Contents last updated: 5/28/2003
What is open Internet governance? Internet users have criticized attempts by traditional governing bodies to regulate the Internet, arguing that such regulation is inconsistent with its "wild frontier" philosophy and borderless geography. Berkman Fellow John Perry Barlow’s A Declaration of the Independence of Cyberspace famously argues that governance of any sort is antithetical to the inherent openness of the Internet. Yet even in the absence of official government action, the Internet is governed—by the social norms of Internet users and through its technical architecture, the code that determines how users navigate the space.
These more subtle forms of governance are open in that they bear no relation to closed geographic areas, but instead apply to the fluid communities of cyberspace. On the other hand, they are also potentially closed: Internet communities can enforce social norms that close them off from dissent and diversity; the Internet’s technical architecture can be shaped by software companies or standards organizations in ways that are not comprehensible to the average user, not open to appeal, not accountable to any defined constituency, and not necessarily subject to the free expression, privacy, and procedural requirements commonly applied to governments.
The Berkman Center examines the boundaries between open and closed systems of Internet governance by studying governments' traditional and nontraditional means of regulating the Internet, the norms emerging in online communities, and the technical, legal and political mechanisms by which the architecture of the Internet is determined.
The centerpiece of our research on Internet governance has been our work with the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN), the nonprofit corporation responsible for governing the Internet Protocol (IP) number system, the Domain Name System (DNS), and related Internet protocols. These key elements of the Internet's architecture allow for the numerical assignment of computers and the mapping of names (such as cyber.harvard.edu) to those numbers.
For years, the United States government, through contractors including the Internet Assigned Numbers Authority and Network Solutions, Inc., coordinated the assignment of IP numbers and domain names. In June 1998, the United States government published its "White Paper" on the Management of Internet Names and Addresses, which called for a change in this coordination system that would respond to the Internet’s increasing globalization and diversity. In particular, the White Paper announced the government’s intention to end its role in IP numbers and DNS coordination and called for the creation of a new, nonprofit corporation to take over these and related functions. After months of contentious debate (which continued years of pre-White Paper debate on the future of these systems), a corporation was formed to undertake this role. But now the debate has turned to how that new corporation, the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) will perform its governance tasks—how it can be open and accountable to its global constituency while ensuring the stability of the Internet.
The Berkman Center played an active role in this transformation and the debate accompanying it. First, we took part in a series of conferences, collectively referred to as the International Forum on the White Paper (IFWP), aimed at gathering consensus on how—and by whom—the post-White Paper IP and DNS systems would be run. At the request of the IFWP chair, Jonathan Zittrain and Lawrence Lessig served as moderators during a key IFWP meeting. The Berkman Center also developed a web-based IFWP discussion forum and a comprehensive website compendium of IFWP-related materials.
In October 1998, ICANN was incorporated. The Corporation, which sought formal recognition by the United States government as the body called for in the White Paper, asked the Berkman Center to facilitate an open meeting at which its board members would introduce themselves to the public and gather input as to how the corporation could be structured to fairly represent diverse Internet stakeholders. Berkman Center staff and fellows organized the logistical and technical aspects of the meeting, which included our development of a real-time scribe system enabling the live broadcast of scribe's notes onto the Internet. Charles Nesson, Jonathan Zittrain, and Molly Shaffer Van Houweling served as moderators, and the Berkman Center compiled a complete multimedia archive of the meeting, now archived on the Berkman site.
ICANN received formal recognition through a Memorandum of Understanding on November 25, 1998, and subsequently asked Molly Shaffer Van Houweling and Andrew McLaughlin to extend their facilitative roles to become senior advisors to the corporation. In addition, ICANN requested that the Berkman Center undertake an independent study on possible options for its membership structure—the mechanism by which the corporation will represent the Internet community at large.
That study addressed the full range of Internet governance issues the Berkman Center researches. How can a governing body adequately and fairly represent the diverse interests of a global constituency? Given that decision-making regarding Internet protocol systems comprises technical, legal and political considerations, how should the average user be integrated in the process? What kind of membership system would ensure ongoing equal representation of Internet stakeholders, withstanding capture by special-interest groups?
In conjunction with the study, the Berkman Center held a Representation in Cyberspace Workshop in January 1999 that provided an open platform for discussion of these issues. The diverse, international group of attendees joined a number of participants who took part in the workshop via the Internet. In addition to watching the proceedings on the Web, these participants were able to submit email comments, which were then posted in real time along with scribe's notes, allowing for a truly interactive experience.
More recent Berkman work with ICANN involved research into new and innovative methods to involve online users and interested parties in open meetings with the ICANN Board of Directors. Berkman affiliates, fellows and staff traveled to ICANN's quarterly meetings all around the world to provide solutions that combine webcasting, web-based comment submission, and online real-time scribing in an attempt to create a "virtual" meeting space in the conference room with the Board.
In addition, the Berkman Center conducted research into how specifications might be structured for an online deliberative process, sharing our work-in-progress in order to encourage substantive feedback from the Internet community at large.
Our current study of ICANN gives the Berkman Center a unique opportunity to learn about and help shape a new form of governance for the Internet—one that can potentially respond to rapid change yet maintain the openness and accountability that lend authority and legitimacy to more traditional forms. Our hope is that this research will promote the development of open Internet governance, defining new mechanisms that will fortify user sovereignty, sustain accountability to the constituency, and uphold the principles of free expression, privacy, and due process applied to traditional governments.
Contents last updated: 5/28/2003