Research articles on Governance

Do ICANN’s policies and operations have an impact on human rights? Civil society engagement in the organisation seeks to inscribe human rights in internet infrastructure.

The author provides an overview of the legal and cultural discourse surrounding pornography in the European Union member state of Bulgaria, in times of 'new digital realities'.

A trustless technology, Bitcoin tries to solve issues of social coordination and economic exchange by relying exclusively on technological means. Is technology alone able to resolve the social and political concerns affecting the Bitcoin network?

​The history of the internet design process as depicted in the internet RFCs provides evidence of the value of social capital, interpersonal relationships, and community in the face of instability. Drawing conceptual distinctions is a necessary first step for many of the other coping techniques.

Datafication leads to subtle forms of governance; this article explores them by drawing on science and technology studies as well as sociologies of visibility.

How did early network designers govern the internet before internet governance? With archival research, this article shows how designers conceived of the Domain Name System (DNS) as a solution to the problem of governing future network users.

Focusing on different democratic ways of negotiating online privacy the authors identify several governance modes, including the currently prevailing protectionist mode.

Through a combination of actor-network theory and interpretative policy analysis, multistakeholder arrangements in internet governance are conceptualised as sites of discursive production in which heterogeneous actors engage in dynamic processes of social ordering.

Internet governance bodies agree that improving online security is important, but disagree on what a more secure internet would look like.