Discover

The 'Internet Governance Forum' ('IGF') is a worldwide organization that supports the United Nations with issues regarding internet governance^[1]. It was announced in July 2006.

Contents

Structure and Function

Advisory group

Secretariat

History

References

External links

Structure and Function

The group was set up thanks to a common goal formed among various groups like the WGIG that included open consultations. These group's goals were set through meetings that were held prior to the convening of the IGF.
The UN Secretary-General established an Advisory Group and a Secretariat as the main institutional bodies of the IGF.
These organizational divisions should not be considered concrete, instead being malleable with future meetings.

Advisory group

The Advisory Group is a multi-stakeholder entity. It is made up of 47 members from international governments, the commercial private sector and public civil society, including academic and technical communities.
Its chairman is Nitin Desai, who also has chaired the UN Working Group on Internet Governance (WGIG) .

Secretariat

The secretariat, based in the United Nations Office in Geneva, assists and coordinates the work of the Advisory Group. As of July 2007, it is headed by Markus Kummer^[2], who also has been involved with the WGIG as its Executive Coordinator of the Secretariat.

History

The suggested need of an organization like the IGF was first pointed out in the WGIG Report. After reaching a clear consensus among its members the WGIG proposed in paragraph 40 of the Report that :

''"(t)he WGIG identified a vacuum within the context of existing structures, since there is no global multi-stakeholder forum to address Internet-related public policy issues. It came to the conclusion that there would be merit in creating such a space for dialogue among all stakeholders. This space could address these issues, as well as emerging issues, that are cross-cutting and multidimensional and that either affect more than one institution, are not dealt with by any institution or are not addressed in a coordinated manner”.''

The IGF was one of four proposals made in the report.
The inaugural meeting of the Internet Governance Forum was held in Athens, Greece from 30 October to 2 November 2006. The convening of the IGF was announced on 18 July 2006.

Date	Event
16 - 18 November 2005	Second Phase of the WSIS in Tunis
16 – 17 February 2006	First Round of Consultations
2 March 2006	Establishment of the IGF Secretariat
19 May 2006	Second Round of Consultations
22 – 23 May 2006	Establishment and First Meeting of the IGF Advisory Group
18 July 2006	Convening of the IGF
7 – 8 September 2006	Second Meeting of the IGF Advisory Group
30 October – 2 November 2006	Inaugural Meeting of the IGF in Athens

References

1. http://www.intgovforum.org/
2. http://www.intgovforum.org/about.htm

External links

★ Internet Governance Forum

★ IGF - Greece 2006

★ IGF2006.info - IGF information and community site

★ IGF Brazil 2007

★ IP Justice IGF webpage

★ Internet Governance: The Way Forward. An international conference organised by DiploFoundation discusses the objectives, multi-stakeholder composition, organisation and relevance of Internet Governance Forum.