By David McGuire
washingtonpost.com Staff Writer Tuesday, July 23, 2002; 4:19 PM
Public participation may be messy, but the organization that manages the Internet's addressing system must give ordinary Internet users more say in its decisions, one of the men responsible for creating the domain-name management body said today.
"Expediency doesn't justify a lack of democratization," said Ira Magaziner, former senior adviser to President Clinton for policy
development.
Magaziner, who set in motion the creation -- and U.S. Government recognition -- of the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and
Numbers (ICANN), made a rare public appearance today at a Cato Institute forum on Internet governance. Magaziner currently works for private consulting firm SJS Advisors.
ICANN manages the Domain Name System (DNS) under a series of agreements with the U.S. government. Those agreements are up for
renewal in September.
When ICANN was established, Magaziner and others involved with the
process expected that the body would quickly adopt polices to
establish public participation, Magaziner said.
"I remain disappointed that that has not happened in the ways I would
have hoped," Magaziner said, adding that if he were still in a
position of power over ICANN, he would lean on the body to increase
democratic participation.
"I do think [ICANN] could use some external force now that would
require it to rethink and reform in a democratic direction,"
Magaziner said.
ICANN has embarked on an internal reform plan, but that plan abandons
a structure that would have allowed ordinary Internet users to elect
a portion of the ICANN board. ICANN President Stuart Lynn has openly
criticized online elections, and has said that ICANN is not an
"exercise in global democracy."
Magaziner said that while he has not been closely following ICANN's
reform effort, he would disapprove of a plan that abandoned
democratic involvement from individuals and non-governmental
organizations (NGOs).
"I think there needs to be a broader representation of consumers and
NGOs than now exists," Magaziner said.
But Joe Sims, ICANN's outside attorney, said Magaziner is too far removed
from the ICANN process to see the problems the organization has had
with online elections and the steps it has taken to include public
voices in its processes.
