[governance] US House Bill to Affirm the Policy of the United States Regarding Internet Governance

[Riaz K Tayob]

Parminder et al, subject to correction and disclaimers for over 
simplification etc...

Thesi*s: The Bill is good for IG.*

(I am NOT the best person to make the case!!)

It establishes a policy in legislation ensuring MS.

It includes preservation as well as advancement - it incorporates the 
possibility of future change.

Political economy:

Enshrines MS for internet. Increases democracy.

Civil society:

For or tepid toward the bill

*Thesis: The bill is not good for IG.*

Imprecision:
- reference to which ms models
- which ones are successful (as opposed to unsuccessful - implying 
selection)
- what is MS?

Political Economy:
Changes developing countries are interested will be limited by US 
legislation - "negotiation" with Congress?
Limits change to to intrasystemic fora.

To Civil Society
If qualitative change is sufficient in this form, would alternate but 
similarly competent (with MS) arrangements not be suitable.

Riaz

On 2013/04/18 09:01 AM, parminder wrote:
>
> On Thursday 18 April 2013 12:24 AM, michael gurstein wrote:
>>
>> Okay but can anyone point to an authoritative definition/description 
>> of what exactly is meant by "the successful multistakeholder model 
>> that governs the Internet" i.e. what exactly was the US Congress 
>> voting unanimously to "preserve and advance".
>>
>
> for instance, whether NTIA's exclusive exercising of the root zone 
> authorisation function is to be considered as a part of the 
> 'successful multistakeholder (MS) model' or not... And if it is indeed 
> MS, then if /exactly/ the same function is tranferred to a 
> multinational committee (without changing anything else about ICANN 
> plus system at all) why would that not still continue to be called as 
> a MS system, and not a movement from MSism to government control?
>
> And whether OECD's inter governmental Council and its 
> inter-governmental Committee on Information, Communication and 
> Computer Policy doing considerable (global) Internet policy work, in 
> consultation with other stakeholders, but only giving them an advisory 
> capacity, should be considered as an aspect of the 'successful MS 
> model or not. If so, whether a similar UN based inter-gov committee 
> with similar (or better) advisory status based relationships with 
> other stakeholders will continue to be called as a MS system, or would 
> that somehow, magically, become classified as a move towards 
> government control?
>
> The above two are the simple and straight forward demands of most 
> developing countries (leave out a few authoritarian  ones whose demand 
> we dont have to consider/ concede) . Both these demands /do not at all 
> change the degree of MSism in the present global IG architecture /(I 
> am happy to be challenged on this) . However, evidently this new US 
> law is basically aimed at resisting these democratic demands of 
> developing countries, and the sad part is that most of the global 
> civil society seems to be ready to get hoodwinked by such obviously 
> less than honest professions of MSism and fight against governemnt 
> control over the Internet. It is just a fight for preserving US 
> control (gov plus business) over the global Internet - that is all 
> what it is. And CS should resist it, seeking greater democratisation..
>
> parminder
>
>
>> M
>>
>> *From:*governance-request at lists.igcaucus.org 
>> [mailto:governance-request at lists.igcaucus.org] *On Behalf Of *John Curran
>> *Sent:* Wednesday, April 17, 2013 8:44 AM
>> *To:* governance at lists.igcaucus.org
>> *Subject:* Re: [governance] US House Bill to Affirm the Policy of the 
>> United States Regarding Internet Governance
>>
>> On Apr 12, 2013, at 8:56 PM, Jeremy Malcolm <jeremy at ciroap.org 
>> <mailto:jeremy at ciroap.org>> wrote:
>>
>>         http://energycommerce.house.gov/markup/markup-bill-affirm-policy-united-states-regarding-internet-governance
>>
>>         ...
>>
>>         "It is the policy of the United States to promote a global
>>         Internet free from government control and to preserve and
>>         advance the successful multistakeholder model that governs
>>         the Internet."
>>
>> This bill was just approved by the House Committee on Energy and 
>> Commerce; it it is now
>>
>> H.R. 1580, a bill to affirm the policy of the United States 
>> regarding Internet governance.
>>
>>  <http://docs.house.gov/meetings/IF/IF00/20130417/100723/BILLS-113pih-InternetFreedom.pdf>
>>
>> The policy text has been changed to only the following:
>>
>>     "It is the policy of the United States to preserve and advance 
>> the successful multistakeholder
>>
>>      model that governs the Internet."
>>
>> Given that it has bipartisan support, it is likely to move fairly 
>> quickly to adoption.  The actual net
>>
>> effect of such a statement becoming official USG policy is subject to 
>> interpretation, but it would
>>
>> definitely make it difficult for the USG to back away from the 
>> "multistakeholder model" at any
>>
>> point in the future.
>>
>> FYI,
>>
>> /John
>>
>> Disclaimers: My views alone.  No congress critters were harmed in the 
>> production of this email.
>>
>

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