The Global Digital Compact: Uniting nations on digital governance

Multilateralism is having a renaissance.

Professionals and their organizations are in the midst of an era-defining moment, best described as "digital entropy." It is a moment defined and framed by the great rapidity and complexity associated with the global proliferation of new sociotechnical, regulatory and organizational digital governance demands.

A clarion call for comprehension, cohesion and cooperation across national borders to address the opportunities and risks of digitalization has never been more important or more challenging.

Meeting the alphabet soup of new digital laws and policies is a commensurately extensive array of international organizations, institutions and initiatives. There is a spring in the step of the G7, the World Trade Organization, the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, the Council of Europe, and the Global Privacy Assembly, as well as with newer fora such as the International Network for Digital Regulation Cooperation, the Global Online Safety Regulators Network, the Global Cross-Border Privacy Rules Forum and the Global Cooperation Arrangement for Privacy Enforcement, which all have priority workstreams related to the cohering of cross-border digital regulation.

It doesn't, however, get more multilateral than the United Nations. The U.N. has a storied history. It was forged from the embers of the League of Nations after World War II when representatives from 50 countries gathered in 1945 to form a new international organization, which aimed to prevent another global conflict. Nearly 80 years later, the U.N. is now comprised of 193 member states in the General Assembly, one of the U.N.'s main bodies, and the U.N. System, a collection of funds, programs and specialized agencies.