Governing the Future of the Internet

The internet is global. So the approach to internet governance should be global as well, right? Not exactly.

The internet, as a network, is decentralized, which makes it inherently difficult to govern. It belongs to everyone, but is owned by nobody. This speaks to a question that’s been around for decades—one centered around how we might govern the technical aspects of the internet. Jovan Kurbalija, director of the DiploFoundation and head of the Geneva Internet Platform, spoke to these very issues at a New America event. “Global governance sounds logical, but when you really dig into the digital policy, you see that the impact of the internet is very local, given the social, economic, political, and cultural context,” Kurbalija said.