Session
Subtheme
Organizer 1: Intergovernmental Organization, Intergovernmental Organization
Organizer 2: Intergovernmental Organization, Western European and Others Group (WEOG)
Organizer 3: Civil Society, Latin American and Caribbean Group (GRULAC)
Organizer 4: Intergovernmental Organization, Asia-Pacific Group
Organizer 5: Intergovernmental Organization, Intergovernmental Organization
Organizer 2: Intergovernmental Organization, Western European and Others Group (WEOG)
Organizer 3: Civil Society, Latin American and Caribbean Group (GRULAC)
Organizer 4: Intergovernmental Organization, Asia-Pacific Group
Organizer 5: Intergovernmental Organization, Intergovernmental Organization
Speaker 1: Francisco Brito Cruz, Civil Society, Latin American and Caribbean Group (GRULAC)
Speaker 2: Gayatri Khandhadai, Civil Society, Asia-Pacific Group
Speaker 3: Jinhwa Ha, Private Sector, Asia-Pacific Group
Speaker 4: Abdul Saka-Abdulrahim, Intergovernmental Organization, African Group
Speaker 5: Victor Durigan, Government, Latin American and Caribbean Group (GRULAC)
Speaker 2: Gayatri Khandhadai, Civil Society, Asia-Pacific Group
Speaker 3: Jinhwa Ha, Private Sector, Asia-Pacific Group
Speaker 4: Abdul Saka-Abdulrahim, Intergovernmental Organization, African Group
Speaker 5: Victor Durigan, Government, Latin American and Caribbean Group (GRULAC)
Format
Roundtable
Duration (minutes): 60
Format description: The organizers of this session support the IGF's commitment to collaborative workshop sessions rather than standard panel discussions. We also share IGF's commitment to ensuring that these workshops benefit from a diversity of perspectives and backgrounds. With this in mind, we believe a 60-minute workshop in a round table setting is best suited for our session. The topic of this workshop is inherently multistakeholder in nature. It requires inputs from companies, civil society, governments, and others. The goal of the workshop is to collaborate to produce a genuinely collaborative discussion among different types of stakeholders. With this in mind, it is imperative that this diverse group of participants be able to look each other in the eye and communicate. We believe that 60 minutes is a sufficient time for this discussion.
Duration (minutes): 60
Format description: The organizers of this session support the IGF's commitment to collaborative workshop sessions rather than standard panel discussions. We also share IGF's commitment to ensuring that these workshops benefit from a diversity of perspectives and backgrounds. With this in mind, we believe a 60-minute workshop in a round table setting is best suited for our session. The topic of this workshop is inherently multistakeholder in nature. It requires inputs from companies, civil society, governments, and others. The goal of the workshop is to collaborate to produce a genuinely collaborative discussion among different types of stakeholders. With this in mind, it is imperative that this diverse group of participants be able to look each other in the eye and communicate. We believe that 60 minutes is a sufficient time for this discussion.
Policy Question(s)
- What are the existing policy gaps in platform content governance in these contexts?
- How can key stakeholders such as civil society, governments, regional human rights bodies strategize towards addressing these existing policy gaps?
- How can we prevent frameworks of regulation or oversight designed to protect rights from being misused to restrict fundamental freedoms, particularly in politically polarized contexts?
What will participants gain from attending this session? - Insight: The session will inform the attendees on platform content governance challenges unique to various geographies in the Global South.
- Knowledge: The session will inform the attendees on diverse perspectives and viewpoints of different actors within the ecosystem.
- Tools: Session will introduce various toolboxes and approaches from various cases in the Global South that have worked in the past.
- South-South Collaboration. Participants will explore opportunities for cooperation between stakeholders in Africa, Asia, and Latin America.
- Collective Intelligence: The session aims to develop a shared understanding of diverse approaches for collective solutions to the stated content governance gap.
SDGs
Description:
Global north-south digital inequality creates a digital divide in platform content governance, particularly as it relates to human rights risks linked to internet content. In turn, this digital divide creates a governance gap, disproportionately affecting the rights of people in the Global South. This gap is heightened by the proliferation of AI-generated content, which can carry a number of risks to human rights. A one-size-fits-all geographical approach to content governance has not been successful for digital platforms or governments. At the same time, scattered attempts at ad-hoc regional approaches by companies and governments have met with unequal results. A key reason for this governance gap is the concentration of major digital platforms in the Global North while Global South stakeholders remain scattered, with limited power to address digital human rights risks. Greater cooperation among stakeholders in Global South geographies is critical to leverage strategy, resources and learning opportunities. Expanding on previous conversations, this workshop will explore challenges to platform content governance in the Global South and opportunities to strengthen South-South collaboration among different stakeholders towards rights-respecting platform content governance in Africa, Asia and Latin America. The session will begin with remarks from speakers. The Business and Human Rights Resource Centre will address its work to foster South-South cooperation. Kakao will address its approach to human rights issues affecting Global South geographies in AI development. The UN B-Tech Project will discuss the importance of rights-respecting content governance to preventing adverse human rights impacts in Africa. Brazil's Supreme Federal Court will discuss relevant judicial developments in Brazil. Then, participants will hold a guided group discussion. Based on a pre-distributed list of questions, the discussion aims to produce a concrete list of action points to serve as a list of suggested next steps to enhance South-South cooperation.
Global north-south digital inequality creates a digital divide in platform content governance, particularly as it relates to human rights risks linked to internet content. In turn, this digital divide creates a governance gap, disproportionately affecting the rights of people in the Global South. This gap is heightened by the proliferation of AI-generated content, which can carry a number of risks to human rights. A one-size-fits-all geographical approach to content governance has not been successful for digital platforms or governments. At the same time, scattered attempts at ad-hoc regional approaches by companies and governments have met with unequal results. A key reason for this governance gap is the concentration of major digital platforms in the Global North while Global South stakeholders remain scattered, with limited power to address digital human rights risks. Greater cooperation among stakeholders in Global South geographies is critical to leverage strategy, resources and learning opportunities. Expanding on previous conversations, this workshop will explore challenges to platform content governance in the Global South and opportunities to strengthen South-South collaboration among different stakeholders towards rights-respecting platform content governance in Africa, Asia and Latin America. The session will begin with remarks from speakers. The Business and Human Rights Resource Centre will address its work to foster South-South cooperation. Kakao will address its approach to human rights issues affecting Global South geographies in AI development. The UN B-Tech Project will discuss the importance of rights-respecting content governance to preventing adverse human rights impacts in Africa. Brazil's Supreme Federal Court will discuss relevant judicial developments in Brazil. Then, participants will hold a guided group discussion. Based on a pre-distributed list of questions, the discussion aims to produce a concrete list of action points to serve as a list of suggested next steps to enhance South-South cooperation.
Expected Outcomes
- Host a follow-up session at another regional/international event on platform accountability/digital rights
- Publication on the challenges and opportunities of South-South Cooperation on Content Governance
- Expected Outcome: Will feed into B-Tech's ongoing workstream that aims to promote collective regional collaboration and intelligence sharing toward South-South Digital Cooperation.
Hybrid Format: Organizers are committed to a productive experience for online and onsite participants, including seamless communication between both groups. First, speakers will deliver scene-setting remarks, speaking to those in the room but directly addressing webcams so those online can hear the remarks and see speakers' faces.
The moderated discussion can then approached two ways: either one group discussion, with online participants listening and contributing directly (there will be an online moderator monitoring questions/hands from online participants) or online participants can hold a parallel discussion with the online moderator, and then the online and in-person moderators will report to the full group about the content of each discussion. We are open to either, subject to IGF's preference.
To ensure interaction, we will utilize a shared googleDoc, accessible to all participants, where moderators will note and summarize all contributions to the discussions.