CSCI1951-B

Virtual Citizens or Subjects? The Global Battle Over Governing Your Internet

Spring 2019

The Internet began as a U.S. government research project, progressed to an open network run by free-spirited geeks, and transitioned in the late 1990s to a unique governance model in which nations, corporations, and civil society were supposed to all have a voice. Suspicions abound that this model is nothing more than window dressing where the fate of the Internet is determined behind closed doors. Where are the real decisions being made? Who is making them? How can you and citizens of other nations influence these decisions? The global battle to run the Internet, brewing for years, has broken wide open with revelations of American spying on a massive scale.