Fine discussion of civil society and free speech at ICANN
Circle ID has published an excellent discussion, by Rebecca MacKinnon, of civil society and free speech at ICANN. It touches on a number of topics, with an emphasis on China, but overall it’s about how ICANN can help guarantee some measure of free speech — not just within ICANN (yawn), but around the world, on the Internet as a whole.
From this perspective, consider the recent folderol about the Non-Commercial Users Constituency (NCUC). If you’ve been following this — which I don’t recommend unless you have an big appetite for petty insults — you’ll know that the NCUC came up with a (bottom-up) charter for how it should run itself, which was in large part replaced by the ICANN staff with a different (top-down) charter. Shrill howls ensued, ringing down the virtual corridors of the mailing lists.
Ms. McKinnon hits the nail on the head:
[T]here appear to be concerns amongst some members of the ICANN board that the NCUC is dominated by a certain group of American lawyers and academics, who for some reason they don’t like. There are a lot of personal animosities in both directions that seem to go way back to when ICANN was founded. Who gives a flying fart about those fights beyond the people involved? Everybody involved with ICANN needs to put the past behind them and figure out how to prove to the world that it can indeed be an effective, truly multi-stakeholder organization that represents the interests of the world’s Internet users.
Until recently, the NCUC (which in my observation has in fact until now been run mainly by American and European academics and lawyers), has not had the depth of expertise and experience among its membership—and leadership—to be truly helpful on matters of greatest concern to the developing and non-English speaking world. Nor has the At-Large constituency—the other potential vehicle for individual user interests seemed to be very useful in that regard. But the NCUC has in the past few months undergone a big recruitment drive and has brought in a lot of new members from around the world. I’m optimistic that with its new bottom-up structure (if ICANN allows it) the concerns of a new, more diverse membership will be able to drive the constituency’s work at ICANN in the future. I’m also optimistic that if members of civil society groups around the world view the NCUC as an effective way to engage with ICANN, they will make greater effort to participate. It’s time for ICANN to prove that its multi-stakeholder bottom-up process, which new CEO Rod Beckstrom has been bragging about, is not a sham. [Emphases mine.]
Sometimes the best thing to do is to just get out of the way. Many people involved with ICANN — both paid and volunteer — think that ICANN wouldn’t be where it is today without them. Who knows if that’s true, but if they thought about where ICANN has ended up, they might rue the claim. It’s definitely time for new blood at ICANN, starting with the CEO, and this most recent spat does seem to have drawn in new participants. Perhaps the endless fight about the non-commercial constituency will finally have a good effect.
In any case, thank you Ms. McKinnon for a thoughtful piece from a real-world perspective.
