[governance] Internet as a commons/ public good; was, Conflicts in Internet Governance

Carlos A. Afonso ca at cafonso.ca
Mon Apr 15 07:43:14 EDT 2013 

Not sure about the "...Accordingly..." in the statement.

--c.a.

On 04/15/2013 01:51 AM, parminder wrote:
>
>
> Anriette/ All
>
> I find this posting, and later ones in the thread very interesting.
> Indeed a good amount of confusion in this group's internal interactions
> owe to the fact that while we have some broad process rules, we have
> very little in terms of substance that we can take as a starting point
> for our political/ advocacy work. Recognising the Internet as a commons/
> public good, and seeking that its basic governance principles flow from
> such a basic understanding of the Internet, is good and useful basic
> agreement to try to reach for this group,
>
> I propose that the caucus adopts this as a/ the basic principle for
> IGC's political/ advocacy work.
>
> I propose that we even go beyond and adopt a working definition of the
> Internet, absence of which itself has been identified as a major problem
> that renders many of our discussions/ positions here unclear. Avri
> proposes the following definition, which I find very encouraging....
>
>     "Internet as an emergent, and emerging, reality consisting of
>     hardware, protocols and software, and human intentionality brought
>     together by a common set of design principles and constrained by
>     policies fashioned by the stakeholders."
>
>
> I propose small modifications to it
>
>     "Internet as an emergent, and emerging, reality consisting of
>     hardware, protocols and software, human intentionality, and a new
>     kind of social spatiality, brought together by a common set of
>     design principles and constrained by policies fashioned by due
>     democratic processes."
>
>
> So what I propose for this caucus to adopt is as follows
>
>     "We recognise the Internet as an emergent, and emerging, reality
>     consisting of hardware, protocols and software, human
>     intentionality, and a new kind of social spatiality, brought
>     together by a common set of design principles and constrained by
>     policies fashioned by due democratic processes. Accordingly, the
>     Internet is to be considered as a global commons and a global public
>     good. The design principles and policies that constitute the
>     governance of the Internet should must flow from such recognition of
>     the Internet as a commons and a public good."
>
> The text can of course be improved a lot, but I thought it is good to
> put forward something that the caucus can work upon...
>
> parminder
>
>
>
> On Sunday 14 April 2013 10:28 PM, Anriette Esterhuysen wrote:
>> The question is, what is needed to protect and strengthen the internet
>> commons?
>> As Avri points out, governments have assisted the theft of the commons.
>> I would say that the form that this assistance takes ranges from lack of
>> the basic regulation that is needed to protect it to active protection
>> of certain vested interests. That is why the notion of an 'unregulated'
>> internet is so problematic and why the notion of an open and unregulated
>> internet can so easily be a contradiction in terms.
>>
>> There needs to be some basic rules that makes sure that the internet
>> remains 'open and free' in a broad sense.
>>
>> The risks, or the challenges related to this is that many governments
>> approach regulation of the internet not from the perspective of
>> protecting it as a commons, but from the perspective of enabling them to
>> exercise more control over internet content and use, and user behaviour.
>>
>> I remain convinced that one of the difficulties in internet governance
>> is that there is a conceptual/principle deficit of some kind. Not so
>> much statement of principles that affirm freedom of expression,
>> 'net-neutrality', etc.. Those are good....
>>
>> I think they real deficit is in how the internet is defined, or what
>> kind of entity we understand it to be.
>>
>> When the management and supply of water is being regulated there are
>> also lots of contestation. For example between mines, communities who
>> live in the catchment area, communities who live downstream subject to
>> seasonal flooding, cities and commercial farms who need dams, and nature
>> conservation and reservers, where traditional seasonal flooding is often
>> essential to the survival of many species.
>>
>> Policy would generally try to understand and balance all these interests
>> and will be premised on a common understanding that water is a common
>> resource. The public interest principles will be fairly easily
>> understood by most that are involved water policy and regulation. But
>> there will be lots of argument about how it is managed, and used and
>> often the wrong decisions will be made.
>>
>> I just had a glance at the CGI.br principles and the IRP 10 principles
>> and neither statement contains anything that suggests what the internet
>> - from the perspective of it being a 'commons' or a public good - is. I
>> know I have been dwelling on this ONE KEY 'principle' deficit for a
>> while... but I just can't give thinking it is at the root of the
>> difficulties we have in addressing the conflicts of interest in internet
>> governance.
>>
>> Anriette
>>
>>
>>
>> On 14/04/2013 02:50, Avri Doria wrote:
>>> All of the Internet, like the land world before it, was once commons.
>>> Then, as before, the rich, the powerful and greedy, with the
>>> assistance of the governments they bought, and continue to buy, began
>>> to misappropriate those commons and called it property.  Each day
>>> more of that commons its stolen. Each day more of the linguistic
>>> commons is stolen and called intellectual property. The Internet
>>> commons is almost gone. This its what government do best - with some
>>> very few exceptions - assist in the theft of the commons.
>>>
>>> I have no problem with those who create art or new Internet spaces
>>> enjoying the fruits of their creativity and inventiveness. A
>>> neologism may be owned. A new Internet space may be owned. But the
>>> language itself or the Internet should not be.
>>>
>>> Diego Rafael Canabarro <diegocanabarro at gmail.com> wrote:
>>>
>>>> At the International Studies Association Annual Convention last week in
>>>> San
>>>> Francisco, an official from the US Department of State said: "there's
>>>> no
>>>> commons on cyberspace". That perception is closely related to the
>>>> conflict
>>>> presented by Mr. Perry bellow in this thread. I'm still struggling with
>>>> that assertion.
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> On Fri, Apr 12, 2013 at 12:20 PM, Norbert Bollow <nb at bollow.ch> wrote:
>>>>
>>>>> Roland Perry <roland at internetpolicyagency.com> wrote:
>>>>>
>>>>>> One of the most significant I'm aware of (and I hope this is within
>>>>>> the remit of your question):
>>>>> It definitely is, and it's a conflict that I have not been
>>>> sufficiently
>>>>> conscious of, so thank you very much for pointing this out!
>>>>>
>>>>> Greetings,
>>>>> Norbert
>>>>>
>>>>>> The private sector has built extensive
>>>>>> networks [fixed and mobile] using $billons of investment on which
>>>>>> their shareholders [many of whom are the consumers' pension funds]
>>>>>> expect a return, versus many customers who feel entitled to have
>>>>>> unlimited usage for a relatively trivial monthly payment (which
>>>> they
>>>>>> sometimes dress up as "Network Neutrality").
>>>>>>
>>>>>> I post this not to support either of the above points of view, but
>>>>>> merely to inform readers of the conflict it unquestionably
>>>> represents.
>>>>>
>>>>> ____________________________________________________________
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>>>>>
>>>> --
>>>> Diego R. Canabarro
>>>> http://lattes.cnpq.br/4980585945314597
>>>>
>>>> --
>>>> diego.canabarro [at] ufrgs.br
>>>> diego [at] pubpol.umass.edu
>>>> MSN: diegocanabarro [at] gmail.com
>>>> Skype: diegocanabarro
>>>> Cell # +55-51-9244-3425 (Brasil) / +1-413-362-0133 (USA)
>>>> --
>>> Avri Doria
>
>

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