“Conventional wisdom holds that none of the main global challenges of the 21st century—whether it is climate change, nuclear weapons or cyber insecurity—can be adequately addressed without proper international cooperation. However, multilateral cooperation in many issue areas including cybersecurity is in a state of gridlock. Diverging conceptualizations of the subject matter has been offered as one driving factor behind the difficulty to cooperate at the international level.
“This paper contends that while international cooperation in cybersecurity has been difficult because of diverging definitions and conceptualizations of the subject, which are apparent in the international system, the problem grew into a state of gridlock because this divergence is anchored in the incompatibility of the ways in which major cyber powers organize their respective political systems at home. As such, it is argued that, the role of the multilateral system to bring about any significant progress in cybersecurity governance is very limited.”
