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<p align="center"><strong>Remarks by Lawrence E. Strickling</strong>
<br>
<strong>Assistant Secretary of Commerce for Communications and
Information</strong> <br>
<strong>Internet Governance Forum--USA</strong><br>
<strong> Washington, DC <br>
July 18, 2011</strong><br>
<strong><br>
</strong></p>
<p>"Thank you for the opportunity to speak once again at the
IGF-USA. I want especially to thank Marilyn Cade for her work in
pulling together the third edition of this meeting and I am glad
to have had the opportunity to speak at each of these sessions.</p>
<p>We are at a critical time in the history of the Internet. Last
month I spoke at the Internet Society’s INET meeting in New York
City where the question before the house was “What kind of
Internet do I want?” I answered that I wanted an Internet that is
open, innovative, growing and global and that continues to rely on
the established global Internet institutions for guidance and
direction. </p>
<p>But in the last year we have seen more and more instances of
restrictions on the free flow of information online, disputes
between various standards bodies and even appeals from incumbent
carriers in Europe for government intervention on the terms and
conditions for exchanging Internet traffic. We have seen
statements by international organizations and even some
governments to regulate the Internet more directly. All of these
events only strengthen my view that now is truly a time for all to
get involved who are concerned about maintaining a vibrant and
growing Internet and who want to preserve established global
Internet institutions. When we speak of global Internet
institutions, we are referring to multistakeholder organizations,
like the Internet Society, the Internet Engineering Task Force
(IETF), and the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C), that have played
a major role in the design and operation of the Internet. </p>
<p>A top priority of the Obama Administration, and in particular,
NTIA, is to preserve and enhance the multistakeholder model that
has been a hallmark feature of the global Internet institutions
that have been responsible for the success of the Internet.
Maintaining the openness, transparency, and user choice of today’s
Internet can only be sustained and advanced in a world where all
stakeholders participate in relevant decision making, not one
where governments, or other stakeholders, dominate. We believe
that preserving our existing institutions while extending this
model to other aspects of Internet policymaking is important for
ensuring the continued growth and innovation of the Internet. </p>
<p>Today, I would like to discuss some recent events where we have
made substantial progress on our goal to protect and enhance the
multistakeholder process for Internet governance. </p>
<p>First, many of you know that I have devoted a lot of time in
speeches to the accountability and transparency of ICANN, the
multistakeholder organization that coordinates the Domain Name
System for the Internet. Starting last year, as one of its
commitments to the global Internet community set forth in the
Affirmation of Commitments, ICANN undertook a detailed review of
its accountability and transparency. I had the privilege of
participating on the team that conducted this review. It was
truly multistakeholder, with members from around the globe
including China, Egypt, and South America, representing elements
of the global Internet community such as registries, registrars,
users, and governments. The team completed its review last
December and issued a report with 27 recommendations to the ICANN
Board for improving accountability and transparency at ICANN.</p>
<p> A little more than three weeks ago, at its meeting in Singapore,
the ICANN Board adopted these recommendations as proposed by the
review team. I am very pleased by the Board’s action, which
demonstrates a commitment to improving the accountability and
transparency of ICANN and to the multistakeholder process of
Internet policymaking. Now the focus turns to ICANN management and
staff, who must take up the challenge of implementing these
recommendations as rapidly as possible and in a manner that leads
to meaningful and lasting reform. </p>
<p>These recommendations, when implemented in a thorough and
meaningful way, will measurably improve the accountability and
transparency of the organization. And while a lot of people
worked very hard to get to this point with ICANN, I think the
success of the effort so far illustrates an important point about
multistakeholder organizations. Multistakeholder institutions
derive their legitimacy from the support and active participation
of all stakeholders. Accordingly, they are more likely than
regulatory or treaty-based organizations to adapt to change and
evolve when the stakeholders demand it. It is difficult to imagine
employing a similar process to reform more traditional regulatory
agencies as quickly or as thoroughly. </p>
<p>The other big news in Singapore was ICANN’s decision to move
forward to expand the number of generic top level domains, or
gTLDs. While that decision may not have satisfied everyone, the
process used by the Board to reach its decision is worthy of
note. In response to long-standing concerns held by governments
about the expansion proposal, the ICANN Board held a number of
focused exchanges with the Government Advisory Committee to
resolve as many of the issues as possible. These exchanges
represented the first meaningful interactions between the GAC and
the ICANN Board since ICANN’s inception and it is critical that
the lessons learned through these recent interactions result in
clear, predictable processes for the ICANN Board and the GAC going
forward. <strong></strong></p>
<p>From our perspective, ICANN improved the new gTLD program by
incorporating a significant number of the GAC proposals. The fact
that not all of the GAC’s proposals were adopted does not
represent a failure of the process or a setback to governments;
rather, it reflects the reality of a multistakeholder model.<strong>
</strong>More important is the fact that the ICANN Board now
recognizes the need to bring governments into its multistakeholder
policymaking in a more meaningful way. If we are to combat the
proposals put forward by others, such as to grant the
International Telecommunication Union the authority to veto ICANN
Board decisions, we need to ensure that our multistakeholder
institutions have provided a meaningful role for governments as
stakeholders. </p>
<p>A second major achievement of the last month was the action taken
by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development
(OECD) in Paris at the end of June to adopt a set of Internet
policymaking principles.<strong></strong></p>
<p>The occasion was the OECD’s High Level Meeting on the Internet
Economy for senior decision-makers from governments, the private
sector, civil society, and the technical community and it was an
unprecedented opportunity to advance the global consensus around
the working multistakeholder model that we believe is critical to
the Internet’s continued success. </p>
<p>Participants at the meeting agreed to a communiqué on
policy-making principles that will create the conditions for an
open, interoperable, secure, and continually innovating Internet.
The communiqué reflects a growing global consensus on the value of
the multistakeholder approach towards addressing Internet
challenges. The principles are not intended to harmonize global
law, but rather provide a common framework for companies and
governments as they consider Internet policy issues.</p>
<p>The OECD member nations endorsed the policymaking principles as
did the business and technical advisory committees. The civil
society advisory committee could not endorse the entire document
due to its concern with provisions relating to online protection
of intellectual property. However, everyone supported the plank
encouraging multistakeholder cooperation in policy development
processes. </p>
<p>So, with these actions in Singapore and Paris, where do we go
next? What is the call to action for all of you? </p>
<p>First and foremost, do not take the OECD principles as the end of
the work. Really, we are just at the beginning. Reaching an
agreement on the OECD language was a challenge, but our history
with those member states and ideological similarities gave us
confidence that we would eventually reach consensus. However,
some other nations, many with less experience with the
multistakeholder model, may be inclined instead to support
treaty-based structures for Internet governance. It is our job to
advocate for this model and highlight how this multistakeholder
process protects their national interests. </p>
<p>The United States is most assuredly opposed to establishing a
governance structure for the Internet that would be managed and
controlled by nation-states. Such a structure could lead to the
imposition of heavy-handed and economically misguided regulation
and the loss of flexibility the current system allows today, all
of which would jeopardize the growth and innovation we have
enjoyed these past years. The OECD’s policymaking principles are
perhaps the clearest statement yet that the United States and
like-minded nations oppose treaty-binding regulation of the
Internet. </p>
<p>Now our challenge is to convince the rest of the world of the
advantages of the multistakeholder approach. Next November, the
United States will participate in the ITU’s World Conference on
International Telecommunications (WCIT). This treaty negotiation
will conduct a review of the International Telecommunication
Regulations (ITRs), the general principles which relate to the
provision and operation of international telecommunication
services. We can expect that some states will attempt to rewrite
the ITRs in a manner that would establish heavy-handed
governmental control of the Internet and cybersecurity. These are
the countries that we, including all of us in this room, must
reach to promote the multistakeholder model, and our work must
begin right away.</p>
<p>The IGF in Nairobi will provide us all with an excellent
opportunity to get started on this important task. I will use
speaking opportunities at the IGF and the Government of Kenya’s
Ministerial meeting to explain why we feel multistakeholder
Internet governance is so valuable to preserving and enhancing a
dynamic Internet and how it can be most useful in countries with
little tradition of employing it. My team at NTIA will also work
extensively at the bilateral level over the next year to spread
the message. We ultimately hope to attain a global consensus on
Internet governance that will preserve an open, interoperable,
secure, and continually innovating Internet. But we need your
help.</p>
<p>Before I close, I would like to remind everyone of the July 29th
deadline for responses to NTIA’s Further Notice of Inquiry on the
IANA functions contract. This process is the first comprehensive
review of the IANA functions contract since the award of the
initial contract in 2000. We have been conducting what I hope the
community agrees is an open and transparent process on the
contract. Based on comments received to our original notice, we
have gone back to the global community to confirm that we
interpreted correctly what was said in the comments. We set forth
our tentative conclusions in response to the comments and then
provided a draft Statement of Work for public comment. This is
the first time NTIA has sought public input on the draft Statement
of Work. In keeping with our commitment to the multistakeholder
model, NTIA is actively seeking the input of global stakeholders.
I encourage you to all carefully read the Further Notice and
submit comments by the deadline.</p>
<p>In closing, let me assure all of you that the United States
government is committed to the multistakeholder model of Internet
policymaking. We are encouraged by the fact that support for the
model is the consensus view of the participants in this conference
and we look forward to working with all of you to build a global
consensus on this principle with nations around the world. Thank
you".</p>
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