[governance] China's next-generation internet is a world-beater - tech - 10 March 2013 - New Scientist

[parminder]

On Wednesday 13 March 2013 02:56 PM, William Drake wrote:
> Hi Parminder
>
> On Mar 13, 2013, at 6:19 AM, parminder <parminder at itforchange.net 
> <mailto:parminder at itforchange.net>> wrote:
>
>> It is rather well known that multilateral agreements have a greater 
>> chance of being based on higher norms and principles than are 
>> bilateral and plurilateral ones, which are more oriented to narrower 
>> interests (pl refer to the literature on FTAs).  Also, almost always, 
>> bilateral and plurilateral agreements based on 'relative power' 
>> results in greater gains for those who are more powerful, something 
>> which follows from the preceding statement.
>
> Among whom is this known, and do they in fact attribute it to narrow 
> interests being less dispositive in multilateral contexts?  I'm not 
> arguing with you, just curious why you say this.  As a political 
> scientist who's reasonably well read in the vast scholarly and policy 
> literatures on international institutions and cooperation, I can't say 
> I've noticed a lot of people taking this stance or offering evidence 
> thereof, so I'm curious.  A few contrary thoughts for your consideration:

Bill.

First of all it should be made clear that I speak from a Southern point 
of view, and so when you ask among whom it is well know my response is, 
among Southern actors - from civil society and government - who engage 
with global governance issues. The bilateral and plurilateral agreements 
that I problematize are the ones of the typical pick and choose variety 
taken up by counties like the US, and also such established plurilateral 
processes like the OECD that intend to engage in 'global' rule making. 
(There are indeed genuine cultural links based grouping like Council of 
Europe that has done considerable normative work.)

Isnt almost all higher level normative work done at UN/ multilateral 
level. Show me where a bilateral process has produced useful norms and 
principles. OF course, later are focussed on narrow interest based 
outcomes. Yes, narrow interests are brought into play as much in UN/ 
multilateral systems as well, but the sheer number and variety of 
actors, as well as, very importantly, established principles of process, 
equity etc, makes for movement towards higher norms based outcomes. It 
is also a basic democratic principle; more people/ actors are involved 
in decision making more the decisions serve all actors equally. 
Bilaterals between a powerful country like the US and a developing 
country has strong elements of take it or leave it, and the competitive 
fear among the weaker partners of what if other similarly placed 
countries enter into similar agreements with the US. Rich country 
plurilaterals are of course based on commonness of interests of richer 
economies with certain structural characteristics, and their outputs can 
hardly ever benefit non-participant developing countries in an equitable 
manner.


>
> To the extent multilateral agreements do  have a greater chance of 
> being based on higher norms and principles, that is often because 
> those higher norms and principles are more squishy and easier to 
> arrive at given more complexly divided interests.

Dont know whether you consider human rights instruments as just squishy, 
but I think they have been and continue to be very useful.
>  The TA offers a good case in point.  Had that been a plurilateral, we 
> might even know what enhanced cooperation means :-)

Similarly, WSIS outcome documents contain so many normative references 
(see the declaration of principles for instance) that continue to be 
useful for progressive causes. You seem to be too dismissive about such 
stuff.

> More higher norms and principles is not necessarily a good outcome, it 
> depends.

They are always a good outcomes. However *only* norms and principles 
without work towards their translation into concrete outcomes is not good.

Anyway, in times of such stalemates like the present one in global IG, 
there seems to be a great degree of consensus, articulated at IGFs, 
mentioned by EU group that met CS reps at Baku, and so on, for 
developing principles on which IG could be based..... So, at least if we 
focus on the current context higher norms and principles are certainly 
not only good outcomes, but very much needed outcomes.


>
> Narrower interests and relative power by no means disappear in large-n 
> collaborations.  Most multilateral deals are in fact clusters of 
> bilateral and plurilateral deals among the most powerful and/or 
> motivated by sharply defined interests.  Outsiders then get pushed to 
> conform with what these inner circle types have worked out.  The 
> problem in trade has been that the identities and mixed interest of 
> the inner circles have diversified, and the outsiders have found fewer 
> reasons to budge.

agree
>
> Small-N collaborations may devote less time to higher norms and 
> principles because they are "nested" agreements.

I am speaking of such ones that are not nested agreements, but are 
attempts to bypass normally accepted norms and principles at global 
level, like TPP and SOPA trying to get away from such higher norms 
through small group and closed door agreements.

>  For example, FTAs at least nominally have to be compatible with the 
> WTO instruments (some disagreement about the consistency of practice) 
> and so the higher norms and principles spelled out in the latter are 
> absent presences in the former.  It's like reading a piece of 
> legislation that modifies another piece of legislation that is not 
> fully incorporated into the text, you have read the docs back and 
> forth to get the full picture.

Yes, but they can  go beyond WTO instruments as long as they do not 
violate thmn, which in a way itself can be considered  a negation of a 
higher order normative agreement reached in negotiating WTO instruments.
>
>>
>> Accordingly, while specifics can vary with contexts, global civil 
>> society has to make its considered value based choice whether it 
>> prefers multilateral agreements or bilateral/ plurilateral ones when 
>> the issue is clearly of a global import, like Internet governance is, 
>> perhaps like no other issue. In all other areas of global governance, 
>> I see a distinct preference in civil society for global agreements in 
>> preference to bi/pluri-lateral ones, on issues ranging from trade and 
>> IP to climate. 
>
> I know where you're coming from, but I don't think this necessarily 
> follows, or that it's entirely fair to characterize it as a values 
> choice (which I guess would mean those focusing on non-multilateral 
> are making inferior choices, from a values perspective?).

This kind of extreme characterisation can always be used to make the 
opposite argument look bad. I am asking just that the same actors should 
note resist multilateralism who  merrily go about doing plurilateralism 
exactly on the same issues (not to speak of US unilateralism). This is a 
values issue and an inferior choice from that standpoint.


>  In many case, national and small-n frameworks may have greater on the 
> ground impact on the people and values CS is trying to defend, so 
> as much as I wish they'd engage more in the multilateral stuff (since 
> that's where I live) I'm not prepared to say that they're committing 
> a grievous moral or strategic error.

Well, they are committing a grievous democratic error, nay mischief, if 
(and ony if) 'they' resist mutlilateralism - and I repeat the above 
phrase - while merrily doing plurilateralism exactly on the same issues 
(not to speak of US unilateralism).

regards

parminder

>
> Best,
>
> Bill

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