The Internet Governance Project (IGP)’s 7th Annual Conference convenes scholars, practitioners, and government officials under the theme From Internet Governance to Digital Political Economy.

The conference’s objective is to reframe analysis of Internet governance as digital political economy. That approach provides a more systematic understanding of the forces driving digital policy issues and a better grasp of both the obstacles to solutions and the feasible paths forward.

During the 2002-2005 World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS), Internet governance revolved around ICANN, multistakeholderism, and their relationship to intergovernmental modes of governance. As the internet grew to encompass every aspect of society and economy, including digital money, these tensions expanded. Online services, digital data, cryptocurrencies, and software became major drivers of economic development, and the internet underwent a process of securitization, surveillance, and attempts to align it to geographic borders.

The global governance of the internet is now inseparable from the governance of digital trade, international currency and investment, military conflict and competition in cyberspace, regulation of platform industries, AI applications, and industrial policy debates about semiconductors, 5G, and other digital technologies.

As the communications infrastructure that supports the ecosystem, the internet is very important, but its policy and governance can no longer be considered in isolation from these other digital developments.

Join us in The Hague October 17-18 for a field-reshaping conference that can bridge the artificial disciplinary and topical divisions, with political economy as a stronger basis for public policy analysis and intervention.

For updates on the event, follow @IGPAlert on Twitter and join the conversation using #IGtoDPE.

Monday, October 17 (9:30 – 17:00, CEST)

9:00 | Welcome remarks

• A.H.M. Heaver, Ministry of Economic Affairs, NL
• Milton Mueller, Georgia Institute of Technology

9:30 | Panel Discussion: (Re)Defining the field: From IG to Digital Political Economy

Moderator: Tatiana Tropina, U Leiden

• Panelists: Milton Mueller, Georgia Tech; Jan Aart Scholte, U Leiden; Michel van Eeten, Technology U of Delft; Louise Marie Hurel, LSE

10:30 | Break

Data Governance

• 11:00 | Exploring the role of data enclosure in the digital political economy, Brenden Kuerbis, Georgia Institute of Technology, US
• 11:30 | Platform antitrust in China, Hao Wang, Peking University, PRC
• 12:00 | Critique of the Surveillance Capitalism thesis. Milton Mueller, Georgia institute of Technology, US

12:30 | Lunch

Standards and Security

• 13:30 | Web PKI and Non-governmental Governance of Trust on the Internet: Karl Grindal, U of New Hampshire, Karl Grindal, University of New Hampshire, USA
• 14:00 | The standardisation of lawful interception technologies in the 3GPP: Niels ten Oever, U Amsterdam, C. Becker, R. Nanni, NL
• 14:30 | Privacy and Security Implications of Regulation of Digital Services in the EU and US: Mikołaj Barczentewicz, Surrey U., UK

15:00 | Break

Platform political economy

• 15:30 | India’Stack. Jyoti Panday, Internet Governance Project, IN
• 16:00 | Distributing Power through Distributed Technology? Blockchain Experiments in Land governance. M Campbell-Verduyn, U Groningen, NL
• 16:30 | Antitrust, Regulation, and User Union in the Era of Digital Platforms. L. Cong, Cornell U& S Mayer, U. Chicago, US

Tuesday, October 18 (9:00 – 17:00, CEST)

9:00 | Teaching Digital Political Economy

• Seda Gürses, Technology University of Delft
• Milton Mueller, Georgia Institute of Technology

10:00 | Panel Discussion: Industrial Policy and the Digital Economy

• Moderator: Shane Tews, American Enterprise Institute, US
• Panelists: George Calhoun, Stevens Institute of Technology and Forbes Magazine; Dirk Auer, U Liège

11:00 | Break

Transnationalism vs. Sovereignty in the International Digital Political Economy, 1

• 11:30 | Europe and global governance of internet identifiers. Elena Plexida, ICANN, BE
• 12:00 | EU’ Narratives and Trade Policy on Data Flows Compared to US and China. Svetlana Yakovleva, IVIR, U Amsterdam, NL
• 12:30 | Governing cross-border data flows, YC Chin & Jingwu Zhou, Beijing Normal U, PRC

13:00 | Lunch

Transnationalism vs. Sovereignty in the International Digital Political Economy, 2

• 14:00 | National Security Creep in Corporate Transactions. Kristin Eichensehr, University of Virginia Law, US
• 14:30 | Analysis of European Digital Regulatory Efforts. Pierre LaRouche, U. Montreal, CA

15:00 | Panel Discussion: The new Trans-Atlantic Data Privacy Framework

• Moderator: Milton Mueller, Georgia Institute of Technology, US
• Panelists: Peter Swire, Georgia Institute of Technology US; Wolf Schünemann, University of Hildesheim, DE

15:40 | Break

16:00 | Reprise: From Internet Governance to Digital Political Economy

• Reconsidering the definition of the field. Laura DeNardis, Georgetown U, US
• 16:30 | Plenary Discussion