Internet Governance Models: An International Perspective

Abstract

The Internet grew up without a formal governance structure, contributing to its once-popular characterization as an uncharted electronic frontier unburdened by regulation, taxes, scarcity, or strife. Of course this description is exaggerated; there have always been rules of some sort in cyberspace. But governing structures rooted in the physical world have struggled to adapt to the online world, and the legitimacy of new structures created for the Internet has been rightfully challenged. These problems have been particularly acute in instances of great international diversity of law or culture - a diversity that may be difficult to preserve in a world without borders. Yet even the most fundamental questions, like whether to apply real-world laws to the Internet in the first place, remain controversial. The Article explores three areas in which various forms of Internet governance have been attempted: content regulation, spam, and the domain name system; and concludes that no one method of governance is likely to solve the problems of cyberspace.

Keywords: Internet governance, cyberspace

JEL Classification: K33