IGF 2014

The Internet Governance Forum (IGF) and Enhanced Cooperation has been introduced in the Tunis Agenda as two parallel tracks to address public policy issues related to Internet Governance (IG). While the IGF was set to be multilateral, multi-stakeholder, democratic, transparent and non-binding process; Enhanced Cooperation was focused on enabling governments to carry out their roles and responsibilities, in international public policy issues pertaining to the Internet but not in the day-to-day technical and operational matters.

While the IGF role is clearly defined in its mandate, there is no clear framework yet for Enhance Cooperation as a process. Both Processes address in their respective role (or mandate) IG Public Policies. One fact that we know by today is that successful IG Public Policies are the ones that are developed within a multistakeholder open balanced approach which became a trend on global, regional and national levels.

The workshop would address the following questions:

1. Can we view the IGF and Enhanced Cooperation as two linked processes since they both address IG public policies or they should remain and two independent tracks.

2. If the IGF is a non-binding and non-outcome policy dialogue platform, can Enhanced Cooperation serve as an outcome for this policy dialogue that can reflect multilateral, multi-stakeholder, democratic and transparent process.

3. In light of the two previous question, what should be a workable framework for enhanced cooperation that will enable governments to carry its role related to IG public policy.

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Workshop Agenda:

Mr. Qusai AlShatti - Background on Workshop Topic & Panelists Introduction - 5 min
Miss Désirée Miloshevic - Multistakeholder Engagement in Enhanced Cooperation process -5 min.
Mr. Ayman El-Sherbiny -The Role on Intergovernmental organizations in Enhanced Cooperation - 5 min.
Mr. Peter Major - Role and Ourcome of the Workgroup on Enhanced Cooperation (WGEC) - 5 min.
Mr. Mohammed AlQurashi - Enhanced Cooperation as a Process for Governments - 5 min.
Mr. Carlos A. Afonso - The View of Civil Society on the Enhanced Cooperation Process - 5 min.
Mr. Faycal Bayouli - Tunisia Experience in Enhanced Cooperation and the WGEC - 5 min.
Ms. Marilyn Cade - The View of The Private Sector on the Enhanced Cooperation Process - 5 min.
Workshop Participants, panelists and Remote Participants - Interactive Discussion - 40 min.
Workshop moderator and Panelists - Summary & Closing Remarks - 10 min.

It will focus on ongoing accelerated developments in the global arena of Internet Governance, with special attention to regional aspirations pertaining to the envisaged global Internet Governance model that would take place after 2015, and to the input of the regional IGFs regarding the ongoing consultation processes that will take place during the next year which will shape the future model.
The global IGF, as well as regional IGFs, played a major role in shaping Internet Governance debate, It is time to revisit the very essence of the IGF as a non-decision, non-output, non-binding platform. Revisiting this does not necessarily mean that IGFs need to change radically, but may mean that enhancements may be introduced in the next decade following 2015.
Panelists of experts and policymakers towards will discuss the following :
• Respective Roles of different subgroups of stakeholders in Internet Governance.
• The global IGF/Arab IGF dialectics: what went well and what went wrong?
• Should the global IGF as well as the regional IGFs (including the Arab IGF) continue to work as a non-decision-based platform, without any binding recommendations? Or is it the time to evolve to something else?
• Can the above evolutions take place before the future IG model takes final shape? In parallel? Or afterwards?
• How can the global and regional IGFs sustain their existing/new roles post 2015?

The growing complexity and significance of Internet governance necessitates addressing the difficult issues that impact, or are impacted by the continued evolution of the global Internet. Capturing these issues requires that the roles played by intergovernmental, and governmental stakeholders in collaboration with Internet technical professionals, private sector businesses and other non-governmental stakeholders be better understood. Successfully dealing with these all-important Internet governance aspects requires connecting several, sometimes-disparate areas of technology, policy, development and civil society to work on solutions and act in concert to ensure collaborative stewardship of the Internet continues.

Program
Each panel member will provide an opening statement regarding the challenges and issues they see with the changing Internet Governance landscape as well as the roles that everyone, including governments, have in the multistakeholder process.

An open discussion will follow with the Moderator providing questions for the discussion.

Specifically, the panel will be asked to address the following questions during the open and interactive discussion:
• The Internet is expanding exponentially - Who is responsible for identifying the Internet governance knowledge gap among the different stakeholder groups?

• What can be done to bridge the Internet governance knowledge gap in terms of resourcing, scaling, and awareness building?


• How should these knowledge gap issues, and discussion be used to improve the global Internet openness and collaborative multistakeholder engagement?


• Where there are issues that may disrupt the roles of existing stakeholders, how should consensus on key principles or outcomes be reached for solutions that benefit the global Internet rather than special interests?


• How should market-specific challenges or issues that are particular to a local community be approached for the global Internet to continue its innovative contributions?

The successful evolution of the Internet has been depending on a flexible, decentralised, bottom-up and issue-driven set of interrelated governance processes open to participation by all stakeholders. During the past five years the dialogue on Internet governance has grown exponentially. As one of the Internet industry leader in their respective countries, most of the country code top-level domain operators have been proactively engaging in the Internet governance process. They have become one of the main avenues to reach out their local community on this matter.
The workshop aims to show best practice cases of ccTLDs that have facilitated the development of “IG-literacy” through initiatives that have contributed to feed the IG process with local input on the IG ecosystem and the need that it remains anchored to the principles of multi-stakeholderism, openness, transparency and accountability.
In the spirit and with the ultimate goal of assuring a constructive evolution of the current IG model, various ccTLDs have been playing key roles in the IG arena and helped enhancing the dialogue at multiple levels.
The workshop will be set in the form of a round table where panelists and attendees will be given ample room for discussion. Central in the discussion will be the identification of difficulties and opportunities to engage the local community in an Internet Governance debate.
A dedicated social media campaign will be enforced to ensure the broadest possible participation before, during and after the workshop.

The evolution of Internet governance principles frameworks and accountability mechanisms has been the focus of considerable discussion in 2014. This process must proceed through careful analysis. Some governments highlighted concern about Internet-related policy issues for which they cannot identify relevant existing mechanisms. However, before concluding that new mechanisms should be created to address these issues, alternative options must be sought to ensure that changes would contribute to enhancing the security, stability, privacy, resiliency and interoperability of the Internet, and to economical and societal benefits.

This workshop will examine how governance/operational problems can be addressed in a manner that continues to safeguard the security and stability of the Internet. It will use a four-step process ICC-BASIS submitted to NETmundial.
1. A potential issue should be identified to the global stakeholder community, indicating the implications to governance and to determine whether the issue has already been addressed in an existing mechanism.
2. Upon assessment, proposed solutions should be described to the global stakeholder community.
3. Proposed solutions should be analysed to determine whether it would violate the principle of "first, do no harm" to the functionality, stability and interoperability of the global Internet.
4. Finally, solutions should be evaluated to determine potential effectiveness for addressing the issues and their potential for unintended consequences.

This workshop also will examine the WGEC mapping analysis and consider how to utilize the WGEC's work to enable a stakeholder to identify existing mechanisms - developed through private sector, (inter)-governmental organizations - to address governance issues.

The multi‐stakeholder model has been an important factor for the success of the Internet. However it is necessary to recognize that the Internet governance dynamics have changed. The new dynamics among stakeholders is associated with an overall increase of complexity and differentiation and suggests that it is increasingly difficult for one single governance regime to address the broad range of concerns associated with today’s Internet. What is needed is to allow for a better match between discrete governance issues and the suitable institutions available.
The panel addresses this situation by advancing an innovative model. It asks whether it is feasible to consider an evolution of the current system to allow for a better interplay among the different actors of the governance process towards a multi‐stakeholder model with variable geometry.

While all stakeholders need to participate in the multi-stakeholder model on equal footing when different governance issues and institutions are envisaged and discussed, then in the implementation of the governance process one stakeholder or a coalition of stakeholders (variable geometry) could take the lead according to the nature of the governance issue at stake: e.g. standards (the private sector), Internet issues relevant to particular communities (civil society), human rights (government).
The variable geometry approach has been discussed in the WTO negotiations to take into account differences among countries participating in the agreement (for instance developing countries) and to reduce the perennial tension between depth and width of the treaties.
The workshop will explore what can be learnt from these experiences for the Internet governance context.

To map, frame and make accessible the often-confusing tangle of processes underway across the vast number of Internet governance-related issues, an increasing number of initiatives have emerged or are being proposed, including:

• CSTD WGEC Correspondence Group mapping activity;
• GIPO;
• Geneva Internet Platform;
• Internet Policy Observatory; and
• Internet Collaborative Stewardship Framework (ISOC).

With the advent of so many initiatives, some of the possible issues and risks that may emerge include:

• Lack of coordination between initiatives;
• Unnecessary duplication of activities;
• Overlooking good initiatives in “competing” forums; and
• Adding to general IG stakeholder confusion;

This roundtable will bring representatives of initiatives together to explore similarities and synergies and ways to improve communication and coordination, with the ultimate goals of:

• Strengthening support and partnerships between initiatives to avoid a sense of “competition”;
• Enabling initiatives to gain access to stakeholders, information and processes that by themselves, they would not have direct access or knowledge of;
• Sharing best practices between initiatives, such as data conceptualization and visualization;
• Contributing to a more inclusive and collaborative mapping of issues, mechanisms, and gaps in Internet governance;
• Encouraging greater IG stakeholder buy-in for all initiatives; and
• Breaking down barriers, generally, between IG stakeholders.

The roundtable will also encourage representatives from regions or stakeholder groups that don’t have such initiatives to join the roundtable, with a view to helping such representatives ascertain whether or not initiatives are needed for their own regions and stakeholder groups.

The proposed workshop has the format of a roundtable during which participants from different stakeholder groups will discuss the results of RIA research conducted, some of which has been undertaken with NEPAD Agency, on mapping multistakeholders participation in Internet governance from an African perspective..
Specifically, participants will be invited to consider how factors such as low level of Internet access and use, low quality of service and high prices of broadband intersect with the notion of multistakeholder participation as a form of deliberative democracy for Internet governance - which is often informed by assumptions from more mature markets and the human rights frameworks of Western democracies.
Participants will explore the evolution of multistakeholders participation through consideration of the main international, regional and national processes/mechanisms of the Internet governance ecosystem from an Africa perspective.
Some specific issues that will be highlighted include:
- What these initiatives have achieved in terms of enabling or constraining the development of an open Internet;
- what has been the level and effectiveness of participation of African stakeholders in these processes;
- why have they not been able to fully develop an African agenda on Internet governance

ICANN is a multi-stakeholder organization that has a critical yet confined role as a steward of the Internet identifiers and protocol parameters. ICANN coordinates closely with other actors in the Internet ecosystem who play a key role in managing the technical resources of the Internet infrastructure. ICANN also has relationships with many different stakeholders who participate in various Internet governance processes at regional and international levels.
ICANN continuously seeks to improve its multi-stakeholder structures and policy development processes to be more effective, inclusive, and transparent. It does that through ongoing reviews undertaken by community members representing all stakeholder groups. The Affirmation of Commitments Reviews and the implementation of recommendations of the Accountability and Transparency Review Teams (ATRT1) and (ATRT2) are example of such community reviews.
ICANN also contributes to several initiatives and efforts aiming to evolve the global multi-stakeholder Internet governance cooperation, and to strengthen ICANN’s multi-stakeholder model. The ICANN Strategy Panels, the Montevideo Statement by leaders of Internet organizations, and the High-Level Panel on the Future of Global Internet Cooperation, are all efforts toward this objective.

This workshop is targeted toward those with an interest in the evolution of the Internet governance ecosystem, and will address a range of issues in this area including:
• ICANN accountability and transparency mechanisms;
• Globalization of ICANN and IANA functions, including the NTIA transition dialogue;
• Enhancing global multi-stakeholder Internet governance cooperation, including reflections on Netmundial;
• Roadmap toward collaborative and inclusive Internet Governance, including the output of the High-Level Panel.


Detailed Agenda:

Introduction by moderator (2 min);

Panelists to react to following questions (10 min per question):

(1)How do you see progress made with regard to the process towards completing the transition of NTIA’s stewardship of the IANA functions?

(2) How can ICANN’s accountability and transparency mechanisms continue to evolve to support globalization of the organization?

(3)What are the key outcomes of Netmundial, and how can the global Internet community benefit from its success?

(4)What are the key recommendations of the High-Level Panel’s report, and what are the next steps?

Discussion with floor (40 min)

Closing remarks by panelists (1 min each)

Could we, as international citizens of the Internet, create a set of general principles, a "Magna Carta" for the Internet? Can we design a platform that enables us to crowdsource from across the world a vision for the "Web We Want"? Could we overcome linguistic, political, and cultural barriers in order to mobilize around issues of net neutrality and pervasive surveillance? How can we design both a technological platform and social process in a way that overcomes rather than increases barriers to inclusion? How can we get the participation of those who are disconnected or otherwise excluded from the Internet itself, the majority of the world?

It seems like such a document should be directly crowd-sourced from the Web itself, yet open-source tools for involving massive amounts of users in collaborative editing, discussing controversial topics, and reaching consensus are still in their early stages. Traditional Internet governance bodies work mostly over mailing-lists, but massive volumes of email prevent many people from participating in the age of Facebook and Twitter, and provide little help for structuring debates and issues. How can we build more effective socio-technological scaffolding is needed to let people engage effectively in multi-stakeholder processes?

Panelists from across the world will discuss and compare their experiences in large-scale constitutional crowd-sourcing, and will suggest best practices in order to extend these efforts in designing participatory platforms to engage users in political discussion and action. Ranging from the Tunisian Constitution and the “Decálogo da Web Brasileira (Brazilian Web Decalogue) to technical standardization at the W3C and the work of the IGF on Internet rights, we hope to learn how to build from these experiences to create a "Magna Carta" for the Web, so that we can build not only the Web We Want, but the world we want.

Ever since the WSIS and WGIG a decade ago, many have argued that there is an important gap in the distributed institutional architecture of global IG. We lack ways to perform holistic, ongoing monitoring and analysis of policy-related developments, and to aggregate and disseminate information needed to make fully informed decisions. This is especially the case with so-called “orphaned” and multidimensional issues that do not fit neatly within any single organization. Where then can governments and stakeholders turn for accessibly formulated and usable information on policy, best practices, and lessons learned, and to connect with sources of experience and expertise in order to construct governance networks that can help identify forward-looking solutions?

Recently, there has been a number of proposals about this informational function. They vary not only in their details but even in how they label what is proposed, e.g. a clearing house, knowledge bank, observatory, policy network facilitator, IGF+, etc. While none of the labels fully capture the ideas in play, there is growing interest in moving forward, as is evidenced by the dialogues and initiatives in the IGF, WGEC, NETmundial, the High Level Panel, EC, ISOC, civil society, academic organizations, etc. Accordingly, the NonCommercial Users Constituency of ICANN (includes 94 organizations and 252 individuals in 81 countries) proposes this workshop to help advance and give shape to the discussion. The panelists and audience would brainstorm on such questions as: What, substantively and operationally, would be entailed by the function? What would be needed to institutionalize and perform it effectively? Which organizations would be involved, with what kinds of interrelationships?

Critics of multistakeholder Internet governance have long focused on ICANN accountability and transparency. But issues of who is accountable to whom exist throughout the Internet governance ecosystem. Traditionally, Internet technical organizations have prided themselves on the way that people participated as individuals, rather than as representatives of organizations or businesses, when developing standards and policy. However, as the Internet has grown and become more integrated with all aspects of life, more stakeholders are wishing to participate. Resource limitations, however, mean individual voices are becoming less common and more organizations are beginning to represent, or claim to represent, their communities in wider Internet governance discussions. In addition, as more stakeholders enter Internet governance discussions, it becomes more difficult to assess via direct experience whether the individuals and those stating that they representing wider groups of stakeholders are acting as responsible stakeholders or have other reasons for engaging in processes.

This workshop will discuss accountability mechanisms and gaps in today’s hybrid multistakeholder Internet governance system where stakeholders participate as individuals, as representatives of organizations or groups of stakeholders, or as representatives of entire nation states. Using accountability literature available in (non-Internet) governance as a starting point, the workshop will examine ways to strengthen the accountability mechanisms available to:

• Stakeholders participating directly in multistakeholder Internet governance decision-making processes;
• Organizations representing the collective voice of their communities in high-level Internet governance discussions such as the UN and IGF; and
• Organizations tasked with implementing policies and decisions by their stakeholders.

The European as well as global youth organisations so far are failing to provide for the youth to participate in the digital policy debate on global level of the Internet Governance. Due to complexity and exclusivity of political IG processes, lack of institutionalised framework for participation, lack of capacity building on the mass scale and civil society bubble, current models of participation are not feasible for the digital policy debates.
The aforementioned factors create barriers and problems for the young people to participate in global Internet Governance fora. They raise concerns if youth participation is fulfilled and working in the digital policy field of global Internet Governance.
Youth involvement in the Internet Governance Discussion e.g. IG therefore appears to be stunted, and remains a field of further development. The workshop aims to map the status of youth participation in a two-folded approach: firstly, current barriers for young people to get involved directly in the IG Discussions shall be identified. Complementary, the workshop aims to share good practice and map opportunities for young people to get involved in IG Discussions (e.g. how to attract young people, setting up a hub, preparing material).

The adoption of (Internet) standards and best practices is a topic of much interest in improving cyber security and deterring cyber crime. In order for either standards or best practices to be effective, they must both be developed and be adopted. Achieving wide-scale adoption can be slow, as it requires building awareness and gaining consensus on practices. One key issue is who bears the responsibility for the implementation of standards and best practices. Another issue is the effect of (non-) adoption on Internet security.

In The Netherlands, standards and best-practice implementation is part of the Dutch government's medium-term vision for telecommunication, media and Internet. This discussion process is supported by organisations like SIDN, NLnet Labs, RIPE NCC, SURFnet; key players with global impact.

Adoption of standards and best practices promoting cybersecurity is a multi national topic. NLIGF proposes to organise a paneldiscussion on this issue, addressing it from a global scope. Topics include the stakeholders and bodies that can or should develop standards and best practices, cooperation between these bodies and the process of deciding which issues to prioritize. The roles of consumers, industry, government in (non-)adoption is looked at, as well as the cost allocation of implementation. The panel will also consider how to ensure that developing nations can contribute to and take advantage of standards and best practices for cybersecurity and discuss new partnerships. Panellists range as wide as the topics are. The respective points of view of the panellists are part of this proposal.

This workshop consists of two debates. Motions will be presented: one related to the globalisation of ICANN and the IANA transition, and the other related to the roles of stakeholders. Oxford-style, two teams of two will respectively support and confront each motion within strictly timed and guided debates. The audience - in situ and online - will stimulate the debate directly through flash questions to either party. Attendees (in situ and remote) will also decide on the winning team, based on the arguments.

Should ICANN be globalised or should it be internationalised? Does ‘respective roles’ of stakeholders in IG allow for their participation on an ‘equal footing’? These two questions have been intertwined within discussions in all of the major global IG processes without resolution. These discussions are, however, often watered down, avoiding direct confrontation of main arguments, in the search for consensus and compromise. In this workshop, confrontation of arguments will be purposely sharpened and polarised through debate, to prepare a base position for substantive progress in other discussions, towards eventual resolution.

Teams are composed of skillful expert professionals who will be invited in cooperation with government, civil society, academia, the technical community and the corporate sector. Moderation and remote moderation will be delivered by experienced Diplo professionals. Recognised experts will be invited to provide short debriefings after the debates.

Main arguments will be summarised and provided the same day, as input to other workshops and future discussions on related topics.

Agenda
--Introduction to the debate

--Introduction to first topic: Should ICANN be globalised or should it be internationalised?
----Modified Oxford-style debate
----Follow up, poll and de-briefing

--Introduction to the second topic: Does ‘respective roles’ of stakeholders in IG allow for their participation on an ‘equal footing’?
----Modified Oxford-style debate
----Follow up, poll and de-briefing

--Wrap up comments

The African Internet Governance Forum (AfIGF) was launched on 30 September 2011, at a workshop organized by the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (UNECA) and the African Union Commission (AUC) held during the 6th IGF in Nairobi, to act as a platform for an inclusive multilateral, multi-stakeholder and multilingual discussion on issues pertinent to the Internet in Africa in general and Internet Governance issues in particular. As stated in its terms of reference, the AfIGF shall meet every year at different venue in each region and at the IGF venue and wherever possible during Multi-stakeholder Advisory Group (MAG) consultation which are held between two Internet Governance Forum.
In this workshop proposal, we address the major issues for the future of Internet in Africa. The issues we may address include:

1. Advances on the ICANN front
2. dotAfrica status and way forward
3. Changes at the AfIGF secretariat + working methods