Digital technologies are being adopted at a faster pace than previous waves of innovation, and their use is re-shaping administration and business, consumer behaviour and social interactions. They are subject to widely varying regimes, from lightly regulated but heavily standardised global...

A C21st bill of rights needs to address Internet-related issues such as collection and dissemination of personal data, lawful interception, provision of access, and government-enforced shutdowns. However, the uncertain nature of Internet access means firstly that it ought not to be a right, and...

The traditional practice of intercepting posts and telegrams was extended to telephony, both wire-tapping and call-logging, at a time of little regard for privacy and with minimal transparency. It was the introduction of competition, particularly non-state operators, that required codification...

Once governments in Africa were persuaded to create markets for mobile telecommunications, a complex game of buying and selling licences and licensed operators began, that has seen the rise and fall of multinational enterprises (MNEs). Their geographic footprints reflect complex patterns of when...

Once again the issue of a plebiscite for the independence of Scotland is being discussed. The likely effects of independence on the telecommunications sector have previously been analysed, but need both to be reconsidered and to be subjected to debate and parliamentary scrutiny. Necessarily, it...

Opinion polls suggest Scotland will reject independence, opening the way to a review of economic governance in the United Kingdom, a complex quasi-federal, asymmetric system of administrations and parliaments, the result of ad hoc changes over decades. One party wants telecommunications...

In order to encourage investment in telecommunication networks, governments have been encouraged to adopt a regulatory state model, with an independent regulatory authority that is subject to a system of appeals and to parliamentary oversight, providing different forms of accountability. The...

This paper compares and contrasts the processes used by the European, United Kingdom and Scottish parliaments in considering broadband policies, legislation, regulatory systems and outcomes, within a complex triple-tiered governance system. Broadband is of increasing importance due to the...

Twenty years of telecommunications market governance under the African National Congress (ANC) has seen a dramatic rise in access to telephony in South Africa, attributable to two mobile network operators licensed by the National Party (NP): MTN and Vodacom. Otherwise, the regulatory state...