ICANN, INTERNATIONAL INSTITUTIONS & DEVELOPMENT
Paper Prepared for the 2005 Annual Meeting of the American Political Science
Association
Nanette S. Levinson
School of International Service
American University
Washington, DC 20016-8071
Abstract
This paper reports on a longitudinal case study of ICANN (since its founding approximately
six years ago) with a particular focus on international institutions and the roles of
developing nations and with reference to the current World Summit on the Information
Society’s work. While the World Summit is much broader than ICANN and while ICANN itself
argues that it is not in the internet governance business, viewing domain name allocations
globally raises key issues in the context of international institutions and internet
governance. ICANN’s history illustrates vividly the deinstitutionalization of a United States
controlled process for the allocation of domain names on the web and the transition to a
new organizational form, vision, and operation. The transition involves the use of
information and communication technologies including attempts at web-based elections.
Using network analysis and institutional change theory, it also illustrates the changing roles
of developing nations and the corporate sector over time. Particular attention is given the
subtle and complex tensions among governments, international institutions such as the
United Nations and the International Telecommunications Union, nongovernmental
organizations and civil society representatives, and the private sector.
Introduction
There has been increasing interest in the role global and regional networks play in
shaping knowledge processes, whether government networks (Slaughter,2003), public-
private partnerships ( Levinson and Hervy, 2004), or individual ‘expert’ networks such
as principled issues networks (Keck and Sikkink,1998). These networks constitute the
byways for knowledge transfer and interorganizational learning within and even across
groups of networks or '‘constellations" (Gomes-Casseres, 2003). Little work has
concerned itself with interorganizational improvisation and learning outcomes and
interorganizational innovation and change in such “constellations”. Even more rare is
work that recognizes the impacts of culture. One significant exception is the work of
Dobbin, 1994 on comparative national policies regarding railways in the nineteenth
century which highlights the distinctive cultures of England, France and the United
States as each country shaped its national railway policies. Another key and often
overlooked dimension is institutional context. Here, see, for example, the work of
Finnemore, 1993, on the roles of international organizations in promulgating norms that
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