Internet governance needs to develop ambitions

In November 2010, I had just arrived in Brussels. I attended the Paradiso conference - the ending ceremony of a project about online cultures and opportunities, developed within a European Commission research programme called Seventh Framework Programme for Research (FP7). There was an award ceremony for kids aged 9-12 who had contributed their visions of what the internet could bring the world. The kid that won the first prize was shipped on to the stage where a helpful European Commission conferencier helped them conclude that ”world peace” was the greatest benefit of the internet, and the kid's most desired future.

Back in the days when no one on the internet knew you were a dog, there was a terrible fear that politicians would destroy any peace of liberal democratic freedoms that could spontaneously arise on a global network of communication. In the wake of 1989, when the cold war was no more and Germany reunited, there seems indeed to have been a brief, but glorious, moment of hope for world peace.

There were some setbacks

International organisations in the United Nations, like the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO), expanded corporate protection mechanisms speedily in the mid-1990s. The TRIPs Agreement and the World Trade Organization (WTO) stirred up much emotion in many parts of the world.

As it slowly turned out people do in fact mostly use communication to share culture with each other – share with friends, share with foes – powerful vested interests reacted sharply to the new digital infrastructure.

There were some more setbacks

Most of the values we've incorporated in our legislative systems are more compatible with Minitel than with the internet. The legal systems in both the United States and in the European Union member states are simply not cut out for citizen-driven, peer-to-peer communication. What is called “Next-Generation” is often a cover for adapting internet technology to its Minitel roots - we’re re-adapting technology to fit better with our norms.

Political forces in Brussels and the member states have an ambivalent relationship to the internet and to internet governance. On the one hand, we hope to improve efficiency of industrial robots and of the public sector. On the other hand, the internet happens to be an adequate tool for private persons to empower themselves. Unfortunately, individuals empower themselves for bad: bad copyright infringement, bad cyberbullying, bad cyberhygiene, bad any-number-of-things which have caused legislative outrage. And private persons are not learning how to be productive programmers the way the computer and the economy intended them to.

I try to remember this kid who wanted the internet to bring him world peace in 2010. I don't think he'd be invited to any European Commission ceremonies again, and even if he were, his 16-year old self would probably look back with scorn at how grown-up Commission officials tricked his younger self into expressing such naive aspirations.

Internet governance under influence

While many initiated internet governance people are excited about the ICANN reform and IANA documents, NetMundial, the Internet Governance Forum, and the Centre for International Governance Innovation (CIGI) group, there’s little reason to be. They are talk-shops set up to delay or criticise the shifting internet standards to the International Telecommunications Union (ITU), an old and corrupt UN organisation no one actually likes.

”Deciding about protocols and IP addresses, it's not something I think politicians should do,” an ISOC-SE member confidently explained to me on a panel in 2013. Yet, intermediary liability provisions in the European E-commerce directive already ensure political influence over IP addresses. Political unwillingness to address net neutrality effectively renders unusable protocols that do not conform to telco desires. There is a multi-layered problem which has nothing to do with the myriad of paper tigers arising globally, and conferences organised by enthused cyber-government officials. The technical community is ignoring or denying the political influence it is having. The political community is, counter-intuitively, ignoring and denying its political influence as well.

European internet governance needs to develop dreams

Where internet governance needs to develop is in its formulation of dreams and ambitions. We laugh, haha, at this kid shoved on to the Paradiso conference stage to express endearing ambitions, but isn't it exactly the ambition that also the European Union was founded upon?

The strength of Europe and of the European Union is that it accepts the equality between participating peers in its processes. The EU emphasises collaboration on equal terms, and the preservation of unique cultural features. Europe is historically prominent in political and natural philosophy, innovation and culture. This has to do with its great cultural diversity, its many languages and the ensuing need to develop mechanisms for conflict resolution, mutual understanding and trade. Europe pioneered the liberal world order. Consumer rights and competition have been high on the agenda since the founding of the European Union.

Decentralisation, key to the success of Europe and of the internet

The common factor between all of Europe’s successes is decentralisation. Mutual respect and equal terms between different interacting parties is the true strength of Europe. Whether the European Parliament or the Council of Ministers or in the Commission. Whether in human rights law, consumer rights law or competition law. The European project carries with it the hope that when people come together from different cultural backgrounds, they will mostly be nice to each other and do productive things.

Decentralisation is also the defining aspect of the internet and similarly networked technologies. It is what made the internet fundamentally different from Minitel: the internet dared assert that people who get to choose the terms of their interactions with others will usually be nice to one another and do productive things.

Taking the large similarities between the technical architecture of the internet and the political architecture of the European Union into account, it is strange that the European Union doesn't embrace, but rather seeks to reform, the normative framework of the internet. It doesn't matter how technical you say the internet governance is, the current lack of individual empowerment in the online world is a direct consequence of individual empowerment not having been politically prioritised.