Liberalization and regulatory reform of telecom markets has emerged as a high profile policy issue. This paper analyzes how the multilateral system under the World Trade Organization can help developing countries in promoting their own information infrastructures. We focus on a specific ?regime?...

This paper analyses the role of the European Union in promoting liberalisation among its member states and in crafting the multilateral regime for telecommunications services. It begins by analysing the origins of the EU regime, describing its contours and assessing its implementation. It then...

During the past two decades, international trade in telecommunication services has significantly intensified. What is more, an increasing number of telecommunications operators have begun to expand their activities beyond national borders through FDIs, joint ventures, and cooperation agreements....

This paper examines the substantial regulatory changes in North American telecommunications markets over the past decade. We argue that a combination of U.S. domestic politics and the logic of international strategic positioning produced substantial and far-reaching reform driven primarily by...

This paper looks at the role of the key international agreements in the process of liberalization of the telecommunications industry. We analyse in particular the role of the WTO agreement in furthering liberalization around the world, and the extent to which it provides protection for foreign...

In most countries, competition in the telecommunications industry is subject to both sector-specific regulation and more general antitrust policies. At the same time, a process of international market liberalisation is under way in telecommunications which can only be truly effective - and...

The article refers to the interplay between deregulation resp. liberalization of the telecommunications sector and the market behaviour of TC-firms. In the past monopolization of the sector left the PTTs in a comfortable national monopolistic situation, but substantially confined their scope of...

Der institutionelle Reformprozess vom gesetzlich geschützten Fernmeldemonopol zu der partiellen Marktöffnung in den 1980er Jahren bis hin zur umfassenden Marktöffnung seit Januar 1998 schuf ein fruchtbares Forschungsfeld, sowohl aus der Perspektive der normativen als auch der positiven...

In order to analyze the remaining role for sector-specific regulation the focus of this paper is on those elements of the Internet periphery and Internet service provision, which are strongly based on telecommunications, in particular Internet access and Internet backbone. Section 2 deals with...

This paper gives a survey of the current state of competition in the German Broadband access market. Existing regulations and their impact on the deployment of high-speed Internet access are evaluated. It is argued that facilities-based competition is preferable to open-network regulations. The...