IGF Workshop Calls for Power Balance in the Internet Governance Dialogue
PARIS, France – A panel of nine leading internet scholars and experts from the East and West jointly called for power balance of related parties in policy-making concerning internet governance and avoiding politicizing related concepts and terms. They made the statement at a well-attended workshop at the UNESCO headquarters in Paris on November 13, 2018.
PARIS, France – A panel of nine leading internet scholars and experts from the East and West jointly called for power balance of related parties in policy-making concerning internet governance and avoiding politicizing related concepts and terms. They made the statement at a well-attended workshop at the UNESCO headquarters in Paris on November 13, 2018.
PARIS, France – A panel of nine leading internet scholars and experts from the East and West jointly called for power balance of related parties in policy-making concerning internet governance and avoiding politicizing related concepts and terms. They made the statement at a well-attended workshop at the UNESCO headquarters in Paris on November 13, 2018.
At the 90-minute workshop, the panel agreed that since internet governance triggers heated debates, internet governance requires in-depth discussion and greater global consensus. The workshop addressing “The East-West Commitment as Multi-stakeholders” was part of the 2018 Internet Governance Forum (IGF), a forum for multistakeholder policy dialogue that is organized by the United Nations. The workshop was hailed by IGF delegates as a big success at the 13th IGF that was hosted by the French government.
As the first invited speaker of the workshop, Dr. Xingdong Fang of Communication University of Zhejiang stressed that the term “development” should be the key word to address the power imbalance among the government, civil societies, private sector, technology companies and academics that are major actors in internet governance between the East and West. In the East, the government usually plays a bigger role in internet governance than other social actors, while in the West, the power of major actors in internet governance, including the government, is more balanced than the East.
“Development can really help us to iron out the differences between the East and West regarding internet governance,” said Fang. As for how to bridge the gap, Fang called for learning from internet pioneers when they first built the internet connecting people around the globe, who encouraged trust and transparence. “Internet of Trust” was also the theme of this year’s IGF.
“In our Oral History of Internet project, we interviewed Internet Pioneers who have made significant contribution to the internet progress in the first 50 years of the internet and see how they helped growing the internet,” said Fang. “We get inspired by their stories, and they also inspire us to find new ways to achieve balanced Internet Governance dialogues.”
The second speaker Wolfgang Kleinwächter, a renowned scholar in internet governance from Germany, said in the internet governance, we must learn to share decision making among the government and nonstate actors as all stakeholders and internet governance elements should be included into the dialogue due to their respective roles.
Kleinwächter called for “bottom up processes” in internet governance, which is a new form of collaboration, coordination, communication that requires flexible processes. With the bottom-up mechanism in place, the government and nonstate actors can contribute to the outcome, which is not predefined. He added that this new idea was inspired by French President Emmanuel Macron, who addressed the opening ceremony of the IGF.
The joint effort “means government, civil society and the business and technical community have to play their roles,” said Kleinwächter. “No stakeholder can substitute another stakeholder. It means the business cannot substitute a government’s role. The government has a special role, so does civil society.”
During the debate, he admits that it was the challenge how to bring the stakeholders based on more or less equal footing into a mechanism where they can share policy development and decision making. But we must do it because “internet governance is about sharing, sharing of principles, norms, programs, and decision making,” he added.
Kleinwächter proposed the concept of “collaborative sovereignty” in internet governance, arguing that “no one can execute sovereignty by ignoring other sides’ interests.” He continued, “We have one world, one internet. We have how to learn to live together and work hand in hand… When it comes to the internet, we should try to define a common understanding based on the different cultures, different histories, different approaches we have as nobody can dictate another side. But we should look forward and go beyond our traditional institutions and mechanisms and be open for new proposals.”
At the workshop, Chengyu Xiong of Tsinghua University in Beijing called on the academics to ‘over cross the gap” between the East and West sides, who helped “seek a common ground.’ Internet governance requires use to “focus on the shared future of civilization instead of disparity in the cyberspace,” he added.
Demi Getshko, the founding father of Brazil’s internet, addressed the workshop with the Brazilian case of internet governance, where the internet connection started in the late 1980s. Brazil had an internet steering committee by decree, but it is not a governmental agency. “It’s really a multi-stakeholder, I think,” Getshko said.
In Brazil, the internet is recognized as added value over the telecom. So the internet is not under the umbrella of the telecom regulators, enabling the internet grow and flourish in a very fast and easy way without any kind of bureaucracy, he said.
He thinks that was very good for the Brazilian internet, whose growth, when comparing to other parts of the world, was much faster. Another factor contributing to the success of the Brazilian internet, Getshko said, was the synergy between the management of top-level domains and the resource from the government. Brazil hosted two IGF annual conferences, which added more synergy to its internet growth.
Facing the future when the technology is pushing forward in a strong way, Getshko noted we have to keep in mind that we must preserve human values, ethics values, and moral values.
The next speaker Liang Guo, former member of the IGF Multistakeholder Advisory Group (MAG), explored the true meaning of multistakeholder principle. Guo told the workshop that he still remembered five years ago, he and other MAG members discussed about the multistakeholder approach and hoped it keeps balance of the government, civil society, private sectors, and technical communities. But he argued academia was different from NGOs if they were put into the category of civil society. Until recently, some UN and IGF documents began to separate academia from NGOs.
To Guo, four or five groups may not cover the most important stakeholders on the internet, or internet users, such as bloggers, game players, or young users, who may not be included in the four or five groups. Guo also urged more attention to cultural differences.
“Different countries, different cultures may have different ideas regarding internet governance,” he said. “Like in the West, mostly people think the relation between government and people are kind of -- I won't say enemy, but they have interest conflicts. But in Eastern cultures like China, we think we are family. Government is the father in the family. So the multistakeholder model is so different. In China, when we talk governance, it is mostly government, and what the government can do, which is quite different from the West.”
Other speakers on the panel included Kilnam Chon from South Korea, the founder of Asia Pacific networking group who developed the first internet in Asia, and Deepti Bharthur of IT for Change in India.
Bu Zhong of Pennsylvania State University served as chair and moderator of the workshop, whose organizer is Communication University of Zhejiang and co-organizers were Tsinghua University and Pennsylvania State University.
At the beginning of the workshop, Zhong introduced the workshop theme, which is East-West Commitment as Multi-Stakeholders. He stressed that the East-West here does not just mean geographic locations, but more exactly, represents developing and developed countries. In the area of internet governance, the multi-stakeholder approach has been widely accepted in the international community and well reflected in the declaration, resolutions and work practice of international organizations here.
Zhong said, in both the East and West, people have realized that it is necessary to avoid politicizing concepts and terms, and internet governance must seek power balance of related parties in each specific case.
“The multi-stakeholder approach as a problem-solving principle is indeed conducive to promoting the discussion and understanding of internet public policies among different actors, “ he said. “But in the East and West, approaches could be so different from each other. We really do not have one-size-fits-all theories, for all of those developments and formats. So an interdisciplinary and multi-nation panel discussion with members from the East and West should enrich a discussion of internet governance, which is fruitful to policy-making.”
Many IGF delegates and attendees raised questions to the panel of scholars and experts, who in turn provided more insightful answers and comments to the internet governance issues. Those who asked questions included the delegates from Germany, Indonesia, Malaysia, Romania, and Russia. More attendees raised their questions to the panel members even after the workshop ended.
This year’s IGF brought various people and stakeholder groups from around the world to the table as equals to exchange information and share good policies and practices in internet governance. France hosted the 13th IGF with the theme “Internet of Trust” at the UNESCO headquarters in Paris on November 12-14, 2018.
At IGF, there is no negotiated outcome, the IGF informs and inspires those with policy-making power in both the public and private sectors. At their annual meeting delegates discuss, exchange information and share good practices with each other. The IGF facilitates a common understanding of how to maximize internet opportunities and address risks and challenges that arise. The workshop “The East-West Commitment as Multi-stakeholders” became the first of its kind organized by Chinese and U.S. universities at the IGF.
