[governance] Managing the Internet in the Public Interest

Anriette Esterhuysen anriette at apc.org
Thu Feb 26 12:33:05 EST 2015 

Dear all

As one of the co-chairs of the drafting group who drafted the NETmundial
principles I know exactly how the "public interest" and "global
reesource" text got there.

Good that you submitted it Michael - I don't recall seeing your
particular submission but it was actually in other submissions as well.
There were many - beforehand and during the event itself. We also
battled text choices out on site in the drafting group which had
representatives of all stakeholder groups on it. The secretariat - and
they deserve a lot of credit - tried their best to respect submissions.

Those of us in drafting group made sure that the public interest text
was in the opening of the statement. There are also other bits of good
text which is there because of the efforts of civil society people
present - and because there were good submissions from civil society -
including from IGC.

Parminder is correct that the text 'global resource' was compromise text.

Some people, including APC, wanted global public good (it is in our
NETmundial submission - I quote: "APC has participated actively in
[snip] driven by the conviction that the internet is a global public
good and a vital enabler of social justice, development, peace,
environmental sustainability, gender equality and human rights."
http://content.netmundial.br/contribution/association-for-progressive-communications-apc-contributions-to-the-netmundial-global-multistakeholder-meeting-on-the-future-of-internet-governance/274

In that context though global public good was not text that anyone else
fought for, and after some options we opted for global resource
particularly as President Roussef and Neelie Kroes had used that that term.

Also, there was a trade off as there often is in such drafting
processes, and I felt that 'managed in the public interest' was significant.

Yes, it is vague, but it is important. As a principle it means it has to
be discussed and decisions and decision-makers have to demonstrate how
they are serving the public good.

As Norbert very importantly and correctly points out, one can absolutely
not assume that all regulation and governance that is 'public' is in the
public interest.


APC has never stopped wanting the internet to be approached, understood
and governed as a global public good. We still use this language - as we
did last year in our NETmundial submission and in various other documents.

What we have had to acknowledge is that for many people (including
socialist economists) the concept of global public good does not apply
to the internet for fairly technical reasons used by economists when
defining public goods.

Our current 2013-16 strategy has exploring how the internet can be
understood as public good-like entity as a priority. You might remember
that about 5 years ago we asked IT for Change to write an issue paper on
the internet as a global public good but you were too busy at the time.
We have definitely not abandoned this concept. But we want to find ways
of approaching it and explaining it that make sense to lawyers
economists, activists, governments and users.

I personally believe very strongly that because the internet is a global
public good its governance cannot just be left to governments - but that
is a different discussion. That is why we explored the Aarhus Convention
because we felt that mechanisms used for transparent public interest
governance of natural resources can provide useful models for internet
governance.

There is good text in the WSIS documents and many of us have drawn on
that good text. There is also some not so good text. This is true for
the NETmundial statement as well.

We should never retreat from good text. But we should also get some good
principles and agreements adopted formally as principles for internet
governance so that we can hold governments AND other actors accountable
for applying them.

Anriette




On 26/02/2015 14:04, parminder wrote:
> 
> On Thursday 26 February 2015 03:02 PM, Anriette Esterhuysen wrote:
>> Michael, many in CS have worked very hard for recognition that the
>> internet should be governed in the public interest. For many years.
>>
>> Getting that text into the NETmundial statement took work, but we got it
>> there and that is why I think it is short-sighted to dismiss that text.
> 
> Anriette, in my humble view this text about 'Internet being a global
> resource that has to be managed in public interest' got in there because
> people were haggling over terms like Internet as a pulbic good, or a
> commons (which were indeed the politically meaningful terms) , which was
> obviously resisted by the usual suspects, and moving the words like
> resource and public around, the involved people reached this somewhat
> meaningless phrase. I may be wrong, in which case I am open to be
> corrected.
> 
> In fact 'governing something in public interest' is a bit of oxymoron,
> because once a subject is recognised for public governance, as Internet
> was by WSIS, it is but obvious that it will be governed in public
> interest (what else ?).
> 
> Further, I am not aware of, as you say, the long struggles either of
> general civil society or APC for a recognition that the Internet should
> be governed in public interest - simply because it is kind of obvious .
> Yes, APC was at one time very active to push the Internet as public good
> agenda, although I have not heard of it in the last many years. We
> should not confuse 'public good' and 'governance in public interest' ,
> not that I am saying that you are confusing the two - just clarifying.
>>
>> It is a very important baseline from which we should never retreat and
>> on which we can build.
> For the above reason, I do not think of it at all as an important
> baseline. Much much more progressive language is written in WSIS docs,
> starting with Geneva Declaration of Principles. especially rights based
> language, and issues like access to knowledge... These concrete
> principles was much more meaningful rather than just professing a vague
> 'public interest'.
> 
> But of course just my view...
> 
> parminder
> 
>>
>> http://netmundial.br/netmundial-multistakeholder-statement/
>>
>> "NETmundial identified a set of common principles and important values
>> that contribute for an inclusive, multistakeholder, effective,
>> legitimate, and evolving Internet governance framework and recognized
>> that the Internet is a global resource which should be managed in the
>> public interest."
>>
>> Anriette
>>
>>
>>
>> On 26/02/2015 04:12, Michael Gurstein wrote:
>>> Contrary to the position of so much of CS in IG, Mr. Obama appears to
>>> be set on developing a regulatory framework for the US that ensures
>>> that the Internet will operate in the public interest.
>>>
>>>  
>>>  
>>> <http://www.nytimes.com/2015/02/25/technology/path-clears-for-net-neutrality-ahead-of-fcc-vote.html>
>>> http://www.nytimes.com/2015/02/25/technology/path-clears-for-net-neutrality-ahead-of-fcc-vote.html
>>>
>>>
>>>  
>>> M
>>>
>>>  
>>>
>>>
>>>
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>>
>>
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