You would have heard of the Internet Kill Switch legislation which at present seems to be shelved. It would have given US President executive control – if one is to believe that he does not have it already - over all critical infrastructure of the Internet. One has no reason to believe that this excluded the ICANN and the authoritative root zone server. Well, before you start arguing that these security related sovereign fears are misplaced, you may want to explain that why, in that case, does US want to control the position of the chief security officer of the ICANN (or of the IANA contractee)? On what basis do you advocate that other countries simply ignore all such deeply serious matters and concerns? Can you guarantee that the next Afghanistan or Iraq invasion will not happen along with tampering of the concerned country domain spaces? Since, the US seems to be the only country that launches such unilateral aggressions, it is in fact the one country least qualified – and not the most qualified, as you seem to argue - to sit over the control of the Internet's root.
>> Since you seem to be comfortable with the status quo, at the same time as you ignore the above issues, you exaggerate the problems with the alternatives. First of all, you have not engaged with a, non-typical-UN, international body's oversight possibility that I proposed, with regional representation, rotated among countries,and with the member being chosen through a broader process within the country though having some alignment with the concerned government as well. Also, as proposed by me, this new body will have only very limited functions, all of them clearly defined by due internationally legal process (unlike it is with the US at present). It would not require consensus to approve every root server entry, but perhaps a majority or some such arrangement. I can easily see the system working, at least as well as the present one.
>> Even the CIRP did not set out the precise manner in which oversight functions may be exercised, because it was a general conversation-starter proposal. In any case, nowhere it is proposed that every root server entry will require consensus. You are just making it up to argue your case. I am sure if the Indian government was to get into the specifics, it is mature and pragmatic enough to ensure a system that works. And it is my feeling that they will also consider an outside-the-UN oversight system of the kind I have proposed. Therefore your main argument against internationalizing oversight of CIRs just does not hold.
>> About the AoC, you know that US can rescind it any moment. In any case, why not enter a similar AoC with the UN? Will you agree? If not, can you please tell me the reason?
>> The simple truth is, many people here trust the US government more than they do the UN. I dont, and the overwhelming majority in the South doesnt. (Most people in the North may also not.)
>> Parminder
>> PS: BTW, as I have said before, without intending to offend anyone, I again beg to state that I personally do not think ICANN does very important work, at any rate not the most important work in global IG. My interest is rather more on the social, economic, cultural policies side.
>>
>>
>>      
>>> In order to seek democracy, one need not have to give instances of what a dictator did wrong, which could be better in a democracy. Inversely, it also hardly works to quote examples, in defense of dictatorship, of how a dictator did not do something which he could well have for his private gain or the gain of his cohorts. Every dictator knows how to defend at least the illusion of legitimacy for his rule! (This explains the US gov's action vis a vis .xxx, that you hold out as such a shining example of US in the role of what you call as the 'neutral steward(ship) of the Internet community".
>>> And the logic you use about how a body with more democratic representation can cause confusion, stalemates and other such problems can as easily be used against bringing in a democratic parliament instead of a dictator. A few hundred politicians, all with individual agendas, coming from very different backgrounds (often from warring groups and tribes in a new democracy), with little training in the high art of state-ship.... Well, this seems to presents a worse picture even than the one you present for the UN, isnt it! But still people, very knowledgeable people, give their lives to seek just this kind of democracy.
>>> In fact, sometimes, only sometimes, the immediate results may actually look worse than the condition before – See, Egypt for instance, there is acute lawlessness on the streets of Cairo, there is fear of persecution of minorities, women are afraid of Shariat law being imposed etc. Wise and knowledgeable people could have predicted this general picture even before Tahrir square happened. But they went ahead with the revolution. As famously said, the remedy for the ills of democracy is more democracy. If we perceive certain kinds of problems in democraticising the oversight of the Internet, we can think of different alternative democratic institutional systems, and also the struggle of improving systems would always be ongoing.But please dont preach continued lordship of one country over all.
>>> parminder
>>>
>>>
>>> On Friday 01 June 2012 02:09 PM, "Kleinwächter, Wolfgang" wrote:
>>>        
>>>> Hi Marilia,
>>>>
>>>> I fully support the spirit of your mail. Good and reasonable points. I wrote an article "Beyond ITU vs. ICANN" ten years ago and, as you have outlined, unfortunately the "good guys vs. bad guys" mechanism continues (very often without any justifiable reason or just for a domestic purpose (in the US) to be treated by an un-informed broader public as the "saver of the freedom of the Internet" in an election year). So far so god (or bad).
>>>>
>>>> But let me take your points one step further and comment on one concrete point:
>>>>
>>>> You say: "a) there is no way to justify US privilege position with ICANN. That needs to be changed;"
>>>>
>>>> I agree in principle but I would like to find out what in your opinion are the privileges your are talking about. IMHO the AoC has ended a lot of the "privileges" which were the subject of criticism in Tunis. The remaining "privileges" of the USG are
>>>> a. the right to authorize the publication of TLD zone files in the root (related to the IANA function which includes, inter alia, a trilateral contractual arrangement with ICANN and VeriSign, the manager of the Hidden Root Server) and
>>>> b. to have a permanent seat in the A&T Review team.
>>>>
>>>> Interestingly, the controversial .xxx case had a rather unnoticed sideeffect. It demonstrated that the USG executes its "authorization function" as a neutral stewart of the Internet community. As you remember, the USG - following pressure from the US Congress and parts of the US public opinion - was rather critical against .xxx. The EU Commissioner Nelly Kroes wrote a letter to Strickling just after the San Francisco ICANN meeting (where the ICANN Board voted in favour of .xxx) and encouraged him to postpone or stop the authorization of the publication of the .xxx zone file in the root. But NTIA, which is the responsible unit within the USG/DOC, followed just the ICANN/IANA procedure and respected the outcome of the (controversial) transparent and bottom up process executed by ICANN.
>>>>
>>>> What would be your proposal to change this procedure? Do you propose an alternative mechanism for the authorization of TLD zone files in the root? With the new gTLD programm we will have probably hundreds of controversial cases soon.  Ideas to transfer this function to an intergovernmental body (a UN like Internet Security Council as discussed by WGIG in 2005 or a G 12, as proposed by EU Commissioner Reding in 2010) proofed to be bad ideas. To give the proposed CIRP an authority to approve finally TLD strings (as it was indirectly intended in the Indian proposal which wanted to give oversight functions over ICANN to the CIRP, which would include certainly also the authorization issue) is obviously also a bad idea.
>>>>
>>>> To give the GAC - where all governments have an equal role - an "early warning" and "advice" option under the established new gTLD program seems to me reasonable. Do you believe this is not sufficient and another body should be established to make the final decision? What would happen if all the 2000 new gTLD proposals - after they are adopted by ICANN - would need an authorization decision backed by a consensus among the members of an intergovernmental council of 12, 51 or 190 UN member states? With other words, do you have any concrete idea how the existing (and working) mechanism for the authorization of TLD zone files in the root can be further improved (enhanced) respecting also the interests of developing countries and civil society in a better way without damaging the future development of the Internet?
>>>>
>>>> The second point: The permanent seat for the USG in one of the four AoC review teams. What is your proposal here? I agree fully, that the review sofar did not produce the expected results. The (mutlistakeholder and decentralized) review mechanism as such is an interesting innovation and has great potential to be developed into an oversight mechanisms with "hard teeth". The first round was done in a rush. Both the governmental representatives from China and the EU were not satisfied with the procedures. The outcome was rather weak and very general. Implementation of even this weak recommendations takes time. However lets wait what the other reviews teams will produce. We will have more knowledge if the four reviews are completed.
>>>>
>>>> A second round has to go far beyond. In my eyes, the "transparency and accountability" review is central and one should start already now to prepare for the second round which starts 2013/2014. The good thing is, that civil society (via the ALAC) has also a permanent seat in this review! Any concrete proposals how to improve this mechaism?
>>>>
>>>> Wolfgang
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>          
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