On Tuesday, the EU accepted a proposal to consider internet censorship as a trade barrier. The proposer of the policy, Jules Maaten, feels that this would protect online freedom of speech.Justice John Stevens has this to say about internet censorship:
As a matter of constitutional tradition, in the absence of evidence to the contrary, we presume that governmental regulation of the content of speech is more likely to interfere with the free exchange of ideas than to encourage it. The interest in encouraging freedom of expression in a democratic society outweighs any theoretical but unproven benefit of censorship.— Justice John Paul Stevens, in Reno v. ACLU, 1997.
Although internet censorship is, in my opinion, valid in certain cases; I don’t think that one can label it as a barrier for trade. Do you agree with this proposal? What do you think would be the consequences on the global economy if such a policy if it were approved?