Public Policies for Information Societies

SUSANA FINQUELIEVICH

Kingston

Conferencia; Regional Consultation on “Open Access to Scientific Information and Research – Concept and Policies”; 2013

UNESCO

UNESCO’s standard-setting work is addressed primarily to Member States, i.e. their governments. The IFAP Template fully endorses the multi-stakeholder approach to the development of the Information Society, however, and acknowledges that the role of other stakeholders (especially entrepreneurs, network, service and content providers, but also, of course, civil society and NGOs) is as (if not, in some cases, more) important as that of governments. Nevertheless, this depends on the specific circumstances, and also on the stage of the process of developing the Information Society, in any particular country. The emphasis in this Template is primarily on what governments and the civil service should do and this was a deliberate choice, in keeping with the approach adopted in the Tunis Agenda for the Information Society, given that the document may be most useful in countries where the role of government policy and of the public sector is especially important.