[governance] The world has changed but we haven't.

[ian.peter at ianpeter.com]

Hi everyone,

My state of health makes travelling on long flights to crowded halls in 
northern hemisphere winters too much of a risk, so my involvement in 
internet governance issues will remain peripheral. But I remain an 
interested observer and do hope that the efforts of those seeking change 
to create a more effective civil society presence do succeed. There is a 
lot to do out there and it would be good to see the way forward for 
effective civil society involvement.

Forgive me for such a wide ranging post as this, but given the 
conversations that have started up here I think it is worthwhile to add 
a wider perspective to the discussions on civil society involvement in 
“internet governance”.

There was a point of time when the Internet Governance Caucus (IGC) was 
a lively and all inclusive forum for civil society people and 
organisations interested in internet governance. That relates back to a 
time when the term was new, as was the internet to many people. In those 
days IGC was capable of working together and coming up with good joint 
statements on issues.

But then there were political splits, and Just Net Coalition (JNC) and 
Best Bits (BB) sprung up to ensure that specific viewpoints were given 
emphasis.

But of late neither BB or JNC has been very active – nor has IGC. (I 
note that the JNC website has no new entries in 2018, nor has its blog, 
and if I am not wrong their public mailing list has also been inactive 
for this period).

So all three appear to be in a state of inertia. It is definitely time 
for something to happen, but what exactly is a bit of a dilemma.

Lets say that we let bygones be bygones and all three groups decided to 
merge again into one? Will that create a useful civil society forum?

Of itself, I don't think so. (3*0=0). What is needed is changes to make 
civil society involvement in these issues more widespread, 
representative and credible. And I think that is going to involve 
greater changes, and also a very strong outreach campaign.

So let me begin by saying the term internet governance is becoming about 
as relevant as television governance. There is nothing generic left to 
do, but there are plenty of emerging issues around the internet where 
civil society needs to present a strong voice.

Apart from digital inclusion, big issues out there include privacy, 
human rights, media domination, cybersecurity, cyberwarfare, digital 
distortion etc: and they come up in separate discussions concerning 
internet of things, artificial intelligence etc as well as in political 
discussions on terrorism, national security and related subjects. Mostly 
these days these issues are addressed in separate fora by different 
groups: often governmental, but sometimes also involving the big 
dominant players (Google Facebook etc.) In most cases civil society 
presence is either absent or weak, and its not sensible to think that 
the same people can represent our interests in this wide range of 
activities.

So I think a new revived IGC would see its primary role as ensuring 
relevant groups and individual experts get involved in emerging fora 
looking at specific issues. Let eg Privacy International or Human Rights 
Watch be our representative when these issues come up: involve 
individual experts like Tim Wu and Bruce Schneier on issues such as 
media concentration and security:

Then I think we are getting towards a meaningful role and involvement 
where civil society involvement will be respected, and IGC could play a 
meaningful ongoing role that extends well beyond getting together 
annually at an IGF (if it continues).

Then there is what to do with CSCG. If, as I suggest, BB, JNC and IGC 
end up as one group again, What is the future of CSCG? Only APC remains 
as an active organisation at this stage. I think here thought needs to 
be given to outreach as well – if for instance there was an agreement 
that privacy and human rights were our two biggest issues, why not 
invite prominent civil society organisations in those areas to join in?

Anyway, something needs to be done in all these areas. People whose 
terms of office have ended have not been replaced because of the 
inertia. I think and hope someone can jump up and take a lead to get 
civil society working well in these areas. I see lots of excellent new 
voices who want to do this, and I encourage action!



Ian Peter (ex co-ordinator of IGC and also Chair of CSCG for a while way 
back then....)







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