Shaping the Architecture of the U.S. Information and Communication Technology Architecture: A Political Economic Analysis1

Peter F. Cowhey, Jonathan D. Aronson and John Richards

Review of Policy Research, 2009, vol. 26, issue 1‐2, 105-125

Abstract: How did political economy help shape the revolution in telecommunications and computer networking? We offer three arguments concerning the impact of political economy and policy on the architecture of the U.S. information and communication technology infrastructure. First, it tilted toward an architectural principle of “modularity” that influenced the paths of both the telecom equipment, computer equipment and software, and computer networking markets. Second, it created multiple network infrastructures for telecommunications when other countries either tried to retain a monopoly infrastructure or limit the number of competitors. Third, it propelled a particular architecture for computing (intelligence at the edge of the network) and the full realization of the potential benefits of the Internet. The particular policy mix for competition matters, and this policy mix reflects fundamentals of political economy.

Date: 2009
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1541-1338.2008.00371.x

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:bla:revpol:v:26:y:2009:i:1-2:p:105-125

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.wiley.com/bw/subs.asp?ref=1541-132x

Access Statistics for this article

Review of Policy Research is currently edited by Christopher Gore

More articles in Review of Policy Research from Policy Studies Organization Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Wiley Content Delivery ().