From ITU to ICANN: The Political Shaping of Global Communications

ABSTRACT: Governments’ role in global communications is changing.
Traditionally, governments have acted through the International
Telecommunications Union (ITU), where they shaped technology according
to their interests in national security, economic development, and
industrial policy. With the emergence of the Internet and of the
Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN),
governments’ roles have dramatically changed. In ICANN only the United
States government has direct control over the management of core
Internet resources. This has not eliminated political influences on
technology, but it has narrowed their scope. This talk will examine how
the political shaping of global communications has changed in the
evolution from the ITU to ICANN.

BIO: Hans Klein is Associate Professor of Public Policy at Georgia
Tech. He is a co-founder of the Internet Governance Project
(www.IGP.org) , a collaborative research and policy project focused on
global Internet governance. He is the former chair of Computer
Professionals for Social Responsibility (www.CPSR.org).