Media Updates

World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS)

Leslie Regan Shade
October 15, 2005

The World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS) is an initiative of the International Telecommunications Union (ITU), bringing together three diverse stakeholder groups: governments, the private sector, and civil society. The first phase of WSIS transpired in 2003, with a series of regional and planning meetings (“PrepComs”), culminating in a Geneva Summit in December 2003; while the second phase consists, again, of a series of regional and planning meetings and a summit in Tunis, Tunisia in November 2005.

The purpose of WSIS is to articulate core principles and a common vision towards an understanding of the information society, and to develop an action strategy for coordinated development.

The Summit enjoys the high patronage of UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan with the International Telecommunications Union (ITU) taking a leading role in its preparation in cooperation with interested UN organizations, including UNESCO, and the host countries. In Canada, Industry Canada, the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (DFAIT) and the Canadian Commission for UNESCO have played an active role in the PrepComs and Summits.

WSIS 1- 2003

The Draft Declaration of Principles (December 9, 2003, and approved by the Preparatory Committee December 10 ), as developed by the WSIS Inter-Sessional, lays out a broad range of values that characterize an information society. This information society builds on the principles of the Charter of the United Nations, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, and the Millennium Declaration and has as its broad overarching theme "common desire and commitment to build a people-centred, inclusive and development oriented Information Society, where everyone can create, access, utilize and share information and knowledge, enabling individuals, communities and peoples to achieve their full potential in promoting their sustainable development and improving their quality of life."

Summary of WSIS Draft Principles and Action Plan (December 9, 2003, approved by Preparatory Committee December 10, and adopted at Summit)
(For complete versions see: http://www.itu.int/wsis/documents/doc_single-en-1161.asp and http://www.itu.int/wsis/documents/doc_single-en-1160.asp) )

Building the Information Society: a global challenge in the new Millennium

1) The role of governments, the business sector, and civil society in the promotion of ICTs for development: all stakeholders should be actively involved in decision making at all levels.

Action Plan: Increased cooperation and partnership between all stakeholders is encouraged. All sectors should mainstream ICT services into their programs and assist developing countries in meeting these same goals. Innovative forms of partnership are also envisioned, including public private partnerships (PPPs), incubator schemes, venture capital investments, government investment funds, and research support and development networks.

2) Information and communication infrastructure: connectivity (to ICTs and other communication infrastructures such as postal services and broadcasting) is emphasized as a crucial component of the information society. Broadband access is encouraged. Universal access policies should be developed via governments, with both public and private sector support. Indicators of connectivity should be developed that disaggregate data by gender and rural penetration.

Action Plan: particular attention must be paid to ensuring that all vulnerable countries and communities can be assisted. Establishing funds for ICT projects in least developed countries (LDCs) is emphasized.

Universal access is a key component . Governments are encouraged to define and establish policies and targeted funding towards universal access provisions, in cooperation with the private sector and civil society. Efforts towards ameliorating the digital divide include monitoring technological convergence with a goal towards integration of ICTs into all facets of communication, and ensuring that the needs of vulnerable groups are considered in both the design and usability features of ICTs.

Access to information and knowledge is a key element of the information society, and attention is paid to on the importance of maintaining and encouraging information in the public domain. Governments are encouraged to develop policies and guidelines towards this end, provide free access on the Internet to information of a public mature, adopt electronic freedom of information acts, and create global portals of open access journals, books, and scientific information. Libraries, archives, and community access sites are a crucial physical infrastructure. Open source software, multi-platform and open platforms at an affordable cost are also encouraged.

3) Access to information and knowledge: this involves promotion of open access, open standards, development of multilingual translation software, open source software, and public access points. Emphasis is made to encourage and sustain “a vibrant and rich public domain,” and the importance of libraries and archives.

Action Plan: The importance of information in the public domain was reaffirmed, as was the role of libraries and archives. The importance of government in supporting public access sites and the development and deployment of open source software was also elaborated.

4) Capacity building: Institutions should be able to provide education and skills training to ensure that everyone can benefit from ICTs. Human capacity needs include developing digital literacy skills and life-long learning.

Action Plan: Encouraging the use of ICTs in education at all levels is stressed–curriculum development, teacher training, institutional administration, and management. ICT literacy and training skills should be designed and promoted. Distance education and training, and program development for young girls and women is also highlighted.

5) Building confidence, trust and security in the use of ICTs: privacy, consumer protection, security, and authentication are rudiments for an information society. A “global culture of cyber-security” needs to be built up in coordination with government, civil society, the private sector, and expert security bodies.

Action Plan: Effective information security should be the goal here, with security, authentication, privacy, and consumer protection intrinsic to the information society. Human rights, freedom of expression, and privacy should underpin a “global culture of cyber-security,” with protection from civil and criminal “cybercrimes”.

6) Enabling environment: governance structures must be transparent, flexible, stable and participatory. The rights of individuals, especially children, should be protected. Intellectual property protection is essential. Standardization should be encouraged. Management of the radio frequency spectrum should be done in the public interest and in accordance with national laws, regulation and various international agreements.

Action Plan: Actions include encouraging all countries to join international trade agreements on basic telecommunications services, supporting small and medium-sized enterprises in the ICT sector, promoting and mainstreaming a principle of non-discrimination and equal opportunity in national, regional, and international ICT regulation, promoting interoperability, creating policies for spam, facilitating laws for electronic commerce, and establishing an international regime prohibiting the circulation of pornographic and other harmful materials. Internet governance should be internationalized to achieve a “universally representative solution” with a dialogue amongst governments, the private sector, and civil society “to ensure the most appropriate management structure. Towards this end, a working group on Internet governance has been proposed. Intellectual property rights should strike a fair balance between creators and owners, with attention paid to the needs of the academic community and strengthened protection for the information rights of indigenous communities.

7) ICT applications: ICTs should be used to create benefits for all, including uses in government, health care, education, employment, business, culture, management of natural resources, and for alleviating poverty. Applications should encourage usability, accessibility, affordability, and sensitivity to local needs, culture, and socio-economics. Sustainability through consumption and production should be encouraged.

Action Plan: ICTs should be used as a supportive mechanism for social and economic development in public administration, business, education, health, employment, environment, agriculture, and science. Applications are for e-government, e-business, e-health, e-learning, e-employment, e-environment, e-agriculture, and e-science.

8) Cultural identity, linguistic diversity, and local content: ICTs should be used to preserve and promote cultural heritage, including the public domain of cultural information, linguistic diversity, multilingualism, and local and indigenous content.

Action Plan: Governments should conform with UNESCO’s Universal Declaration and Action Plan on Cultural Diversity by thinking of innovative ways to use ICTs to preserve cultural diversity and heritage and to protect languages. Private and public partnerships should ensure that local content is supported.

Governments should develop or preserve legislation that guarantees media independence, and assist state media to transform their systems into public services with editorial autonomy. Media professionals should commit themselves to establishing partnerships and working with the media in developing countries and disadvantaged societies.

9) Media Development: Independent, pluralistic, and free media, is essential to the information society. Diversity of media ownership should be encouraged. Traditional media should be sustained.

Action Plan: Encourage media to play a role in the information society; encourage domestic legislation that guarantees the independence and plurality of the media; encourage the establishment of professional journalistic networks. Take measures to combat media and ICT pornography. Promote balanced and diverse portrayal of women in the media.

10) Ethical dimensions: Values such as “freedom, equality, solidarity, tolerance, shared responsibility and respect for nature” should be upheld. Promotion of the common good, protection of privacy and prevention of abuses are paramount.

Action Plan: Stakeholders should be invited to provide input on ethical issues. Stakeholders should also take appropriate actions and preventative measures against illegal and other acts motivated by racial hatred, violence, xenophobia, and all forms of child abuse.

11) International and regional cooperation: Political dialogue amongst all nations should be encouraged. Developing countries need to become integrated into the information society, and various funding and cooperation programs should aid in this in providing financial and technical assistance, technology transfer, examples of best practices, and knowledge sharing. All stakeholders are invited to commit to the ‘Digital Solidarity Agenda’.

Action Plan: Cooperation amongst UN agencies to achieve this goal, with the support of government leaders of developing countries should be established within the context of the UN’s “Global Compact.” The Digital Solidarity Fund would put in place financial and technical resources for inclusion of all men and women in the information society. This should include national e-strategies, including poverty reduction programmes, mobilization of resources, and private sector contribution to the fund. National mechanism to bridge the digital divide through established of universal service programmes should be considered. A national ICT Development Index should be established. ii

WSIS 2-2005

The second phase of WSIS is meant to concretize the Plan of Action and to work on issues specifically related to Internet Governance, and Financial Mechanisms for funding ICT 4 Development. A Working Group on Internet Governance (WGIG) has been formed, as well as a Task Force on Financial Mechanisms (TFFM).

WGIG

The WGIG consisted of 40 members from governments, private sector and civil society. The WGIG has been asked to “investigate and make proposals for action, as appropriate, on the governance of the Internet by 2005”, dealing with the following issues:

“1. Develop a working definition of Internet governance

2. Identify the public policy issues that are relevant to Internet governance
3. Develop a common understanding of the respective roles and responsibilities of Governments, existing international organizations and other forums, as well as the private sector and civil society in both developing and developed countries.”

The WGIG was chaired by Nitin Desai, Special Adviser to the Secretary-General for the WSIS. The Background Report contains much of the work of the WGIG, reflecting a wide diversity of opinion from the WGIG.

WGIG was guided by WSIS principles, particularly that of the secure and stable functioning of the internet.

Its definition of Internet Governance was the following:

Internet governance is the development and application by Governments, the private sector and civil society, in their respective roles, of shared principles, norms, rules, decision-making procedures, and programmes that shape the evolution and use of the Internet.

This definition goes beyond dealing with issues dealt with by ICANN (the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers). It encompasses issues of relevance to public policy, including Internet security and safety, technical developments, and the maintenance of critical resources.
Priority areas identified by WGIG included:

1. Administration of the root zone files and system
2. Interconnection costs
3. Spam
4. Meaningful participation in global policy development
5. Capacity Building
6. Allocation of domain names
7. IP addressing
8. Intellectual property rights
9. Freedom of expression
10. Data protection and privacy rights
11. Consumer rights
12. Multilingualism

Task Force on Financial Mechanisms (TFFM)

The United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) led the Task Force on Financial Mechanisms in collaboration with the World Bank, UN DESA, and other key partners. The mandate of the Task Force was to “conduct extensive consultations, research, and reviews of information surrounding the role and effectiveness of financial mechanisms to support ICT for development.” The final report of the TFFM grouped the main areas of concern under five general categories which relate to the WSIS themes:

1. Enabling environment and policies
2. Infrastructure
3. Access
4. Content & Applications
5. Capacity Development

Seventeen general findings were outlined. They are:

1. The global ICT sector is dynamic and transformational.
2. ICTs are emerging as a vital factor in economic and social development. They can achieve developmental objectives.
3. A supportive environment is needed to attract investment into the ICT4D sector. This includes an ICT policy and regulatory environment that includes open entry, fair competition, and market-oriented regulation.
4. A supportive development policy for ICT4D through national e-strategies and the integration of ICT into poverty reduction, is needed.
5. Open access policy mechanisms are needed to attract private investment, civil society, and community networks to ICT4D.
6. The international private sector has become the dominant player in infrastructure development.
7. Investment shifts have veered towards domestic, regional, and south-south financing and investment.
8. ICT investments in developing countries are encouraged by domestic financial mechanisms and multi-stakeholder partnerships.
9. Multinational development banks and international donors have re-directed public resources from direct financing to policy reforms and infrastructure development.
10. National universal service and access funds that promote community access can play an important role addressing ICT access gaps; however, institutional capacity is needed to succeed.
11. Regional cooperation, multi-stakeholder partnerships, and seed financing are critical for addressing infrastructure gaps.
12. International donors are redirecting resources to ICT policy and strategy development.
13. Evidence indicates that ICTs that deliver relevant and valuable information applications, services and content to developing countries.
14. Many ICT4D initiatives and experiments are being financed by a wide spectrum of donors, NGOs, foundations, and international organizations.
15. Government can enable successful "e-strategies.
16. Building knowledge is key for achieving Information Society objectives.
17. ICT-related capacity building needs in the public sector represent a high priority in all developing countries.

The TFFM recommended coordination across financing programs and ICT development initiatives, multi-stakeholder partnerships to achieve these goals, an emphasis on domestic finance to support innovative financial mechanisms, private sector support for locally relevant applications and content, and encouragement of increased voluntary, consumer-based contributions.

Resources
World Summit on the Information Society Website: http://www.itu.int/wsis/

Canada’s Web Site for WSIS
http://www.wsis-smsi.gc.ca/

Canadian Contribution to WSIS Prepcom
www.wsis-canada.gc.ca/act/en/docs/ContributionPrepCom1.htm

Canada at the WSIS
http://www.wsis-canada.gc.ca/act/en/canada.htm

WSIS Survey
http://www.wsis-smsi.gc.ca/cgi-bin/checkInfo.pl?language=en

Canadian UN Commission
http://www.unesco.ca/english/Culture/culture-wsis.htm

Journal Articles
Information Technologies and International Development Journal (Summer 2004). 1(3-4). Special Issue on WSIS. URL: http://mitpress.mit.edu/catalog/item/default.asp?ttype=5&tid=1557

Marita Moll, and Leslie Regan Shade. (2004). “Vision Impossible? The World Summit on the Information Society”. In Seeking Convergence in Policy and Practice: Communications in the Public Interest, v.2, edited by Marita Moll and Leslie Regan Shade. Ottawa: CCPA, pp. 45-80.

Wolfang Kleinwachter. (2004). Beyond ICANN vs. ITU: How WSIS Tries to Enter the New Territory of Internet Governance. Gazette: the International Journal for Communication Studies 66 (3-4): 233-251.

Aida Opoku-Mensah. (2004). Twin Peaks: WSIS from Geneva to Tunis: Whither Africa in the Information Society? Gazette: the International Journal for Communication Studies 66 (3-4): 253-273.

Claudia Padovani. (2004). The World Summit on the Information Society: Setting the Communication Agenda for the 21st Century?, An Ongoing Exercise. Gazette: the International Journal for Communication Studies 66 (3-4): 187-191.

Audrey Selian. (2004). The World Summit on the Information Society and Civil Society Participation. The Information Society 20: 201-215.

Annabelle Sreberny. (2004). WSIS: Articulating Information at the Summit. Gazette: the International Journal for Communication Studies 66 (3-4): 193-201.

Yuezhi Zhao. (2004). Between a World Summit and a Chinese Movie: Visions of the ‘Information Society’. Gazette: the International Journal for Communication Studies 66 (3-4): 275-280.

Don MacLean. (2003). The Quest for Inclusive Governance of Global ICTs: Lessons from the ITU in the Limits of National Sovereignty. Information Technologies and International Development 1(1): 1-18.

Wolfgang Kleinwachter. (March 2003). Global Governance in the Information Age. Development 46(1): 17-25.

Dieter Zinnbauer. (2001). Internet, Civil Society, and Global Governance: The Neglected Political Dimension of the Digital Divide. Information, Communication & Society 7: 45-64.

Brian D. Loader, ed. (1997). The Governance of Cyberspace: Politics, Technology, and Global Restructuring. Routledge.