Internet Governance Research a Decade After WSIS

New Directions and Persisting Challenges

GigaNet 11th Annual Symposium

5 December 2016

Zapopan/Guadalajara, Mexico

09:00 WELCOME

• Marianne Franklin, Chair of Steering Committee
• Daniel Oppermann, Chair of Program Committee

09:15-10:45 – PARTICIPATION, TRANSPARENCY & RESPONSIBILITY

Since its early days as Arpanet and also after the development of HTML and the ongoing dissemination of the commercial Internet, participation was and still is a key factor driving the success of networks. The airiness of the first generation of users in the 1990s however is over. The virtual space for free expression by some once even hoped to be independent from state control is struggling today with surveillance from different directions. Several stakeholders, among them governments and private companies, have a keen interest today in observing and evaluating user behavior on the net. As a consequence critical users try to find more secure technical means to communicate or look for institutional ways to protect user privacy and improve online participation of different stakeholder groups. We will start our day diving into this debate on participation, transparency and responsibility with the following presentations:

• Rachel Pollack Ichou. Opening the black box: in search of algorithmic transparency 
• Isadora Hellegren. Deciphering Crypto-Discourse: Articulations of Internet Freedom in Relation to the State 
• Brandie Nonnecke and Dmitry Epstein. Crowdsourcing Internet Governance: The Case of ICANN’s Strategy Panel on Multistakeholder Innovation
• Moderator: Alejandro Pisanty 
  

break

11:00-13:00 – LEGAL CHALLENGES

 User participation, data storage and data (in)security in cyberspace, approached in the first panel, are also subjects of intense intense debate for legal scholars, who are often confronted with the conflict between territoriality and cyberspace. Legal regulations concerning privacy, the growing awareness of hate speech, the right to be forgotten and the challenges of legal compliance in cyberspace are among the topics that will be discussed at a round table with the following experts:

• Markus Oermann, Tobias Mast and Wolfgang Schulz. Doing Internet Governance: Constructing Normative Structures inside and outside of Intermediary Organisations
• Patricia Vargas-Leon. Implications of the application of the “hot pursuit” principle in the cyberspace: an analysis of the case “Microsoft v. United States of America” 
• Nicolas Suzor. Digital constitutionalism: Using the rule of law to evaluate the legitimacy of governance by platforms
• Michael Dick. WIPO’s “Making Available Right” and its Implementation in the Canadian Copyright Regime: At the Intersection of Internet Governance and Intellectual Property Policy
• Moderator: Thiago Tavares 
  

13:00-14:30 lunch break

14:30-15:45 – ACTORS AND POLICIES IN INTERNET GOVERNANCE

 The third panel picks up the topic of participation in a different way. It focuses on questions related to end users and young people involved in, or affected by policies and practices of big IG actors like ICANN and the IGF. ICANN`s New gTLD Program is another form of increasing participation in the Internet. So far, the evaluation of this program is in its early stages and the complexity of the whole process has let to the organization postponing its second round of the program. Also the IGF is a key actor that promotes participation and especially tries to open doors to the next (or rather, the current) generation of Internet users. In this session we want to discuss these aspects of big IG actors:

• Jeanette Hofmann. The founding of the IGF from a field theoretical perspective
• Efrat Daskal and Anna Orlova. Does the world belong to the young? The role of youth in the IGF
• Keisuke Kamimura. Policy oriented evaluation of the expansion of top level domain name space
• Moderator: Marianne Franklin

break

16:00-17:15 – EMERGING ECONOMIES & CRISIS

The ups and downs of participation in the Internet and in Internet Governance can also be observed very well over the past few years in countries with increasing economic growth and also in relation to the Internet. Depending on the context they are labeled as emerging economies, newly industrialized economies, tiger states, BRICS, or developing countries. While some countries benefited from historically and often violently gained economic advantages building basic infrastructure and later telecommunication networks that are today offering stable and strong Internet connections other are still struggling with their colonial past followed by more or less stable ups and downs and unsteady developments. In this last session we want to explore some of these questions and cases and discuss the relation between power and access.

• Kimberly Anastácio. A view from the cheap seats: Internet and colonialism
• Soraia Souza. Internet policy framing in emerging economies: a case study of Marco Civil da Internet, a Brazilian Law for Internet Governance
• Adam Senft and Irene Poetranto. Internet governance during crisis: The changing landscape of Thailand
• Moderator: Daniel Oppermann
• Discussant: Alison Gillwald

17:15-18:00 – FINAL SESSION

•  Summing up
• Updates and Announcements
• Stocktaking and Looking Forward
• Moderator: Marianne Franklin

The symposium will be followed up by the GigaNet Reception at the restaurant MI LOLA, Avenida Providencia 2925, Guadalajara.

GigaNet 10th Annual Symposium

09 November 2015

João Pessoa, Brazil

The Global Internet Governance Academic Network (GigaNet) is presenting its 10th Annual Symposium on 09 November 2015 in the city of João Pessoa, Brazil. The symposium will take place in the Convention Center Poeta Ronaldo Cunha Lima and will once more bring together a large number of Internet governance researchers from several parts of the world discussing some of the most current topics of the field like privacy, human rights, critical infrastructure, multistakeholder systems, regional approaches and more.

GigaNet is inviting all interested individuals to participate in this event which will initiate its first panel at 9h in the morning followed by a truely diversified set of subsequent sessions. Although GigaNet was established as an academic organization it is important to emphasize that people from all sectors of society and independently of their fields of activities are welcome to contribute to the discussions.

The final session in the late afternoon is followed by an easygoing additional event to celebrate the 10th birthday of GigaNet’s Annual Symposium. We hope to see you there!

9:00 WELCOME

• Marianne Franklin, Chair of Steering Committee
• Daniel Oppermann, Chair of Program Committee

9:15-10:45 – MULTISTAKEHOLDER GOVERNANCE APPROACH

The multistakeholder governance approach is one of if not the most important theoretical approach to Internet governance. For many years it has been handled as the basis for setting up inclusive structures on a local, regional and global scale. Over the past years a growing number of researchers has started to analyze and also to question this approach. Some of these researchers will present their ideas and conclusions during this session which will provide us with the necessary theoretical framework for the subsequent debates of the day. The paper presented are:

• Madeline Carr. Power Plays in Multi-stakeholder Internet Governance. 
• Roxana Radu and Nicolo Zingales. In search of the holy grail: meaningful multistakeholder governance in internet policy-making. 
• Stefania Milan and Arne Hintz. In multistakeholderism we trust?
• Moderator: Aline Contti Castro
• Discussant: Mishi Choudhary

10:45-11:00 BREAK
11:00-12:30 WSIS+10 & REGIONAL FOCUS

The World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS) is considered to be a starting point for many Internet governance debates and also for the Internet Governance Forum (IGF) itself. The results of the WSIS meetings in 2003 and 2005 comprise among other documents the first comprehensive definition of Internet governance developed by the then active Working Group on Internet Governance (WGIG). The WSIS process was of great importance for the global dissemination of Internet governance debates. What happened to the WSIS process over the past 10 years? Which path did the actors involved back then took over the last years and how does this affect today’s Internet policy development processes on a global and a regional level? These and other related questions we want to discuss at a round table based on the following papers:

• Julia Pohle. Internet governance within WSIS+10: Deliberative exclusion or strategic neglect? 
• Rikke Frank Jorgensen and Meryem Marzouki. Internet Governance and the Reshaping of Global Human Rights Legacy at WSIS+10. 
• Carolina Aguerre and Hernan Galperin. Internet Policy Formation in Latin America: Understanding the Links between National, Regional, and Global Dynamics.
• Courtney Radsch. The changing landscape of Internet governance in the Arab region.
• Moderator: Marianne Franklin

12:30-14:00 LUNCH BREAK

14:00-15:30 TRUST & ETHICS

While the fast and dynamic character of global Internet development does often not allow us to identify and follow all changes and processes happening in the plurality of locations in this world there are always certain key moments which call global attention and might as a consequence change perceptions and influence decision-making processes of several global, regional and local actors. One of these key moments in the history of the Internet are the so called Snowden revelations which since 2013 function as a game-changer for many actors involved in and also beyond the Internet governance environment. Today’s discussions surrounding these developments lead us to a series of much broader questions related also to a general set of fundamental values like freedom, responsibility and sustainability. Together with Jeanette Hofmann and Rolf H. Weber we want to discuss in this session the role of values and the importance of trust and distrust in the global Internet governance environment. The papers presented are:

• Rolf H. Weber. Ethics as New Topic in the Internet Governance Ecosystem. 
• Jeanette Hofmann. Constellations of trust and distrust in Internet governance.
• Samantha Bradshaw: Trust and Internet governance.
• Moderator: Daniel Oppermann
• Discussant: Xianhong Hu

15:30-15:45 BREAK
15:45-17:15 INFRASTRUCTURE & CRITICAL INTERNET RESOURCES

Naturally, Internet governance is also to an extensive degree focused on questions of technical infrastructure and critical Internet resources. One crucial question is the ambivalent relation between actors representing traditional approaches like national souvereignty and the nonambiguous transboundery character of computer networks like the Internet. The conflicts that arise in this context embrace different aspects like top level domains (TLDs) or financial transactions and are often related to questions of technical, financial or even national security. These and other questions including critical infrastructure and the actors involved in its development and maintenance we want to elaborate together with the authors of the following papers:

• Brenden Kuerbis, Milton Mueller and Rio Maulana. Beyond technical solutions: Understanding the role of governance structures in Internet routing security. 
• Milton Mueller and Farzaneh Badiei. Sovereignty and Property Rights: Conceptualizing the Relationship between ICANN, ccTLDs and National Governments. 
• Diego Vicentin. Developing standards, shaping the network: ethnographic notes on the IEEE 802 LAN/MAN Standards Committee.
• Moderator: Olga Cavalli

17:15-18:00 FINAL SESSION

– Summing up
– Updates and Announcements
– Stocktaking and Looking Forward

• Moderator: Marianne Franklin 
• Rapporteur: Julia Pohle

The symposium will be followed up by GigaNet Anniversary Reception in Tambaú.

GigaNet 9th Annual Symposium

1 September 2014

Istanbul, Turkey

8:30 – 9:00 WELCOME AND INTRODUCTIONS

9:00 – 10:30 THEORETICAL SESSION: Conceptualizing Internet governance

• Carolina Aguerre. A framework for national mechanisms on Internet governance
• Kirsten Gollatz, Jeanette Hofmann and Christian Katzenbach. Between Coordination and Regulation: Conceptualizing Governance in Internet Governance
• Rolf Weber. Proliferation of “Internet governance”

11:00 – 12:30 EMERGING SCHOLAR SESSION: Institutional innovation in Internet governance

• Andreas Kuehn. A New Paradigm in Securing Software Vulnerabilities – An Institutional Analysis of Emerging Bug Bounty Programs and their Implications for Cybersecurity and Internet Governance
• Uta Meier-Hahn. Internet interconnection: how economic sociology can inform the discourse on internet governance
• Trisha Meyer. Access and Control: The Political Economy of Online Copyright Enforcement in the European Union

12:30 – 1:30 LUNCH

1:30 – 3:00 INTERACTIVE SESSION: Multistakeholder governance and its alternatives

• Samantha Bradshaw, Laura DeNardis, Fen Hampson, Eric Jardine, and Mark Raymond. The Emergence of Contention in Global Internet Governance
• Aaron van Klyton and Kerry Holden. Exploring the tensions and incongruities of Internet governance in Africa
• Derrick Cogburn. Uncovering the Conceptual Antecedents of the NETMundial Outcome Document on the Future of Global Internet Governance

3:30 – 5:00 INTERACTIVE SESSION: The DNS and global Internet governance

• Hong Xue. ICANN New gTLD RPMs Caveats of Intermediary Liability in Domain Name System
• Patricia Vargas-Leon and Andreas Kuehn. Political Economy of Critical Internet Resources: South America vs. Amazon
• Kenneth Merrill. A Marketplace of Networks: Power and counter-power in the DNS