GPPi organizes discussion with MEP Marietje Schaake on digital freedom

On 17 June 2013, GPPi organized a talk on digital freedom in Budapest with Marietje Schaake, member of the European Parliament and rapporteur for the first EU strategy on digital freedom in foreign policy. Marietje Schaake zoomed in on the challenges of protecting digital rights in a world characterized by instant information exchange and connectivity.

Schaake gave the keynote address for a 17 – 21 June 2013 forum in Budapest that brings together 40 undergraduate students from 20 countries for the final stage of the Global Debate and Public Policy Challenge (GDPPC). GDPPC is an annual program that offers undergraduates an opportunity to explore issues of global importance. The event took place at the Central European University School of Public Policy.

Schaake said that today people’s digital freedoms and the open Internet are under threat. This is a global trend, though its manifestations differ. Repression and human rights violations have a growing technological component, she said. We not only face concrete cyber-crime and threats. In many countries government desires to control and repress have moved online. In other places, it is their inaction and unbridled privatization of the web. There is also the risk that well-intended cyber security measures have disproportionate collateral impact on our digital freedoms.

To prevent fear, hype and incident-driven policies and practices, said Schaake, knowledge, transparency and accountability are needed. ​“Let us not make ​‘cyber’ into something completely different, alien or spacy. Rather, let us focus on integrating technological developments in a way that allows us to preserve core, constitutional principles, democratic oversight and digital freedoms as essentials in our open societies.”

Following Schaake’s address, GPPi Director Thorsten Benner moderated a discussion between her and the audience.

Schaake is a Dutch politician for the social liberal party Democrats 66. Since July 2009, she has served as a member of the European Parliament. She is a member of the European Council on Foreign Relations and is vice-chair of the Supervisory Board of Free Press Unlimited. She serves on the Board of Governors of the European Internet Foundation, the Board of Directors of the Flemish-Dutch House de Buren and the board of the Dutch section of the Internet Society.

GDPPC is organized and implemented by GPPi in collaboration with the International Debate Education Association, the European Council of Foreign Relations and the Central European University School of Public Policy. The program is supported by the Open Society Foundations.