[A2k] Geist: Why The Lack of ACTA Transparency Is Not Standard

[Judit Rius Sanjuan]

Why The Lack of ACTA Transparency Is Not Standard
By Michael Geist
Source (with links): http://www.michaelgeist.ca/content/view/4549/125/
Thursday November 19, 2009

In the face of widespread criticism of the lack of ACTA transparency,
participating governments and music industry lobbyists have claimed
that the transparency issue is much ado about nothing.  As governments
seek to keep relevant information secret, those same governments
released a joint statement last week arguing that "it is accepted
practice during trade negotiations among sovereign states to not share
negotiating texts with the public at large, particularly at earlier
stages of the negotiation."

It is important to emphatically state that this is simply not the case
for many multilateral agreements and the activities of international
organizations that typically serve as the forum for global agreement
discussions.  U.S. NGO groups have made a strong case for how ACTA's
lack of transparency is out-of-step with many other global norm
setting exercises.  With regard to international fora, they note that
the WTO, WIPO, WHO, UNCITRAL, UNIDROIT, UNCTAD, OECD, Hague Conference
on Private International Law, and an assortment of other conventions
have all been far more open than ACTA.  For example, it notes that the
WIPO Internet treaties, which offer the closest substantive parallel
to the ACTA Internet provisions, were by comparison very transparent:
The two WIPO Internet Treaties (WCT and WPPT) were negotiated in a
completely open meeting at the Geneva Convention Center. The public
was allowed to attend without accreditation. The draft texts for the
WCT and the WPPT were public, and the U.S. government requested
comments on the draft texts, which were available, among other places,
from the U.S. Copyright Office.

Two other documents offer similar reviews of the transparency of
negotiation documents and opportunities for public participation.  The
inescapable conclusion is that the ACTA approach is hardly standard.
Rather, it represents a major shift toward greater secrecy in the
negotiation of international treaties on intellectual property in an
obvious attempt to avoid public participation and scrutiny.

(The documents prepared by US NGOs that Michael Geist mentions are
available here: http://keionline.org/content/view/246/1)