Sovereignty and universal service: sacred cows in the satellite industry

David Wright

Telecommunications Policy, 1999, vol. 23, issue 7-8, 557-568

Abstract: Globalisation strikes at the cornerstone of telecom policy -- i.e., the sovereign right of every country to license the provision and use of telecoms within its borders. Sovereignty has historically been protected by means of a licence, the fees, conditions and procedures for which vary significantly around the world. In the satellite industry, those countries with the lowest teledensities tend to have the highest licence fees. Although there is a trend towards lower licence fees for subscribers, some regulators are just shifting the burden to service providers or the satellite operators. The European Commission and the European Conference of Post and Telecom Administrations (CEPT) have taken steps towards greater harmonisation of licensing conditions, one of which is universal service obligations (USOs). More than half of all countries have USOs which originated in the days of monopoly. With growing competition globally, assumptions about USOs need to be challenged. Regulators should refocus their energies from imposing tough conditions on the satellite industry to removing regulatory roadblocks.

Keywords: European; Commission; and; the; European; Conference; of; Past; and; Telecom; Administrations; (CEPT); Universal; service; obligations; (USO); Licence; conditions; and; fees; Satellite; services; One-stop-shopping; Satellite; industry (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 1999
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0308596199000415
Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

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:eee:telpol:v:23:y:1999:i:7-8:p:557-568

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.elsevier.com/wps/find/journaldescription.cws_home/30471/bibliographic
http://www.elsevier. ... /30471/bibliographic

Access Statistics for this article

Telecommunications Policy is currently edited by Erik Bohlin

More articles in Telecommunications Policy from Elsevier
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Catherine Liu ().