of rolling out the network infrastructure so that everyone in the world can have access to the Internet. This vision was explicit in the G8 Okinawa Charter on the Global Information Society adopted in July 2000 at the G8 Summit. It is a politicaleconomic perspective which underpins the early WSIS texts and which in effect gives priority to building the infrastructure and the consumer base for global e-commerce over the public interest in communications for development. It does so by claiming that the former will lead to the latter without providing supporting evidence for its case. One early draft of the WSIS Declaration described the Information Society as “a new and higher form of social organisation where highly developed ICT networks and ubiquitous access to information… improve quality of life and alleviate poverty and hunger”.4 Others have argued compellingly that giving universal access to the Internet will cost a lot and accomplish little. Bill Gates, speaking in October 2000 at a Seattle conference on the “digital dividend”, famously argued that investment in health and literacy is more important for poor people than providing access to PCs and the Internet.5 Charles Kenny, an economist with the World Bank, has estimated that the worldwide subsidy needed for everyone living on $1 a day to get one hour of access a week might reach $75 billion – considerably more than the global total of aid flows each year.6 Despite such concerns, the roll-out of ICT-based products, service and applications remained a dominant perspective in the WSIS debate. This calls for market freedoms and procompetition policies but also includes limits on freedoms and rights where this serves the interests of corporate stability and growth e.g. intellectual property, proprietary software, security, Internet governance, spectrum planning and licensing. 234
FUTURE CHALLENGES OF THE INFORMATION SOCIETY