I come before you today to deliver a call of action to each and every one of you.
A call of action that each of you commit to get personally involved in a multistakeholder
effort to address key Internet policy issues, to find consensus approaches to dealing with
the issues, and to implement those solutions.
Now, is that too much to ask at 9 o'clock this morning?
I don't think it is.
But to do this you are going to need some help, and I am going to provide some help
right now to those of you perplexed and confused by the multistakeholder process.
First, we need a shared understanding on what is the multistakeholder process and what it
is not.
There is no single model of the multistakeholder process, but for purposes of this discussion
let's focus on the key attributes that define an authentic multistakeholder process.
One, it must be stakeholder driven in that stakeholders determine the process and scope
and direction of work.
Two, it must be open and inclusive, both in terms of allowing broad participation and
ensuring that all issues are addressed.
Three, the process must be transparent and accountable to all stakeholders and to the
public.
And four, outcomes must be consensus-based, delivering positive value to the greatest
number of stakeholders.
Now a multistakeholder process that exhibits all of these attributes is most likely to
beone that will be accepted as legitimate by the stakeholders and public.
Just as important as what is a multistakeholder process is understanding what it is not.
And one, it is not an ism.
The multistakeholder process is simply a set of tools to help people collaborate to solve
problems.
It is not a philosophy, or a political ideology, and we do the process a disservice to refer
to it as an ism because it encourages people to argue about it and take sides about what
should be a set of tools that can provide and help everyone.
Secondly, beware of those who haphazardly, or even manipulatively, attach the multistakeholder
to what in fact are multilateral or top-down processes.
When a Government or a business runs a consultation that is open to input from all stakeholders
but keeps the decision-making to itself it in no way is running a true multistakeholder
process and we find that rarely do such efforts even allow for collaboration among the stakeholders,
much less decision-making by them.
So having described what is a multistakeholder process and what it is not, let me turn to
my second point - which is that people are reluctant or afraid to take the initiative
to establish multistakeholder processes.
Part of that fear stems from people not knowing how to organize, and manage a multistakeholder
process.
And that can be easily overcome.
The Internet Society's Collaborative Governance initiative is developing training materials
on how to run multistakeholder processes, and there are already lots of instructional
materials available.
We in the Internet community may like to think that the multistakeholder process was born
with the Internet, but that's simply not the case.
Collaboration and consensus-building techniques have been around for decades, snd there are
many instructional guides and manuals available worldwide to anyone who needs some help.
But trust me when I tell you that, of the keys to successful multistakeholder process,
they mostly reflect simple common sense and basic stakeholder management principles.
It is not rocket science and it is easy to learn.
Another part of the fear and reluctance to bring forward multistakeholder processes stems
from the sense that the problems today are so large - protecting privacy, battling cybersecurity
threats and the like - these are so large that people are intimidated about trying to
organize a response.
Also, there is a predisposition to want comprehensive enforceable solutions to these problems, which
usually translates in to waiting for Government or some other organization to take the initiative.
I urge you not to let that fear deter you from taking action.
The existing Government processes to enact comprehensive legislation or write legislations
or negotiate treaties are not well equipped to deal with the fast changing issues of the
Internet.
These processes are slow.
They usually don't result in any outcome and when they do, the problem that they intended
to address often no longer exsists.
And if they get it wrong, it's incredibly difficult to undo bad legislation or regulation.
Instead, I encourage each of you to think about how to address Internet policy challenges
in smaller bits.
Can you define a piece of the issue in a way that a group of stakeholders in your own country
or region could address the topic, find a consensus solution, and then have stakeholders
implement it?
We need to encourage experimentation around the world.
We need to encourage finding ways to make incremental progress on issues by solving
parts of the problem and then building on the small successes through iterations of
the process over time.
You will need to be creative.
You will have to focus on elements of these issues whose solutions are within the power
of the participating stakeholders to implement.
And let me say that implementation is key.
Too often participate nts in multistakeholder processes claim success when they reach consensus
on the solution.
But then they fail to address who is going to implement the solution, and how it will
be implemented.
You must focus right from the start to define the problem to be solved in a way that allows
the parties to the process to implement any consensus outcome.
As an example of what I mean, take the issue of disinformation, or fake news, online.
Some of the responses being discussed involve creating comprehensive regulatory frameworks
for deciding what is disinformation and what to do about it.
Absent a Government convening the multistakeholder process to create such a framework, there
is little use to having you organize your own process to develop such a scheme.
You have no authority or ability to implement the framework, and because of that fact you
would have a hard time sustaining such a discussion for any length of time.
But that doesn't mean it's an issue you should stay away from, you can make a contribution
to solving the problem.
What if you convened a multistakeholder process to develop and implement an educational program
on media literacy.
You could certainly identify a set of stakeholders who would have the ability and incentive to
design and deliver such a program.
Now, none of you can do this by yourself.
You need to work together with others in your community.
You need to recruit stakeholders who will represent all of the key views that have to
be addressed.
But it takes a catalyst, someone who steps forward and takes that lead to initiate the
discussion, and each and every one of you can play that role as a catalyst.
No matter how limit the geographical extent of the discussion every successful multistakeholder
decision that is implemented provides input in to new norms for answering the challenges
before us.
Over time they will combine and compound in to broad solutions and, if and when Governments
decide to legislate a comprehensive enforceable approach, they will be guided by the aggregation
of these individual solutions.
Commentators refer to the Internet as having allowed permissionless innovation - the idea
that allowing experimentation with new technologies without requiring Government or competitor
approval.
What I'm urging all of you today is to engage in permissionless problem solving.
If we all make it our responsibility, perhaps we can spur the next great leap forward for
the Internet to better recognize and respect Human Rights, to better deter cybercrime and
attacks, and to better meet the needs of citizens around the world - and all I ask is that you
give it a try.
So please do it, and I thank you for listening to me this morning.
(Applause.)