icegov2012 proceedings

2.1 The Lei Azeredo
If we analyze the main reasons mentioned by interviewees to
justify why the MCR initiative emerged, most of events and
contexts mentioned by interviewees make direct reference to the
Lei Azeredo. The Lei Azeredo was a Bill of Law sent to the
Lower chamber in 1999 (PL 84/99), and to the Senate in 2003
(PLS 89/03). The Bill focused on regulating crimes over the
Internet, framing Internet policy mainly from a Criminal Law
perspective rather than from a Civil Law framework. The Lei
Azeredo was heavily criticized by cyber activists, think thank
organizations and particularly by Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva’s
(Lula) government (2002-2010) for trying to regulate crimes over
the Internet in a context where civic rights over the web were still
not defined. In fact, as interviewees claim, the projects name
“Marco Civil” (“Civil Regulatory Framework” in English) was
chosen precisely to make clear their opposition to discussing
criminal codes of conduct prior to securing civil rights and
obligations related to Internet use.
2.2 Cyber Activism
The Lei Azeredo attracted, from the start, fierce criticism inside
and outside online forums of debate, but it was mostly after 2009,
with the launch of a blog know as “Mega não”, by the cyber
activist João Caribé, that social opposition to the Lei Azeredo
gained a coherent voice. The “Mega não” movement fuelled an
intense activism in blogs, twitter and other social media that not
only attracted even more online activists to the cause, but also
received media coverage from niche national media and also
motivated protest marches in a number of cities, having also
themed important Internet-related events of the year [9].
Interviewees argue that the existence of the “Mega não” social
movement played a key role in the overall success of the MCR
project. It is argued that those who were closely engaged with the
“Mega não” movement were also those who pioneered the
comment section of the project’s website; not only, activists
linked to the “Mega não” movement were also said to be the ones
who helped to publicize the MCR initiative by using their own
twitter hashtags and blog networks to comment on the initiative.
Interviewees mention that, at first, cyber activists were suspicious
that their “bottom up” movement would be overlooked by the “top
down” initiative they were being invited to join; nonetheless,
interviewees say that gradually most “Mega não” supporters
started to trust the MCR initiative as a real opportunity to push
forward their own policy interests what, in return, attracted even
more contributors and publicity to the MCR website.
2.3 Policy Activism
Another key element mentioned by interviewees refers to the
policy activism of CTS. CTS was already known nationally and
internationally for its policy agenda in favor of open source
software, creative commons license, and other topics related to
technology, law and society. Specifically in relation to the Lei
Azeredo’s debate, CTS was also known for their two reports
criticizing the draft bill proposal, which is perceived by
interviewees to have increased their influence on government
bodies, academics, and cyber activist networks.
As interviewees from the Ministry of Justice claim, CTS’s public
policy views were amongst the top reasons why they were called
to co-author the MCR project. The Ministry of Justice was said to
welcome CTS not only due to their opposition to the Lei Azeredo,
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but also based on their shared ideas of designing online
collaborative venues for policy making. And as interviewees from
CTS argue, they welcomed the Ministry of Justice’s invitation
because they perceived the initiative as an opportunity to push
forward their own policy agenda, as much as a promising
opportunity to influence politicians to support in the future policy
debates based on collaborative online practices.
2.4 Government’s Support
The third element mentioned by interviewees as decisive in
launching the MCR project was the executive government’s
support. President Lula’s speech at the 2009 FILS international
open-source conference is mentioned as the starting event for the
entire initiative. During his speech, the president explicitly
opposed to the Lei Azeredo’s proposal calling instead for an
alternative bill securing Internet civic rights. Lula’s speech
however was far from an isolated event; it simply illustrated a
broad agenda pushed forward by the incumbent government to
understand Internet as a challenging way of thinking civic social
relations and governance. Experiences using Internet for policy
making precede Lula’s government, backing to 1999 when IRC
chat technology and blogs have been pilot for policy making
inside government. Interviewees nonetheless stress that it was
after Lula’s presidency start in 2002 that uses of Internet for
policy development expanded. The role of the Ministry of Culture
is mentioned as illustrative of this point, two projects in particular.
The first, known as “Pontos de cultura”, linked government’s
financial support to local cultural centers to the provision of
Internet access to local community. The second, know as
CulturaDigital.br, invited citizens to create and share their blogs
and digital identities in a public and open-source Wordpress-based
platform in order to foment policy deliberation online.
2.5 Collaborative Policy Making Framework
The last contextual element mentioned by interviewees refers to
the emergence of new ways of combining law, society and
technology. Due to the emergence of collaborative and networkbased
technology, interviewees needed to re-conceptualize how
their institutions understood knowledge production. CTS, the
Ministry of Justice and the Ministry of Culture had pioneered in
previous years several experiments investigating alternative
governance models based on technology. CTS, for example, had
been influential in supporting the use of the Creative Commons
License; the Ministry of Justice and the Ministry of Culture
piloted the portal Culturadigital.br, inviting cyber activists and
hackers to share their opinions online. It is within this panorama
that interviewees said to have welcomed the MCR project: as an
opportunity to try out alternatives to the traditional governmentcentered,
closed-doors process of policy making. As one
interviewee phrases it, the MCR initiative was a “symbiotic
movement between the way you define policy making, and the
object of policy regulation … and it is within this ‘happy
marriage’ between these two elements that we define what we
aimed to achieve”.
3. DESIGNING TECHNOLOGY FOR
DELIBERATION
One way to understand how policy forums are affected by web 2.0
tools is evaluating, when public consultations are over, what
answers citizens provided to government and what uses