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There is considerable international discussion at the moment over whether internet access should be recognised as a fundamental human right.
The ability of the internet to allow people to communicate, access education, jobs, participate in democratic processes and to create businesses makes it a powerful force for opportunity. It helps the poor to help themselves out of poverty and the disenfranchised to have a voice.
A growing number of countries around the world have recognised the internet as a fundamental human right. France did so in July 2009 and Finland followed in October, making access to a 1Mb connection a right as an interim step towards making 100Mb access (the proposed speed of the Australian National Broadband Network) a right by 2015. Estonia, known for its forays into internet voting, and Greece have also made internet access a right.
A recent BBC survey of 27,000 people across 26 countries found that 79% of people agreed that internet access should be a human right. An even higher 85% of Australian respondents believed that internet access should be a right and 87% of Chinese respondents held the same view.
The United Nations is also moving slowly towards have internet access declared a universal human right.
Australia hasn't yet made any formal declaration about internet access, but has enshrined in law phone access as a legal right, through the Universal Service Obligation. I've not yet found indications of discussions by Australian governments or courts over whether internet access should also be singled out as a legal right.
So with all these steps occurring internationally, where is the opposition to declaring internet access as a human right?
A number of states around the world are already or are considering restricting internet access through universal censorship or means such as licensing individual internet users. Some states have even shut-down access to entire internet services or arrested bloggers and online commentators in attempts to control access to information and debate.
Commercial interests in a number of countries are pushing for laws that would allow them to require ISPs to cut internet access from households they suspect of information piracy without recourse to existing legal processes.
These approaches could oppose the concept of internet access as a fundamental human right as they may lead to situations where people are denied access to some legitimate online information (mistakenly or deliberately censored) - or could be permanently denied access to the internet altogether.
Both stem from a view of the internet as being primarily a news and entertainment medium without considering the broader uses of the internet as a communications and service delivery medium.
Telephone access is considered a fundamental right in many countries and few filter or block phone conversations based on content (though they may monitor conversations as a law enforcement activity). Telecommunications providers are not generally held responsible for the conversations of their customers and are not usually required to cut access to subscribers if they discuss or conduct illegal activities by phone.
Cutting people off from internet access permanently in response to illegal activity could easily become a life sentence to poverty. These people would be unable to enjoy the same access to services, information and communication as the rest of society, potentially leading to further criminal activity or permanent underprivilege.
The challenge for countries is how to successfully walk the path between open internet access and regulation of illegal material. Making internet access some form of legal or fundamental human right, while still ensuring that copyright owners' rights are respected and illegal online activity can be addressed and contained. Punishing wrong doers, without establishing an underprivileged class.
It will be interesting to see how different nations attempt to solve this over time.
Wednesday, March 17, 2010
Is internet access a human right or a privilege? | Tweet |
Tuesday, March 16, 2010
21st Century statecraft in action | Tweet |
We're beginning to see the early shape of 21st Century statecraft, through how the UK and US have begun adopting social media approaches in their international relations.
Both nations have recognised the need to engage their own citizens, and the citizens of other nations, in ongoing conversations - tapping broad bases of expertise and improving the transparency of government decisions.
The UK has shown leadership through its FCO Bloggers, a group of 20 or so diplomats and ambassadors who provide insights into Britain's foreign relations and international dealings. Hosted at the UK's Foreign and Commonwealth Office website, the FCO Bloggers provide insight into Britain's overseas engagement and opportunities for local and British citizens to participate in a more open discussion of the diplomatic ties and issues that are vital to preserving global stability.
The US's Department of State has operated the DipNotes blog for some time and used an 'opinion piece' approach to introduce senior diplomats to the blogging concept (a friend of mine says that the best way to get people over the age of 45 blogging is to call them 'opinion pieces' rather than 'blog posts').
The Department also uses Twitter, Facebook, Flickr and YouTube to provide greater insights into the activities of the Department.
Most recently, the State Department has introduced crowdsourcing to its engagement mix with the introduction of Opinion Space 2.0, an intriguing data sharing and visualisation tool which clusters individual viewpoints into 'constellations'.
Opinion Space captures public views and portrays them on a 3-dimensional spectrum, providing government with a measure of what is important to its citizens and allowing the crowd to prioritise ideas and approaches.
While it's still early days, I am beginning to see some of this 21st Century statecraft bear fruit. By improving transparency and encouraging greater engagement in international relations, the different approaches of both the UK and US are helping to build their national awareness of the need for strong international ties. They also provide ways for the citizens of other nations to become involved in discussions, allowing words a greater opportunity to replace bullets in international dealings.
I hope that in the (not too distant) future, other nations also begin experimenting in this space - using social media to empower diplomatic relations and build bridges between nations. As usual, the technology is not the barrier - it's the willingness of Government Departments to adopt new ways of doing business and to permit dialogue to occur on a less controlled basis.
Monday, March 15, 2010
Report: Real (political and government) Leaders Tweet | Tweet |
The Digital Policy Council at Digital Daya has released a thought-provoking report on the incidence of social media use by government leadership around the world, characterised through the use of Twitter, entitled Real Leaders Tweet (PDF)
Considering the 163 countries recognised by the United Nations, the report indicates that 24 (15%) already have leaders or government-sanctioned agencies using Twitter. Of those 21 are considered amongst the most stable regimes in the world - which means their political and governance systems are highly entrenched and self-sustaining, not that they are necessarily democracies.
The report argues that
... democracy is not necessarily a pre-requisite for active use of Twitter. Many leaders heading governments labelled as "non-democratic" employ Twitter to good effect - to engage the people of their countries.
One of the key findings of the report is that "Good Leaders Twitter". This means that in stable societies social media use by government to engage, listen and respond to their citizenry is a positive way to reinforce their state's integrity and ongoing success.
The report also commented that 'fragile' nations - those with a high degree of political instability - are likely to consider social media as a threat to the continued survival of the regimes in question. In these situations social media can become a destabilising force for groups in power as it allows opponents to self-organise and have a greater public voice (for example during the recent Iran election).
From these findings Digital Daya has concluded that social media is a significant means of change for nations, but not a significant means of control. Stable governments of all types that adopt social media will find that their use helps reinforce their legitimacy and improve citizen engagement, whereas fragile states will often discover that the opposite is true.
While it could be debatable whether Twitter is the appropriate social media tool to use for this type of analysis, the report still raises intriguing questions for government decision-makers across the globe.
Thursday, March 11, 2010
Why not make your department's public presentations public? | Tweet |
Every years there are many conferences, forums and other publicly orientated events where public servants speak - providing views on their activities, successes and learnings across a wide-range of professional disciples.
The conference I have been at the last two days, FutureGov Hong Kong, is one example of these - where three Australian public servants spoke about our experiences and our presentations were distributed to delegates from approximately 10 countries.
Given that these events are public - anyone who registers (and pays a fee if one is charged) can attend, I have often wondered why more government departments do not make presentations given publicly by their staff - which do not contain sensitive or in confidence material - available online for the benefit of broader audiences.
Recently I found the State of Utah slideshare site, which does exactly this.
This is a great example of how to leverage government knowledge, sharing it across a department, a government, different governments and with the community.
Spreading this knowledge across the public sector increases its impact and value (and reduces the potential economic tax placed on its distribution by private sector conference organisers).
Are any Australian governments or departments doing this already?
Wednesday, March 10, 2010
