Democracy and the Internet Initial Project Vision Statement

Democracy and the Internet (CS/INTA 4803 DAI-CS/INTA 8803 DAI)

Initial Project Vision Statement

Motivation/Opportunity (Phase 1)

Description:

In 2000, the United Nations tasked the world with 9 Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) in the areas of education, health, women’s empowerment, environment, etc. These goals came with a set of targets that were to be accomplished by 2015. The UN is now working to create a vision of “Beyond 2015” that includes the role of Information Communication Technologies and the voice of youth. To create this new vision, the International Telecommunications Union employed an online platform to crowdsource the ideas of youths from around the world. Youths contributed their perspectives as to how to improve health, education, employment opportunities, democracy, and the environment using ICTs. This communique will be read to the UN General Assembly later this year.

The UN is generally a closed power space of decision making, particularly when it comes to the participation of the global youth. The ITU has observed this gap in communication between the youth and policy makers and seeks to use networked technologies to give the youth a platform to share their vision in the form of a communique to the United Nations General Assembly. Now that this document has been crowdsourced, there is a wealth of data to be used to tell the story of how and who produced this communique. With guidance from the ITU, our team will design a visually and contextually appealing aid to present a crowdsourced communique from the global youth to the UN General Assembly.

Stakeholders (Phase 1)

Name: United Nations

Description: The Organization works on a broad range of fundamental issues, from sustainable development, environment & refugees protection, disaster relief, counter terrorism, disarmament and non-proliferation, to promoting democracy, human rights, gender equality and the advancement of women, governance, economic and social development and international health, clearing landmines, expanding food production, and more, in order to achieve its goals and coordinate efforts for a safer world for this and future generations.

Actual/Planned Contact: UN Envoy to the Youth, Ahmad Alhendaw

Name: Information Technology Union (ITU)

Description: It is a specialized agency of the United Nations that is responsible for issues that concern information and communication technologies. The ITU coordinates the shared global use of the radio spectrum, promotes international cooperation in assigning satellite orbits, works to improve telecommunication infrastructure in the developing