I met Cees Hamelink on Monday May 9th 2005 and addressed some questions relevant for my research on communication rights. The CRIS campaign in his terms is relevant for the education about Communication Rights not only for the people, but also for national governments!
Cees Hamelink is Professor of International Communication at the University of Amsterdam. He is the founder of the People's Communication Charter and is active in the CRIS campaign.
Q: What do you think about the working group on Internet governance?
A: I think they have a very difficult task in combining the sectors representing governments, new international institutions, business and civil society. Some of which are very powerful actors. I don’t think they will come up with a solution defining this problem. Maybe, I’m too pessimistic, but the only thing that could happen it’s a half-baked compromise. Especially the Chinese government would have a major role in this, with all the potential problems with Taiwan and Japan following, and the US will hear carefully what they will have to say. The market, on the other hand, controls the entire infrastructure.
Q: National and international laws on Internet surveillance increase control over communication, are communication rights supposed to monitor these laws?
A: Ideally what is being developed through laws (war on terror, surveillance) should be checked in the language of communication rights. Communication rights are the basis from where we depart. Human rights, such as the protection of privacy, security etc. should be respected in international laws and treaties, but this could happen in an ideal world. In the real world this is not the case. The actors in the WSIS, mostly governments could have included communication rights in their declaration, but they didn’t.
Q: What is the role of the CRIS campaign in the WSIS?
A: The CRIS campaign is important in this process and has played a crucial role in the first wave of the preparation of the summit in 2002. It had mobilized all the civil society and has stressed the issue of communication rights. On the other hand it’s important to create a permanent campaign, which would educate people and communities around the world regarding communication rights. The CRIS campaign plays against powerful forces, mainly the interest of government and corporations. In the WSIS, which is a UN led summit, most of the states playing a role are corrupted and the corporate industry remain in control. There is a lack of information in the world regarding communication rights. More books, internet pages and videos are needed which explains why communication rights are important not only to communities, but also to national governments, which lack knowledge about communication rights. The aim of the CRIS is also to provide easily accessible material on communication rights.
Q: What do you think about the Tunisian phase of the WSIS?
A: Tunisia it’s wrong country for hosting the summit, because there is no freedom of expression, where journalists are being jailed. Tunisia should be an example on which to inform the world about the digital divide. The question here is the implementation of communication rights, where the state does not play a good role. Civil society was thinking of withdrawing from the summit, but there are many NGO’s, which are financed by governments and will not take action against the fact that rights are violated in the country, which host the summit.
Q: What do you think about the counter summit of We Seize in Geneva?
A: There is a need to have more people’s summit. The WSIS is not an alternative summit and is certainly not a people’s summit. Since the first Prep Com in 2002, the WSIS went in the wrong direction. The Cris campaign co-opted the agenda, which was made by powerful actors in the beginning and now runs after the agenda. The notion of civil society is in itself problematic, because on one hand you have NGO’s, which are state controlled.
Q: What about the privatisation of knowledge in the process of the WSIS?
A: The stand of the WSIS is hypocritical, because on one hand promotes access to knowledge and on the other it doesn’t take a clear stand against the WTO, which dictates intellectually property regimes. It leaves the power to the big conglomerates and to those who own the content. An enormous pressure from the WTO on the UNESCO convention on cultural diversity, which is being created simultaneously at this moment, could be perceived. This is mainly the failure of the WSIS, which is producing only hot air, because it cannot create a framework on communication rights and culture diversity through the WTO.
Q: Why the right to communicate does not oppose WTO regulatory practices directly?
A: The right to communicate does not exist yet. New rights should be established, which go against the WTO, but we are still a long way off. The core of an essence of communication rights is a democratic system, a strong democracy, which is grounded on the participatory model of governance. In the participatory model, the people have the right to be listening to and to engage in communication processes. There is a need for public spaces first of all, because in most societies a public sphere does not exist. The places where citizens engaged in debates and where listened to in ancient times were the squares. Today the squares are being replaced by shopping malls, which are not public spaces where you could do what you like, but private ones, which are controlled through private surveillance.
