UNU-CRIS Paper Presentation at the 2021 GigaNet Symposium

Every year on Day Zero of the global Internet Governance Forum (IGF), GigaNet conveys an Annual Symposium for internet governance scholars. You can join the debate on the live tweeting #GigaNet2021

On 6 December 2021 from 17.15 until 18.45 (CET) Nadia Tjahja, UNU-CRIS PhD Fellow, Trisha Meyer and Jamal Shahin, UNU-CRIS Professorial Fellows, will present their paper: Who do you think you are? Individual Stakeholder Identification and Mobility of the Internet Forum at the Panel 3B: Mapping Agency and Stakeholder Dynamics.

Abstract of the paper: The Internet’s Governance ecosystem is based on principles of multistakeholder participation. Given the transcendence of the policy debates that need to inform Internet Governance (IG), various key actors have considered that a multiplicity of actors need to be involved in order to enable the internet to work effectively for all. Input into IG has thus required a variety of expertise and advice from different sectors and backgrounds. As the debates on digital governance are again at the fore of international policymaking (see, e.g. the UN Secretary General’s statements on Digital Cooperation, or moves towards digital sovereignty in regions of the world), we aim to revisit debates on the effectiveness of the Internet Governance Forum (IGF).

To critically understand how multistakeholder governance takes place, we choose to take a global picture of participation of various stakeholders in the Internet Governance Forum (IGF). Our paper critically addresses how stakeholders identify themselves in the given frameworks that are applied across the IGFs. We examine stakeholder identification and the nature of stakeholder mobility. We analyse how stakeholders identify themselves and how they are understood by the wider community. Moreover, we are interested in understanding how stakeholders move across stakeholder groups over time. Combined, these elements allow us to reflect on cross-fertilisation of ideas and movement of interests that add to the discussions of the legitimacy of the multistakeholder model.

For further information about the programme, please click here, to read the draft paper here. Please note that you can register and get your Zoom link for Symposium here.