The Internet is considered by many to be the global infrastructure of the information society, the most critical piece of the economic, social and cultural foundation of our time. Internet governance has been on the international agenda for a relatively short time. In a very narrow sense, it has been around since ICANN was created in 1998.

In a wider sense, international dialogue has been ongoing since 2003, when delegates to the first phase of the World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS) concluded that Internet governance concerns a set of issues, including, but reaching beyond Internet names and numbers. Decisions taken around this wider set of issues can have important implications for sustainable development. Examples of points of convergence between Internet governance and sustainable development include:

1.      The dependence of developing countries and development organizations on the stability and security of the Internet. The case of Zimbabwe's country-wide interruption in service illustrates this point;

2.      The role of the Internet itself in supporting better institutional governance (for example, in facilitating institutional accountability and transparency and citizen participation in governance activities. As the Louder Voices report points out, a significant portion of developing countries do not have the capacity to realize or take advantage of these opportunities); and

3.      Internet-enabled global knowledge sharing and management (for example, in the areas of health; food, agriculture and biodiversity; education; and science and technology).

The WSIS Working Group on Internet Governance developed this working definition of Internet governance, which was adopted by the WSIS governments in the Tunis Agenda (2005):

...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 is helpful in that it enumerates the stakeholders and some of the challenges facing Internet governance; however, it provides no direction as to what a system, or a combination of systems, of Internet governance would require in order to be sustainable.

One of IISD's strategic objectives is to advance sustainable development by contributing to institutional transformation, particularly through promoting the principles of accountability, participation and legitimacy. Our Internet governance research and and commissioned work (PDF - 288 KB) builds on earlier work on network governance and the intersections of information and communications technology policy and sustainable development.

The final meeting of the Word Summit on the Information Society in November of 2005 in Tunis saw the creation of the Internet Governance Forum (IGF), aimed at providing a "multi-stakeholder" space on a wide range of topics related to Internet governance. IISD's participation in the first meeting of the IGF focused on strengthening the role of young people in the process and on contributing to discussions around the links between the governance of the Internet and sustainable development.

Following the meeting, IISD helped organize and moderated one of the three thematic weeks of the electronic consultation among young people on Internet governance issues. The discussion archives can be accessed here.

Read about the differences between Physical Governance and Digital Governance.

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