[governance] CSTD meeting on enhanced cooperation

[parminder]

Dear All

I made the following statement at the opening panel of the discussion on 
enhanced cooperation at CSTD's substantive session (this is different 
from, and in a way continuation of, the meeting of May 18th)

I have tried to see if the discussion on (1) technical governance side 
and (2) social/ economic policy side of global Internet governance can 
be separated, to the extent possible, as one way to make progress.  I 
have also tried to list the major concerns of various actors in  these 
two areas of global governance. I also suggest that a UN CIRP like body 
should perhaps exclude CIR oversight from its purview. Accordingly, for 
internationalising CIR management a separate arrangement may be considered.

Parminder

*CSTD Session on Enhanced Cooperation *

*on Public Policy Issues Pertaining to the Internet*

/*May 22, Geneva*/


/*Comments at the opening panel by Parminder Jeet Singh, Executive 
Director, IT for Change*/

I must first of all thank the chair for a very balanced report on the 
special meeting on 'enhanced cooperation on public policy issues 
pertaining to the Internet' held on May 18^th . I think that the meeting 
was an important and a positive step forward. We got a lot of good ideas 
which can serve as the basis for moving forward on this very important 
but long neglected mandate from the WSIS.

What I heard from the meeting, and also note from the chair's report, is 
that many governments as well as other stakeholders have deep concerns 
both regarding the fact that there continues to be very substantial gaps 
in global public policy making, and in democratizing its processes, as 
well as the fact that an important and express mandate from the WSIS 
remains completely unaddressed. Others in the room were of the view that 
this may be an exaggerated view. However, at this stage, it is enough 
that many governments and other stakeholders do have deep concerns and 
they must be provided a formal space to express and discuss them.

In this regard, the idea of a CSTD working group was proposed by many 
participants. I think it is a very good proposition. We heard in the 
last session how the CSTD working group on improvements to the IGF 
worked so well, and was able to produce such good results. There is no 
reason why a similar process should not be tried out for resolving the 
issue of 'enhanced cooperation'.

At the same time as we agree to the next step for a formal space for 
dialogue on 'enhanced cooperation', we must also start discussing the 
most contested issues and area which have caused such deep political 
divisions. We should earnestly listen to and address the concerns of 
different parties. At the May 18^th meeting, I heard views that could 
roughly be polarized into camps – those who were more or less satisfied 
with the status quo, and those who wanted a new mechanism to deal with 
public policy issues pertaining to the Internet. The latter view, 
perhaps, has been most concretely captured by India's proposal of a UN 
Committee on Internet-Related Policies (CIRP). I will very briefly try 
to – just in an illustrative way - touch upon what concerns and what 
fears inform these two somewhat opposing positions, and how we could 
perhaps address them, and move forward taking all such concerns and 
fears into account.

/*Need for institutional developments on the technical governance side
*/Before we start discussing the very complex area of global Internet 
governance, it is important to develop some overall sections and 
categories. Global Internet governance can be seen in two relatively 
distinct though related parts – technical governance and, what may be 
called as, larger public policy issues of a social, economic, cultural 
and political nature. These two areas of IG are rather different in the 
nature of the 'problem', the ecology of actors and, thus, the 
appropriate responses to the problem, including, very significantly, in 
the present context, the role of different stakeholders. However, one 
often sees that discussions about IG, especially when done in a 
politically surcharged atmosphere, often gets confused about what part 
of the global Internet governance system (or the absence of it) was 
being spoken about. Concerns coming from one side of this two-way 
division of IG space – technical and non-technical -– are answered by 
views and facts about the other side. India's CIRP proposal also got 
caught in this very unfortunate somewhat misguided cross-fire. While 
CIRP is mostly about larger public policy issues – the kind of work done 
by OECD's Committee for Information, Computer and Communication Policies 
(ICCP) – almost all the responses to it came from the side of, and 
concerning, Internet's technical governance. More about it later.

Technical governance – or perhaps, 'technical management' is a better 
term here – of the Internet can be said to include the management of 
Internet's name and number resources, and the processes of development 
of technical standards, the kind of work which, respectively, ICANN and 
IETF does. Internet's technical governance is uniquely a very 
distributed system, which is relatively open and transparent, and also 
includes innovative bottom up processes. Such a distributed technical 
management of the Internet's core systems and standards has helped 
develop the Internet in a kind of creative tension with the nationally 
bound, hierarchical social order of the industrial age. This creative 
tension has an important role in the kind of social, economic, cultural 
and political impact that the Internet makes, the details of which I 
will not be able to go here. As one could would judge, I strongly 
support retention and strengthening of the current distributed model of 
technical governance in its general and essential characteristics. 
Although one must add here, that, it needs considerable improvements, 
which can be done in an evolutionary manner. It has not adapted itself 
enough with the Internet related developments of the past decade, and is 
often very prone to capture by big business. I also do not see 
opposition from too many quarters to this distributed system of 
technical governance, as such. In fact, Tunis Agenda too has some 
approving language about how this disturbed system has been managed.

The real problem with technical governance of the Internet relates to 
its unilateral oversight by one government, the US, which is quite 
untenable and unacceptable to almost all non-US governments and many 
other stakeholders. It is this /key problem/ on the technical governance 
side that we must address. In fact, those most interested in 
safeguarding the current distributed architecture of technical 
governance of the Internet must be most pro-active in addressing this 
'oversight issue'. Only by making a satisfactory resolution of the key 
oversight issue can we protect this distributed architecture. Otherwise, 
those unhappy with the status quo – for very valid reasons – will seek 
the solution in a manner that shifts the very architecture of the 
technical governance of the Internet, towards a top-down, cumbersome 
bureaucratic processes based governance, which we know is just not 
suitable for the Internet. This is one of the most important point to 
understand and appreciate by defendants of the distributed model – 
including the technical community.

ICANN just cannot remain a US Non-profit, subject to all kinds of US 
law, small and big, as any US based entity is. ICANN controls too 
important and critical a global infrastructure for such an arrangement 
to be acceptable to the global community. The best intentions of the US 
Department of Commerce, the oversight body for the ICANN, cannot shield 
ICANN from the application of the US law. Till now, it is simply good 
luck, and perhaps some careful management by the executive part of the 
US government, that nothing has happened to expose this very deep 
inconsistency between ICANN's role and its legal structure and 
obligations, but one can be sure that something will happen, perhaps 
sooner that later. It would of little use to be very surprised when such 
a thing happens, and then look for ways around it. ICANN instituted the 
.xxx domain space over the objections of many governments. Here, I am 
not commenting on the merits of that decision or the processes followed 
for it. However, what is interesting is that ICANN has been taken to the 
court (of course, US court) by some US companies on grounds of 
anti-competitive behavior in setting up .xxx domain space. The very fact 
that a US court has accepted this case makes it at least possible that 
the ICANN decision on .xxx will be struck down, in which case ICANN will 
have no option other than to withdraw this domain space. Such a step 
would of course make a mockery of the global governance body status of 
ICANN.

Non US governments have very valid security and other public policy 
concerns vis a vis US oversight of the critical Internet resources 
(CIRs), and these must be addressed. These cannot be taken lightly, or 
dismissed as efforts for taking control of the Internet. US has asserted 
its security concerns vis a vis the root of the Internet, by ensuring 
that ICANN's security staff is selected only with US government's 
permission. In this light, how can the security concerns of other 
governments vis a vis the root of the Internet be misplaced! It is quite 
ironical that when US exercises oversight, it is considered not a 
significant issue at all, but when exactly the same oversight – with 
exactly the same role and powers – is sought to be put under an 
international body, the alarm of governmental control is raised!

At the same, we must also address the concerns of those who are wary of 
internationalising the oversight of CIRs. They are most afraid of a very 
bureaucratic process exercising excessive and undue control over 
technical governance system, which many claim the US has refrained from 
doing till now. It may not be the right arrangement to have 50 or 100 
governments use the typical UN processes to try to do oversight of CIRs. 
In this regard, India's CIRP proposal may therefore need to be re-worked 
by removing the CIR oversight function of the proposed CIRP. Other more 
innovative methods for internationalizing CIR oversight can be found. I 
will not be able to go into the details here, but if we earmark this as 
/the key problem/, and list the various concerns around it, I am sure a 
mutually satisfactory solution can be found.

At the very least, ICANN has to become an international body, subject to 
international law, with a host country agreement (shielding it from 
local laws vis a vis its global role and operation) has to be put into 
place. Next, we need to agree to a very light international oversight 
body, which may consist of such members as best represent global public 
interest, and which has a very minimal, and circumscribed, role with a 
clearly laid of process and procedure for exercising it. The members may 
have to be county-based representatives, with some clear relationship 
with governments, but perhaps coming from technical-academic side, with 
a broader national process of their selection (just an idea!). 
(Membership of some global technical bodies may provide some good leads 
in this regard.)Again, I will leave out the details, and different sets 
of possibilities, but I am very positive that something can be worked 
out in this direction.

/*Mechanism for enhanced cooperation on social and economic policy issues
*/The other side of global governance is what may be called as the 
larger public policy issues concerning social, economic, cultural and 
political matters vis a vis the global Internet. These issues are in 
fact much much more important that those related to technical governance 
of the Internet, but get almost completely neglected in global 
discussions. There are three ways such social policy issues get decided 
today. First is the manner in which global Internet monopoly companies 
like Google and Facebook just decide important policy matters and the 
world gets subject to them. Second, and related, is the way these global 
monopolies incorporate the law and policy preferences of the country 
where they are registered – mostly the US – in their architecture and 
practices and once again the rest of world is the hapless consumer of 
such policies, without taking any part in making them. Thirdly, are the 
various plurilateral initiatives which are very active in making 
Internet policies that have default global application. One of the main 
sites of such policy making is the OECD's Committee on Computer, 
Information and Communication Policy (CCICP) referred to earlier, which 
is OECD's Internet policy making mechanism. Council of Europe (CoE) is 
also very active in this area. OECD recently came up with 'Principles 
for Internet Policy Making', which OECD now wants non OECD countries 
also to accept. One can see no reason why all countries should not be a 
part of developing such principles in the first place. This is a simple 
and straight-forward demand for democratic global governance of the 
Internet, and we are sure everyone will be better off for it. OECD has 
also developed guidelines for Internet intermediaries, and CoE has been 
working on guidelines for search engines and social network sites.


It is somewhat surprising that many stakeholders of the very same 
countries that are involved with OECD's and CoE's cross-border Internet 
policy mechanisms are found raising the question; whether there are at 
all any significant global pubic policy issues pertaining to the 
Internet that needs to be addressed globally, and are not being so 
addressed at present. To anyone asking me this question, I simply re fer 
them to the very busy and full calender of events, and their agenda, of 
these plurilateral Internet policy making bodies. India's proposed UN 
CIRP should principally be doing this kind of policy work, and perhaps 
leave out the CIR oversight function to a different, more innovative, 
international body or mechanism.

The above few points on the possible ways forward are only illustrative 
to show that there are real concerns as well as real fears of different 
stakeholders, and that these can indeed be addressed. Progress on 
shaping new institutions that are adequate to the task and mandate of 
'enhanced cooperation on public policy issues pertaining the Internet' 
may not be as difficult as it may appear at first sight. Internet is now 
a central force shaping the social dynamics, architecture and structures 
of the emerging information society. If we have to ensure and maximize 
the democratic and egalitarian potential of the Internet, we must take 
charge of shaping the architecture and processes of the Internet in 
global public interest. In this regard, I refer to the press release 
issued by the UN Special Rapporteur on Cultural rights, Farida Shaheed, 
and Special Rapporteur on Freedom of Expression, Frank La Rue, which was 
issued in the context of the May 18 meeting on 'enhanced cooperation'. 
It observes that “it is crucial to address who and what shapes the 
Internet today” and goes on to highlight the “urgency to arrive at a 
global consensus on Internet governance and architecture”. That is the 
real task of 'enhanced cooperation'.


Thanks you, Chairman.




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