
There is great potential to transform sustainable development through the interface of technology and social organization; but also great risk that the technology may drive unsustainable practices instead.
| · Heather Creech Director - Global Connectivity | ||
| · Don MacLean Associate | ||
| · Terri Willard Associate | ||
| · Tony Vetter Associate | ||
Innovation in the Governance of Technology and Society: Progress on Internet Governance (PDF - 701 kb)
This report explores progress on the evolution of Internet policy and decision-making, the key institutions involved, and the importance of the debate to developing countries. The continuation of the Internet Governance Forum will be key to ensuring the open and candid exchange of ideas and best practices among all Internet stakeholders-including governments, intergovernmental organizations, non-governmental organizations, industry, the private sector, civil society, academia and the Internet technical community-continues at the international level. Further, lessons learned from finding new approaches to decision-making around the Internet and its related technologies have relevance for the governance of technology in other domains, in particular the central concept of "shared responsibility."
Review of the Mandate of the Internet Governance Forum: A response from IISD
(PDF - 418 kb)
The upcoming fourth annual Internet Governance Forum (IGF) meeting November 2009 in Sharm El Sheikh, Egypt marks the start of an evaluation process of the five-year mandate of the forum, ending in 2010. IISD prepared the following response to seven questions posed by the Secretariat soliciting inputs for a synthesis document to support the UN Secretary General's formal consultation with IGF participants. IISD is broadly supportive of the IGF and has affirmed that the IGF should renew its mandate for a second five-year term.
The Internet of Things: A killer app for global environmental sustainability?
(Google Video - 13:43 min)
What is the "Internet of Things"? It is the integration of the physical world and the Internet, an information space created by emerging applications that enable humans to monitor and interact with their environment. Tony Vetter discusses at the Internet Governance Forum in Hyderabad, India how "Internet of Things" policy and architecture should be built on sustainable development objectives.
Global Connectivity focuses on new challenges for sustainable development
IISD announces the new Global Connectivity program, which describes our broader, ongoing focus on new and emerging challenges for sustainable development. Global Connectivity replaces the Knowledge Communications program to incorporate how technology, in particular communications technology, is supporting and changing how we organize our governing systems, our economies, and our cultures in unprecedented ways.
As the world moves from an industrial-based economy to a more connected, knowledge-driven, "information society," it faces new and old challenges for sustainable development. The application of knowledge—as manifested in areas such as entrepreneurship and innovation; research and development; software and design; and in people's education and skills levels—is now recognized to be one of the key success factors in the global marketplace.[1] It is also crucial for ensuring that such success is environmentally, socially and economically sustainable.
There are indeed countries that show that significant advances are possible in the short and long run through implementation of strategies for increasing a country's ability to generate, obtain and apply knowledge.[2] In developing countries, reduction of poverty, child mortality and disease pandemics, as well as improvement of education, gender equality, maternal health and environmental protection, are the priorities articulated by the Millennium Development Goals. There is wide recognition[3] that the world possesses the knowledge necessary to meet these goals; the gap between the production and the use of knowledge in policy and practice, however, is also widely acknowledged. The Netherlands Development Assistance Research Council finds, for example, that the gap exists "due to weak linkages between knowledge producers and knowledge users, and between knowledge production and innovation."[4] Our own research supports these conclusions.
Over the years, IISD's research and work on the links between the emerging information society and sustainable development have focused on two areas:
IISD publishes periodic informal notes on our observations of trends and key issues in ICT for sustainable development. You can download the 2004 note (PDF - 143 kb) and the 2005 note (PDF - 151 kb).
Information Society and Sustainable Development Policy
For sustainable development to be effective and efficient, it must harness the institutions and tools of the information society; and for the information society to sustain itself, it must pay careful attention to the stocks and flows of resources (both material and human) that underpin it.
Internet Governance
Internet governance is a combination of legal and non-legal tools and frameworks, developed by governments, industry and civil society in order to establish the respect of shared principles, norms, rules and procedures that shape the evolution and use of the Internet. A major challenge for effective Internet governance is achieving a balance between the Internet's dynamic nature and potential for fostering innovation and creativity on the one hand, and, on the other, the need to ensure the respect of broader societal values like universal rights and freedoms and the principles of sustainable development.
Globalization of ICT enabled services
IISD's primer on Responsible Competitiveness in the Information Technology Enabled Services (ITES) explores an ambitious agenda for countries, cities and firms to create an outsourcing model that is genuinely sustainable.
Global Processes
For over a decade, IISD has been involved in international policy processes on the use of information and communication technologies (ICTs), from the World Summit on Sustainable Development, to conferences like the Global Knowledge series and the World Summit on the Information Society.
Youth and ICTs
One of our major areas of focus is the engagement of young people as researchers, leading creators and earliest adopters of information and communications technologies.
[1] Dahlman, Carl. "World Bank Knowledge Economy: Products and Strategy: emerging lessons" in Knowledge for Development." Washington, DC: World Bank Institute, 2003.
[2] Chen, Derek H. C. and Carl J. Dahlman. "The Knowledge Economy, the KAM Methodology and World Bank Operations." Washington, DC: World Bank, 2005. 14.
[3] See, for example, Human Development Report 2005, p. 17, the official UNDP Web site, and the official World Bank Group Web site.
[4] Netherlands Development Assistance Research Council (RAWOO). "Mobilizing Knowledge to Achieve the Millennium Development Goals." 2005. 1. http://www.rawoo.nl/pdf/Rawoo27.pdf