[WSIS CS-Plenary] S&T for Development in WSIS - notes from meeting in Washington

[Ralf Bendrath]

Hi all,

Fullsack Jean-Louis wrote:

> Many thanks Ralf. Be attentive and tell these business managers the opinion of CS.

Actually it was not only business people, but many from scientific
organizations who more belong to civil society. But the good old cs
left-liberal groups were missing who still have principles and don't let
themselves buyout by private sector money.

And yes: We told them what we think. Not everything (time for discussion
was limited), but at least we were there and held up the flag.

Here are the notes I took durng the meeting. Pretty unedited, but
probably interesting. 
Bottom line: Private Sector and Science Community is going to developing
countries to tell them how to regulate (read: dereulate and privatize)
their information society. The Washington CS groups really should become
more active here, if I may suggest. Well, Frannie ad the Public Voice is
working on this, as is the CRIS USA chapter, but there is still a lot to
do.

Best, Ralf

-------------------------

US National Academies
Science and Technology for Development of the Information Society
Planning Meeting for Post-WSIS I Follow-up Activities
Washington DC, 23 March 2004


Session I: Overview presentations

Opening Remarks
William Wulf, Natl. Academy of Engineering
-wsis.nap.edu

US Government Interests in WSIS
Richard Beaird, US State Department (the big guy who was in Geneva all
the time, RB)
-WSIS "an experience you can keep living"
-Regions of the world reached remarkable similar conclusions:
  oICTs are important for their development (economic, political,
cultural)
  oAll wanted to further their involvement. Question only was: How where
when?
  oPrinciple vehicle for this InfoSoc they want to be part of is the
internet
  oSomething healthy in all that for us
  oOur fear of what the world would do with the InfoSoc became less
  oWe have been mostly involved with the private sector
  oWe now deal with civil society and scientific community
  oNow there are all three major pillars of our society involved:
Private Sector, Civil Society, Scientific Community
  oThree principles
   - Cyber Security
   - Infrastructure development
   - Capacity building
  o'summit is not only about developing world!
  oMajor Principles for US: 
   - Free flow of information & freedom of the press
     - "enabling environment" as in plan of action
     - rule of law
     - foreign direct investment
     - tech is an enabler, not an end in itself
     - chances for SMEs, especially important in the developing world
     - intellectual property rights: key principle, have been endorsed
in the first phase. "Key enabler for disseminating knowledge"
     - tech-neutral international standards
     - governments have to play a role in the delivering of fundamental
social services (education, health, 
)
   o aware of our audience: developed and developing world
     - we must be sensitive to those in marginalized areas
     - our partners in civil society and private sector
     - work together with them

UNESCO's interests in WSIS
Mogens Schmidt, UNESCO
- UNESCO overview: education, science, culture, communication as areas
of action
- WSIS plan of action is mirroring UNESCO's activities
- rather "knowledge societies" than "information society"
- enhancing info-flows is not sufficient, you need to strengthen
reflection etc.
- four principles for UNESCO:
  oFreedom of expression
  oUniversal access to info and knowledge
  oHuman dignity and cultural and linguistic diversity
  oQuality education for all
-WSIS II:
 oFinance /digital solidarity agenda
 oInternet governance
 oNetwork security
 omain focus for UNESCO: 
  - building capacities in the developing world, practicing digital
solidarity
  - scientific information sharing: we support this different IPR model.
The IPR issue will pop up again! UNESCO developing policy guidelines for
public domain information
 oInternet governance: UNESCO would support any model that maintains the
openness of the current ICANN model without creating a new bureaucracy
  - UNESCO will hold a multi-stakeholder meeting on 7 April in Paris on
phase two structure and issues.

The Overseas Private Investment Corporation (OPIC) program for ICT
infrastructure
Jim Gale, OPIC
- were part of the Marshal Plan
- direct investment & insurance in ICT infrastructure build-up in the
developing world (infrastructure, B2B projects, wired and wireless, 
)
- mission: mobilize and facilitate US private capital investment in the
developing world
- OPIC has given or insured some tens of billions of US-Dollars
-At WSIS 2003 they announced a new programme: 400 million dollar fund to
help broaden US ICT companies involvement in developing countries
- www.opic.gov
- jgale at opic.gov

Questions & Answers

(some others went to the microphone, but I was busy preparing my
remarks/questions. RB)

Ralf Bendrath 
- CS involvement in US delegation? --> no, but fighting for CS
participation in rules of procedure
- ICANN / Internet governance debate? --> no specific interest to engage
in this
- intergovernmental bureau meeting last Friday (March 19)? ' no new
president elected
- rumours say US govt is planning a thematic meeting on cyber-security?
--> Beaird did not know about this
- Tunisia? --> Demarche from EU (Irish presidency) two weeks ago, George
W Bush has addressed human rights situation directly with president Ben
Ali recently.


Break

Session II: Proposals for WSIS-related Public-Sector Projects

Chair:Paul Uhlir, National Research Council, ISTIP

-Wesley Shrum by conference call
 oPre-summit event "Past, Present and Future of Science and Engineering
in the Information Society", Tunis, November 13-15  
 oSheet was distributed on this
 oThe draft of the web page is at http://worldsci.net
-AAAS (American Association for Advancement of Science) / Association
for Women in Science): 
 obetter dissemination of scientific information
 ogender issues in ICT, 
 oinvolve AAAS members into bridging digital divides; 
 oIPR: increase access to scientific information by developing nations,
determine acceptable levels of protection of IPRs for all
-Institute of Museum and Library Services
 oAlso planning a pre-summit conference on the role of libraries in the
information society
 oSheet with more info was distributed
 oContact: Joyce Ray jray at inls.gov
-NRC, ISTIP Office
 oGlobal series of workshops on open access to digital information
resources
 oGoal: develop economically sustainable models for access to scientific
information, mainly in health and environment areas. Multi-Stakeholder
approach
 oInventory of what US public sector in S&T has already underway with
regard to action plan implementation in developing countries, to be
officially delivered by US government at next summit. "Will not too hard
to do, but be quite impressive". Will not cost any extra money. ;-)
Encourages private Sector to do the same.
 oCODATA-ICSTI Web portal for archiving digital scientific information
resources, with emphasis on developing countries. Conference in Berlin
in November 2004.

Discussion:

- who is collecting all this info? ' no-one yet
- listserv will be created as outcome of this meeting for US S&T
coordination, contact:  Paul Uhlir, National Research Council, ISTIP
- what came out of CERN meeting right before WSIS 2003? ' publications
planned
- what happened to the project ideas that came up at the WSIS
roundtables?
- Link between MDGs and WSIS outcomes?
- Who can help the scientific organizations who want to help the WSIS
action plan to happen but don't know how to do this? ' UNESCO and others
are trying to create clearinghouses. Also use www.wsis-online.net! But
also do it nationally!

Session 3: Proposals for WSIS-related Public-Private Partnerships

Introductory Remarks
Marilyn Cade, AT&T
- companies are not able to be involved as they used to be
- "private sector = NGOs and companies"
- examples: 
  o educational programmes for regulators all over the world,
US-Congress funded, the participants afterwards go back to their
countries and implement it. "You can help here!"
  o EU-funded programme that educates people in eastern European and
developing countries on how to run an ISP, negotiate bandwidth etc.
  o IT mentors programme: USAID funded: helping to set up ICT business
associations in developing countries. 
- "Introducing privatization in developing countries is still work in
progress"
- how do we advance the building up of infrastructure in those
countries? Get away from routing every packet through the US.
- How do they get the money?
- Some funding could be re-prioritized
- Do it as multi-stakeholder-approach! Re-create the original founding
structure of the internet!

Project Presentations

- Global Internet Policy Initiative (GIPI)
 oCDT and others are running it
 oHow to build policy reform into the info-society?
 o' how to bring deregulation, privatization, democracy, human rights
etc.into developing countries' internet policy reform?
 o' working on them country by country by multi-stakeholder-approaches
 obased on best practices and international standards
 oactive in India, Russia, Indonesia, etc., many in Caucasian countries
 overy good record in working with US gov, private sector and UN
agencies
 ono parachute-in - parachute-out approach
 ohave a project on information security in Russia (!)
 owww.internetpolicy.net

- Interoperable Search Standard for Government Information
 oProposal by US Geological Survey
 oCommon search standard for govt. information proposed
 oGovernments and parliaments are interested, but need some incentive
 oPart of WSIS e-government actions
 oUse open standards from ISO etc.
 oMakes govt systems more robust in case of changes of technical systems
Hardware, Software)
 oDon't want to be dependent on Google's trade secrets on how the page
ranking is done
 oIT companies could become involved and work together (Oracle,
Microsoft, Sun, others), they have been doing this before (for
Geological Data)
 oWorks with Internet, gene data, pictures, everyting
 oContact: Eliot Christian, echristian at usgs.gov

Here, an interesting discussion popped up on what the "original goal of
WSIS" was and where it went. Private sector people arguing for
"de-politicizing" the process in order to get infrastructure projects up
und running. 
(Personal remark: There are no "non-political" projects. And civil
society's very important contribution to WSIS was to move the debate
from "information (read: ICTs) to "society", which is of course highly
political. The attempt of private sector companies to "de-politicize" it
will only further lead to the hegemony of the free market model. RB)

- People Link 
  o "Internet you can eat"
  o active in 42 countries
  o Did not really tell what they do, sorry. 

- World Federation of Scientists: Permanent Monitoring Panel of
Information Security
  o Part of WFS's efforts to warn of planetary emergencies
  o Secretary general of NATO is chair here
  o Delivered report to UNGA etc. 
  o The usual fear-mongering, but also raised concerns on
privacy-threats.(RB)

Questions and Answers

Ralf Bendrath:
  o Information Security: careful, can be about "content security" (i.e.
censorship)
  o Privacy under threat, not security. Much bigger planetary emergency!
  o --> answer: Don't want discussion, but get projects done.

Discussion on a US action plan for implementation of WSIS action plan
- no plans yet at government level
- government will have it very narrow if they do anything here
- multi-stakeholder-approach should be started here to broaden it
- other way: first make a survey of who is doing actual stuff anyway
that relates to the WSIS action plan headlines
- "would be good for state department also"
- more on the above mentioned listserv to be set up