Abstract: The Internet is a component of global telecommunications infrastructure that has proven especially significant, far-reaching, and often challenging for traditional market economics and geopolitics. In particular, the nature and functionality of the Internet has inhibited its integration into existing institutions and the global hegemony of communication policy. Consequently, new efforts and models have arisen to address this mis-alignment, creating a new landscape of governance that is decentralized and reactionary.

This paper conducts a critical examination of international internet governance, focusing specifically on the Internet Corporation of Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) in efforts to understand its role and implications for the internet, geopolitics, and international telecommunications regulation. Unlike prior studies, this research focuses specifically on the organizational and inter-organizational structure of ICANN to understand the networked model of governance in this context, identify noteworthy stakeholders, parse strategies, objectives, and outcome discrepancies that may exist.

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