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On the heels of the World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS) conference, which brought geeks galore to Geneva, to swap tales of tech advance and opine about policies and regulations on security, freedom of speech, access, band width, women and ITC, green ITC, and a host of other matters; our attention turned to the meetings of the Commission on Science and Technology for Development — the CSTD. The fifteenth session of the CSTD met from 21-25 May, to review and follow-up on progress made at the WSIS ( the outcomes document is available here ), to include a special focus on improvements to the Internet Governance Forum (CSTD meeting details are available here).  Priorities of the CSTD were elaborated in two areas:

• Innovation, research, technology transfer for mutual advantage, entrepreneurship and collaborative development in the information society
• Open access, virtual science libraries, geospatial analysis and other complementary information and communications technology and science, technology, engineering and mathematics assets

We watched a parade of spokesmen and women expound on the achievements and progress of their countries — particularly in providing access to the internet, in moving toward universal cell phone coverage, and in promoting ITC technology for development in many areas, some quite innovative.  The speed at which even the poorest of the least developed countries have advanced in these areas is at once staggering and impressive.

There is an elephant in the room, however, and it is called Governance.  The less developed and emerging economies are calling for an international governmental organization, under the UN umbrella, to replace the current multistakeholder format of the Internet Governance Forum.  The IGF they claim gives the large developed economies along with big business interests far too much say in Internet issues, and less developed and emerging economies too little.  Wrapped up in this debate is wariness among the Western stakeholders that an international governmental approach would stymie Internet freedoms and innovation. In addition, the smaller nations say they are being left out when it comes to technological advances, which take too long to reach their level and at too great an expense. These issues are not to be resolved in any definitive way by the CSTD, to be sure, but the meetings of the Commission provide a useful review of WSIS outcomes and serve as a forum for the airing of concerns.  And these can be and are taken up by the Multistakeholder Advisory Group (MAG) as it advises the Secretary General and host country (Azerbaijan this year) of the IGF on the programme and schedule of the Internet Governance Forum meetings.

From the CMBD News 29 May 2012

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