This summer, we spotted an interesting development; with the upcoming elections just around the corner, both in the Netherlands and in the U.S., political parties address particular attention to Internet issues in their campaigns. 

Yesterday, we published an article about the Dutch Socialist Party, which had several policy proposals against IT bottlenecks. Last Tuesday, the American Republican Party (commonly abbreviated as ‘GOP’), devoted two sections of their election campaign to Internet issues.

The views on Internet governance seem to give quite balanced solutions for multiple Internet issues. For instance, the GOP intents to keep the ‘multi-stakeholder approach of Internet governance’, while resisting attempts to give international or intergovernmental organizations control over the Internet. Simultaneously, the GOP aims to keep the Internet free of regulations and remove barriers that protect out-dated technologies and business plans. A third issue addressed on the GOP’s platform is privacy and data protection; personal data should receive full constitutional protection and individuals should have the right to control the use of their personal data by third parties. However, the GOP rejects net-neutrality, in line with its current policy. 

An interesting fact to mention is that the MPAA has already announced their support for the Republican’s anti-piracy stand in their campaign. Christopher J. Dodd, chairman and chief executive of the MPAA, says: "The Republican Party platform language strikes a very smart balance: it emphasizes the importance of us doing more as a nation to protect our intellectual property from online theft while underscoring the critical importance of protecting Internet freedom.'' An interesting issue will be the development of enforcement of intellectual property rights overseas.

It is interesting to notice how Internet related issues are no longer just an afterthought for politicians, but are now addressed in an active manner during election periods. This might be because of the vast resistance the last Congress encountered from the Internet community after it wanted to fast-track SOPA last January. By addressing these issues during elections, political parties have the opportunity to see what issues are important to their voters, before converting solutions to those issues to law. Nevertheless, how these proposals will translate to regulation will depend on the results of the elections. 

The Republicans party platform can be found here. 

Read more about copyright regulation on Future of Copyright:

• Dutch Socialist Party proposes to reform private copying levy
• Australian Law Reform Commission opens public consultation about copyright and the digital economy
• Chinese government opens public consultation on new copyright to film productions

Sources: ADWEEK, Los Angeles Times, The Register 

Written by: Nathalie Falot