“The 21st century is a terrible time to be a control freak.”
So says Ben Scott, policy adviser for innovation in the office of Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. Scott and his colleague, Senior Adviser Alec Ross, are a pair of “whiz kids” advising Clinton on how to make the most of cyber-technology in service to U.S. diplomacy.
Part of that mission, Scott told visiting editorial writers last week, is to make the 60,000-member State Department itself “nimble, Internet-savvy.” Or, as Scott puts it, “to turn the aircraft carrier.”
That means erasing boundaries between policy-making and technology — in an era when the Arab Spring movement is driven by hand-held devices; when there are 2 billion-plus Internet users worldwide; when African villagers without bank accounts move their money via cell phones.
In short, diplomacy is changing, or perhaps expanding. “The power shift is from control of government to smaller institutions and groups of individuals,” Scott said. “We have lost control of our information system — and we won’t get it back.”
Of course there will still be government-to-government diplomacy. But now there is also direct, people-to-people diplomacy. Think Kony 2012. “Clinton has made Internet freedom a priority,” said Scott. “The Internet is government by no state — and every state.”
And if you think the United States is driving the process, think again. “The Brazilians, Norwegians and Indians are ahead of us,” Scott said. “The shape of the Internet will be determined not by developed countries, but by some 30 countries in the developing world. Will they be committed to our Internet values or not? They will matter tremendously.”
Which countries? Try Thailand, Scott said. Or Turkey. Vietnam. Tunisia. Libya.
“The dark side is that technology is agnostic,” Scott said. “Some governments are using the tools to crack down, conduct surveillance, steal intellectual property, use viruses.” That’s why part of the job is to protect Internet freedom, educate vulnerable communities about filtering and monitoring, encryption and deletion technology.
“The benefits still outweigh the vulnerabilities,” Scott said. “And you can’t put it back in the bottle.”