The second week of the WSIS online forum focuses on internet governance and the issues for Uganda. At the 2003 World Summit on the Information Society the issue of Internet governance emerged as a contested issue among governments. The two key points of disagreement were:
Should the scope of Internet governance be defined narrowly or broadly?
Who should be responsible for Internet governance?
On the issue of the scope of Internet governance, one position associated with developed countries, argued for a narrow definition of governance ‘OF’ the Internet as technical coordination. The second position, associated with developing countries, argued for a broad definition of governance ‘ON’ the Internet, related to what the Internet carries such as issues spam, network security and pricing and interconnection.
On the issue of responsibility for Internet governance, there were also two positions. One, held by developing countries, argued that Internet governance is related to national sovereignty and responsibility for should fall under an intergovernmental body such as the UN and the ITU. The second position, held by developed countries, argued that the current system of private sector leadership should be maintained and because the system works, there is no need to change it.[i]
The Geneva Summit established a Working Group on Internet Governance (WGIG) to address these issues with the following mandate:
Develop a working definition of Internet governance;
Identify the public policy issues that are relevant to Internet governance;
Develop a common understanding of the respective roles and responsibilities of governments, existing international organisations and other forums as well as the private sector and civil society from both developing and developed countries.
The WGIG is due to report ahead of Prepcom 3 in September 2005, where the issue of Internet governance will be discussed.
Prior to the WGIG’s formation in late 2004, the UN ICT Task Force Global Forum on Internet Governance proposed the development of a matrix of all issues related to Internet governance.[ii] The resulting paper proposes that a conceptual framework is needed fro dealing with Internet governance that is based on two building blocks of policy:
Statements of fact such as definitions of the Internet and Internet governance and the key players involved;
Norms such as the commonly agreed standards and obligations that can act as criteria for assessing what is good or bad regarding Internet governance.
The report provides as statements of fact:
Three definitions of the Internet, governance and Internet governance;
Four characteristics of the Internet as standard commons, private market, end-to-end principle, the global, non-territorial nature of the Internet;
Three governance functions technical standardisation, resource allocation and assignment and public policy;
Four types of actors involved in Internet governance state-based institutions with universal membership, state-based institutions with non-universal membership, formal non-state organisations, informal non-state organisations.
The report constructs two tables on the state of play in Internet governance in which the main actors are mapped across the three governance functions and the extent to which agreements have been reached. From this matrix a number of patterns emerge:
Actors performing first two governance functions technical standardisation and resource allocation and assignment are mostly non-state actors, e.g. IETF for standardisation, ICANN for resource allocation.
Actors performing the third governance function are mostly state actors, e.g. ITU, WIPO, WTO, UNESCO. One non-state actor involved in public policy is ICANN.
On the extent of agreements reached, the matrix shows that:
Agreements are broad but not deep;
Governance is fragmented;
Agreements reached in certain institutions conflict with rules adopted in others, e.g. copyright issues conflict with free expression and fair use norms, the Whois data access rules of ICANN conflict with privacy norms;
Governance is vulnerable because of the absence of agreement on facts and norms and the fact that much governance takes place in non-state spaces that have not been endorsed by states.
There are a number of factors that may prevent deeper agreements on Internet governance:
Policy bodies have not accepted the non-territorial nature of the Internet as a global channel of communication;
Policy bodies have not accepted the end-to-end principle, which has implications on the focus of Internet policy.
The implication of the non-territorial nature of the Internet means that traditional international agreements, that are based on the assumption of territorial jurisdiction would not work with respect to Internet governance. Similarly the key problem with the ICANN regime of Internet governance is that one state, the USA, holds unilateral supervisory and contractual authority over ICANN and the DNS root zone.
The implication of whether the end-to-end principle is accepted is essentially a decision as to whether the Internet should continue to exist in its present form. Acceptance of the end-to-end principle would mean that the focus of policy would be on senders and receivers of messages rather than the channel itself. The alternative is that governments assert that control and policy mechanisms should be built into the underlying Internet code. This would substantially change the nature of the Internet and produce the Orwellian spectre of Big Brother into the lives of Internet users.
2. Discussion questions
2.1 What is at stake in Internet governance for Uganda?
Should Uganda support the demand that responsibility for Internet governance should be transferred to an intergovernmental body like the ITU?
Should Uganda support the continuing role of ICANN but insist on certain reforms to the ICANN regime with regard to the role of the USA, to the narrow definition of its responsibilities and to its system of global accountability?
Should Uganda support the establishment of a global multi-stakeholder body to address broad Internet public policy, based on acceptance of the global non-territorial nature of the Internet and the end-to-end principle?
2.2 Internet Policy Priorities
Perhaps the most remarkable attribute of the Internet, is that nobody seems to know who runs it[iii]. However, the Internet is not without its problems:
Poor countries pay for traffic in both directions, when connecting to rich countries like the US. The “Halfway Proposition”, a background paper on reverse subsidy of G8 countries by African ISPs, aims to articulate the root causes of high connectivity costs in Africa and to map out a strategy of how to tackle the problem.
We all receive far too much junk mail, or spam, as well as scams.
There are too many viruses and worms floating around the Internet.
The Working Group on Internet Governance is making an assessment of a range of public policy issues affecting the Internet. The inventory of these public policy issues and priorities are[iv]:
Equitable Distribution of Resources
Administration of Internet names and IP addresses
Administration of root server system
Telecommunications infrastructure, broadband access, convergence with NGN
Which of these issues are important for the development of the Internet in Uganda? As applicable, do indicate examples and/or best practices of what we have in Uganda today.
3. Resources
[i] Adam Peake: Internet Governance and the World Summit on the Information Society, prepared for the Association for Progressive Communications (APC), June 2004:
http://rights.apc.org/documents/governance.pdf
See also the “Halfway Proposition” by the African Internet Service Providers Association (AfrISPA) presented at the Conference of African Ministers of Finance, Planning and Economic Development in Johannesburg, South Africa, October 2002.
This discussion paper has been adapted from an Africa Civil Society in the Information Society (ACSIS) discussion paper on the topic “Internet Governance and Africa”.