Editorial by Wolfgang Kleinwächter MIND 2
Editorial by Wolfgang Kleinwächter MIND 2
Editorial
Wolfgang Kleinwächter
In 2011, the global controversy around Internet governance reached the highest political level. The Internet was a key priority of the 2011 meeting of the G8 in Deauville in May 2011. “For the first time at leaders’ level” says the “Deauville Declaration”, the G8 agreed “on a number of key principles, including freedom, respect for privacy and intellectual property, multistakeholder governance, cyber-security and protection from crime.”
Among the six principles mentioned, the principle of “multistakeholder governance” is probably the most controversial one. It goes back to the definition of Internet governance which was drafted by the UN Working Group on Internet Governance (WGIG) and adopted by 150+ heads of state during the 2nd UN World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS) in Tunis in November 2005. It says: “Internet governance is the development and application by governments, the private sector and civil society, in their respective roles, of shared principles, norms, rules, decision-making procedures, and programs that shape the evolution and use of the Internet.”
This definition does not propose a “central Internet authority” or a “one-stakeholder leadership model” as some governments suggested during WSIS I. Instead it proposes a decentralized but inclusive and participatory concept which gives all stakeholders a place by referring to their “respective roles”. It links them together in a network of shared rights, duties and responsibilities and encourages everybody to participate in transparent, open and bottom-up policy development and decision-making processes.
This innovative concept goes beyond traditional intergovernmental policy-making and allows a high degree of flexibility and diversity in its implementation. It rejects the idea that one Internet body could be the “governor of the Internet” or that one Internet governance model fits all Internet governance challenges. Incidentally, it was inspired by Kofi Annan, the former UN Secretary General, when he outlined in his meeting with WGIG members (March 2004) that “we need to develop inclusive and participatory models of governance. The medium must be made accessible and responsive to the needs of all the world’s people.” And he added:  “In managing, promoting and protecting [the Internet’s] presence in our lives, we need to be no less creative than those who invented it. Clearly, there is a need for governance, but that does not necessarily mean that it has to be done in the traditional way, for something that is so very different.”
The multistakeholder Internet governance model is one such creative innovation. Since 2005 it has become the catchword for global Internet governance. In the IGF Report to the 65th UN General Assembly in 2010, Ban Kin Moon, the present UN Secretary General, used the words “multistakeholder”, “stakeholders”, or “government, private sector, civil society and technical community” 57 times (on eleven pages) – in other words, the main agents in Internet governance. The OECD, the Council of Europe, the African Union and other organizations that have discussed and adopted “Internet Governance Principles” in recent years see the multistakeholder model as a key element for Internet policy-making in the years ahead. US President Obama and EU Commissioner Kroes have referred to the multistakeholder principle as the key element in future Internet policy mechanisms.
However, the multistakeholder Internet governance concept is very vague, lacks operational clarity, is open to conflicting interpretations and is often not more than just lip service. There is a broad range of ad hoc opinions on what it could or should be and there are numerous open questions: What precisely are the “respective roles” of the main stakeholders? Which proce- dures should be used for interaction among the various governmental and non-governmental stakeholders? What does “shared norms and principles” mean in political and legal terms? And how can a shared decision-making process among groups which have a different legal status under present international law be organized in relation to the use and future evolution of the Internet? If we accept that the Internet has triggered a global power shift, where does the power go and how is the power redistributed? How can concrete policies be made, which guarantee openness, freedom, rule of law and democracy in the Internet?
So far we have two practical platforms on which multistakeholderism is exercised: ICANN and the IGF. Both have produced encouraging results but have also revealed conceptual and procedural weaknesses. While ICANN now has quite a highly developed and recognized bottom-up policy development procedure, which includes all affected and interested constituencies, it remains unclear what exactly the role of the governments is in ICANN’s PDP and how the GAC and the ICANN Board interact in decision making. Similarly, the IGF is a great success, but here, too, the procedure is unclear as to who can make final decisions when it comes to issues like IGF improvement.
The present MIND publication of the German Internet & Society Co:llaboratory wishes to contribute to the global debate by giving various stakeholders from government, private sector, civil society and the technical and academic community an opportunity to comment on a key article written by Bertrand de La Chapelle, who himself is labeled by the Internet community as “Mr. Multistakeholder”. He is a recognized academic from the Diplomatique Academie Francaise in Paris and he has worked in all sectors: as webmaster for the civil society in the WSIS process, as ambassador for the information society in the French Foreign Office and as the director of the ICANN Board.
The MIND concept, to stimulate dialog among stakeholders, offers a chance to see the complex issue from different perspectives. As the Internet has no single authority, there is no final theory. Multistakeholderism is still a work in progress and its further development needs the involvement of all stakeholders. The printed version of this publication allowed 12 recognized experts from around the world to add their ideas. But the online version will be able to accommodate 120, 1,200 or even 12,000 additional comments. Such a broad, open and transparent dialog is needed to move further forward into the still unknown territory of cyberspace if we want to know how this “terra incognita” should be organized, managed, regulated and governed in a way which keeps the Internet free, democratic and open to all. You are invited to join.
