The World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS) was a two-phase United Nations-sponsored summit on information, communication and, in broad terms, the information society that took place in 2003 in Geneva and in 2005 in Tunis.(2005, November 21). Gambia; World Summit On the Information Society Opens. Africa News. Aa part of stock-taking initiatives, WSIS Forums have taken place periodically since the initial conferences.
One of the Summit's chief aims is to bridge the global digital divide separating rich countries from poor countries by increasing internet accessibility in the developing world. The conferences established 17 May as World Information Society Day.
The WSIS+10 Process marked the ten-year milestone since the 2005 Summit. In 2015, the stocktaking process culminated with a High-Level meeting of the UN General Assembly on 15 and 16 December in New York. The United Nations General Assembly concluded the WSIS+20 review in December 2025.
Background In the last decades of the 20th century, Information and Communications Technology (ICT) has changed modern society in many ways. This is often referred to as the digital revolution, and along with it have come new opportunities and threats. Many world leaders hope to use ICT to solve societal problems; yet, at the same time, there are concerns about the digital divide at international and domestic levels and specifically divisions between those who have access to ICT and those who do not.
Recognizing that these challenges and opportunities require global discussion on the highest level, the government of Tunisia made a proposal at the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) Plenipotentiary Conference in Minneapolis in 1998 to hold a World Summit on the Information Society. This resolution was then put forward it to the United Nations. In 2001, the ITU Council decided to hold the Summit in two phases, the first from 10 to 12 December 2003, in Geneva, and the second from 16 to 18 November 2005 in Tunis.
On 21 December 2001, the United Nations General Assembly by approving Resolution 56/183 endorsed the holding of the World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS) to discuss information society opportunities and challenges. According to this resolution, the General Assembly related the Summit to the United Nations Millennium Declaration to implement ICT to facilitate achieving Millennium Development Goals. It also emphasized on the multi-stakeholder approach to use all stakeholders including civil society and private sector beside the governments. The resolution gave ITU the leading managerial role to organize the event in cooperation with other UN bodies as well as the other international organizations and the host countries and recommended that preparations for the Summit take place through an open-ended intergovernmental Preparatory Committee - or PrepCom - that would define the agenda of the Summit, decide on the modalities of the participation of other stakeholders, and finalize both the draft Declaration of Principles and the draft Plan of Action.
A number of non-governmental organizations (NGOs), scientific institutions, community media and others participated in preparations for the summit as well as the event itself, drawing attention to human rights, people-centered development, freedom of speech and press freedom. In Germany, a WSIS working group initiated by the Network New Media and the Heinrich Böll Foundation, has been meeting continuously since mid-2002. In Pakistan, PAK Education Society/Pakistan Development Network created Pakistan Knowledge Economy or Information Society. It promotes ICT in Pakistan and was the only Pakistani NGO who participated in UN World Summit on Information Society, Geneva.
Geneva Summit, 2003 Delegates from 175 countries took part in the first phase of WSIS at Geneva in 2003, where they adopted a Declaration of Principles. This document is a roadmap for achieving an information society accessible to all and based on shared knowledge. A Plan of Action was developed, setting out a goal of bringing 50 percent of the world's population online by 2015. It did not include specifics of how this might be achieved. Civil Society delegates from non-governmental organizations (NGOs) produced a document called "Shaping Information Societies for Human Needs" that brought together a wide range of issues under a human rights and communication rights umbrella."Shaping Information Societies for Human Needs", Civil Society Declaration to the World Summit on the Information Society, Unanimously adopted by the WSIS Civil Society Plenary (Geneva), 8 December 2003. Retrieved 20 October 2013. Archived from the original on July 16, 2024.
The Geneva summit also left unresolved more controversial issues including the question of Internet governance and funding. When the 2003 summit failed to agree on the future of Internet governance, the Working Group on Internet Governance (WGIG) was formed to come up with ideas on how to progress.
WSIS Action Lines The WSIS Action Lines set out by the Geneva Plan of Action are as follows: C1. The role of public governance authorities and all stakeholders in the promotion of ICTs for development C2. Information and communication infrastructure C3. Access to information and knowledge C4. Capacity building C5. Building confidence and security in the use of ICTs C6. Enabling environment C7. ICT Applications: E-government E-business E-learning E-health E-employment E-environment E-agriculture E-science C8. Cultural diversity and identity, linguistic diversity and local content C9. Media C10. Ethical dimensions of the Information Society C11. International and regional cooperation
Digital divide and WSIS
The digital divide was addressed in Archbishop John P. Foley's address leading up to the 2003 WSIS and in the Vatican document, Ethics in the Internet.Ethics in the Internet, John P. Foley and Pierfranco Pastore, Pontifical Council for Social Communications, The Vatican. Retrieved 20 October 2013. Foley describes the digital divide as the current disparity in the access to digital communications between developed and developing countries; he calls for the entire international community to work towards resolving this. The digital divide is considered a form of discrimination dividing the rich and the poor, within and among nations, on the basis of access or lack of access to new information technology. The digital divide is a new form for gaps that have always existed between the information rich and the information poor, and this term recognizes gaps between individuals as well as between nations.
Senator Burchell Whiteman from Jamaica stressed that Jamaica realizes the importance of bridging the digital divide because of the social and economic impacts it has on disadvantaged countries. Ignacio Gonzalez Planas, Minister of Informatics and Communications of the Republic of Cuba, noted that only a few countries enjoy advanced or even basic ICT, including phone networks. Vice Premier Huang Ju, the State Council of the People's Republic of China, said that the information society should be a people centered society in which all peoples and all countries share the benefit to the fullest in greater common development in the information society.
Criticism of Geneva outcomes In a press statement released 14 November 2003 the Civil Society group at WSIS warned about a deadlock if governments could not able agree on the Universal Declaration of Human Rights as the common foundation of the summit declaration.Civil Society Statement at the End of the Preparatory Process for the WSIS 14 November 2003 It identified two main problems: On the issue of correcting imbalances in riches, rights and power, governments do not agree on even the principle of a financial effort to overcome the so-called "digital divide", which was precisely the objective when the summit process was started in 2001. Governments are not able to agree on a commitment to basic human right standards as the basis for the Information Society, most prominent in this case being the freedom of expression.
The "digital divide" concept was criticized by some civil society groups as well. For instance, the Foundation for a Free Information Infrastructure (FFII) rejected the term."Re:interpretation?". Comment on Joe Barr, "Why UN's information society summit is doomed to fail", 17 February 2004.
Tunis Summit, 2005
The second phase took place from 16 through 18 November 2005, in Tunis, Tunisia. It resulted in the Tunis Commitment and the Tunis Agenda for the Information Society, as well as the creation of the Internet Governance Forum (IGF). Massachusetts Institute of Technology. website, World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS) - Tunis Agenda for the Information SocietyTunis Agenda for the Information Society United Nations. November 18, 2005. Retrieved October 26, 2025.
The summit attracted 1,500 people from International Organizations, 6,200 from NGOs, 4,800 from the private sector, and 980 from the media. Funding for the event was provided by several countries. The largest donations to the 2003 event came from Japan and Spain."Funding of WSIS-2004", World Summit on the Information Society, International Telecommunication Union, 26 June 2006. Retrieved 20 October 2013. Archived from the original on 18 October 2004. The 2005 event received funding from Japan, Sweden, France and many other countries as well as companies like Nokia."Funding of WSIS-2005", World Summit on the Information Society, International Telecommunication Union, 26 June 2006. Retrieved 20 October 2013. Archived from the original on 2 July 2004.
Criticism The summit was marred by criticism of Tunisia for allowing attacks on journalists and human rights defenders to occur in the days leading up to the event.Tunisia: Political Prisoners Held in Solitary for Years 7 July 2004 A fact-finding mission to Tunisia in January 2005 by the Tunisia Monitoring Group (TMG), a coalition of 14 members of the International Freedom of Expression Exchange, found serious cause for concern about the current state of freedom of expression and of civil liberties in the country, including gross restrictions on freedom of the press, media, publishing and the Internet. The coalition published a 60-page report that recommends steps the Tunisian government needs to take to bring the country in line with international human rights standards.Tunisia Monitoring Group releases report on state of free expression 22 February 2005 At the third WSIS Preparatory Committee meeting in Geneva in September 2005, the TMG launched an update to the report that found no improvements in the human rights situation.
The Tunisian government tried to prevent one of the scheduled sessions, "Expression Under Repression", from taking place. French reporter Robert Ménard, the president of Reporters sans frontières, (Reporters Without Borders) was refused admission to Tunisia for phase two of the Summit. A French journalist for Libération was stabbed and beaten by unidentified men after he reported on local human rights protesters. The representatives of the Human Rights in China NGO were refused entry to Tunisia due to Chinese government pressure on Tunisia. A Belgian television crew was harassed and forced to hand over footage of Tunisian dissidents. Local human rights defenders were roughed up and prevented from organizing a meeting with international civil society groups.
The South African Broadcasting Corporation (SABC) issued a report on human rights conditions in Tunisia and its role as WSIS host,Rights groups says Tunisia is not right for WSIS 13 November 2005 citing the position of the IFEX Tunisia Monitoring Group. It said:
Debate over internet governance