CI Global Meeting on A2K

Khalilur Rahman SajalConsumers Association of Bangladesh

(CAB)E-mail: cab@citech.net,

krsajal@yahoo.comWebsite: www.consumerbd.org

Consumers International 21-22 April 2010

Kuala LumpurMalaysia

Introduction

Human rights is the “Rights essential for human beings to live a humane life”.

Every Individual is born with and entitled to the inherent and inalienable rights, and most nations around the world have laws to guarantee their people human rights. In particular, fundamental freedoms and rights described in the national constitution.

Information society is not a separate world from what we live in now.

Human rights in the information society means the human rights described in the UDHR and in the related international laws.

Article 19Freedom of opinion and expressEveryone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression; this right includes freedom to hold opinions without interferences and to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers.In order to protect societies against possible abuses of the right to freedom of speech, international human rights law also provided for a series of limitations on this freedom.

Article 27Sharing benefits from the development of technologyThe right to access to technology is provided in Article 27.1 of the UDHR where it is stated that ` Everyone has the right freely to ... share in scientific advancement and its benefits.’ This right is inspired by the basic moral principle of equality and the notion that science and technology belong to the common heritage of humankind.

Article 28Social and international orderEveryone is entitled to a social and international order in which the rights and freedoms set forth in this Declaration can be fully realized.

Universal Declaration of Human Rights

Key Actors in Information Society

States States need to demonstrate their national legislation and policies on human rights complaints

Civil Society Civil Society should show awareness and willingness to address the specific human rights challenges within an information society context

Corporate Corporate Social Responsibility

Key Actors

Dimensions and Human Rights provisions for the Information Society

Technology Access to technical education

Use of technology to promote human rights

Equal sharing benefits of technology

Protection against harmful effects

Participation in public policy making

Attention for the needs of disadvantaged groups

Dimensions and Human Rights provisions for the Information Society

Culture Self determination of culture development

Diversity of creative work and media contents

Participation in culture life

Recognition of cultural practices

Sharing benefits of scientific developments

Protection of cultural heritage

Use of the mother tongue

Involvement in cultural policies

Dimensions and Human Rights provisions for the Information Society

Politics Freedom of expression

Freedom of opinion

Protection of privacy

Responsibility to provide information about matters of public interest

Dimensions and Human Rights provisions for the Information Society

Economy Self-determination of economic development

Right to development

Corporate responsibility

Privacy/security

Corporate ownership

Causes of access to information inequality

Economic causes

Social and cultural causes

Education

Gender

Disability

Age Race Nationality Legislative causes

Right to access information, knowledge is a constitutional right of every individuals

But many individuals are being deprived of such rights because of disparity

in opportunity, which is termed as Digital Divide

Priority must be given to those who today are excluded from the information society

Digital Divide

Access to and the ability to effectively use ICTs to obtain accurate, sufficient and timely information and services are becoming increasingly important to fully participate in Information Society.

In order to get benefits from the information society, we require to have more knowledge and money, which leads to the digital divide

Digital Divide can be best described by the disparity in access and use of information caused by inability to access computers and the internet due to economic reasons, educational backgrounds, disability, age and regions.

Digital Divide

Indicators of Human Development Index

Life expectancy at birth, as an index of population health and longevity

Knowledge and education, as measured by the adult literacy rate and the combined primary, secondary, and tertiary gross income ratio.

Standard of living, as measured by gross domestic product per capita at purchasing power parity.

Indicators of ICTDevelopment Index

ICT Access- Fixed telephone lines per 100 inhabitants, mobile telephone subscriptions per 100 inhabitants, International Internet bandwidth per Internet user, proportion of households with a computer, proportion of households with Internet access at home

ICT Use- Internet users per 100 inhabitants, fixed broadband Internet subscribers per 100 inhabitants, mobile broadband subscriptions per 100 inhabitants

ICT Skills- Adult literacy rate, secondary gross enrolment ratio, tertiary gross enrolment ratio

HDI & IDI

HDI Ranking IDI Ranking

Top 10 Countries with highest ranking

1 Norway Sweden 1

2 Australia Luxembourg 2

3 Iceland Korea 3

4 Canada Denmark 4

5 Ireland Netherlands 5

6 Netherlands Iceland 6

7 Sweden Switzerland 7

8 France Japan 8

9 Switzerland Norway 9

10 Japan United Kingdom 10

HDI Ranking IDI Ranking

Top 10 Countries with lowest ranking

173 Guinea-Bissau Congo 150

174 Burundi Papua New Guinea

151

175 Chad Eritrea 152

176 Congo Mozambique 153

177 Burkina Faso Ethiopia 154

178 Mali Burkina Faso 155

179 Central African Republic Guinea-Bissau 156

180 Sierra Leone Guinea 157

181 Afghanistan Niger 158

182 Niger Chad 159

Source: UN Human Development Index 2009 & International Telecommunication Union, Measuring the Information Society 2010

HDI & IDI

Developed countries have much higher levels of ICT access, use and skills but developing countries have made larger improvements on ICT access over the five year period and are therefore likely to catch up slowly with developed countries on ICT access.

HDI and IDI have an inter-relationship in Information Society

Human rights should be ensured in information society related to technological, cultural, sociopolitical and economic aspects.

Obligatory international funding mechanism

Innovative and binding international funding mechanism (fund, subsidies) for the development of infrastructure and skills at the international, regional and national levels aimed at the least developed and developing countries.

Links between traditional media and new information technologies

Develop links between traditional & new information technology and promote community access to information and communication.

Community media support as a means to meet the needs of specific population and other groups and stimulate the production of appropriate content/messages.

Authentic tripartite structures e.g. government, civil society and private sector in all international regulatory bodies linked to the information society, notably in the framework of WTO, ITU, WIPO and others

Enhance transparency, access to information and democratic participation.

Special emphasis on implementation of policies and tools facilitating participation by under-privileged regions and communities at local, regional and national policies.

ICT in private and public administration

Transfer of knowledge

Encourage transfer of knowledge in local language corresponding to their needs and reflecting their aspirations

Invest in the development of skills specially for women and marginalized section of the community through training program in order to increase their political, cultural and social participation

Use of Open source software

The license shall not restrict any party from selling or giving away the software as a component of an aggregate software distribution containing programs from several different sources. The license shall not require a royalty or other fee for such sale.

The program must include source code and must allow distribution in source code as well as compiled form.

Must be the preferred form in which a programmer would modify the program.

Use of Open source software

Deliberately complicated source code is not allowed. Intermediate forms such as the output of a preprocessor or translator are not allowed.

The license must not discriminate against any person or group of persons.

No provision of the license may be predicated on any individual technology or style of interface.

Freedom from license restrictions on primary software code

Free software is a matter of liberty, not price.

They are essential, not just for the individual users' sake, but for society as a whole because they promote social solidarity

Users' freedom to run, copy, distribute, study, change and improve the software, improved reproducibility of experimental results, quicker detection of errors, accelerated scientific progress, and faster adoption of machine learning methods in other disciplines and in the industry ultimately lead to highly usable, flexible and scalable software whole community in accelerating research.

Conclusion

Global Information Society is composed of relationships between ICT networks and non-ICT firms, governments, NGOs, consumers etc., each of which participates in a variety of roles; so it is also a multilayered and complex system.

Only responsible behavior of key actors can promote human rights in the information society.

It is very important to identify “responsible” & “irresponsible” behavior by key actors, and also to develop and follow guidelines to promote “responsible” behavior by key actors.

In order to meet the challenges, a new multilayered, multi-stakeholder dynamic concept of responsibility is necessary. Individual stakeholders and the sector as a whole must engage in effective, collaborative ways, balancing the benefits of inclusiveness and consultation on one side and effectiveness in directing and enforcement on the other.

Conclusion

Thank You.