Electronic communications regulation in Europe : an overview of past and future problems

For many years, electronic communications has been one of the most important areas of policy intervention or the European Union. Liberalisation and privatisation of the telecommunications industry were very important topics of the policy debate in the two decades from 1990 to 2010. In these years, the EU developed a sophisticated regulatory framework aspiring to the principle of favouring the entrance of new players in the sector and characterised by a strong pro-competition flavour. More recently, however, the necessity of mobilising important investments for the creation of new Next Generation Networks, capable of delivering all the benefits of the digital revolution to European citizens, has cast doubts on the validity of the established framework. This paper discusses the solutions adopted during the liberalisation process and summarizes some of the key future challenges to the existing regulatory framework

A comparison of a new index based on the Media Pluralism Monitor with some other indices ranking freedom of expression

Raise your hand if you have never heard about countries’ rankings on freedom of expression, freedom of the media, media independence, which are produced every year by NGOs like Reporters without Borders or Freedom House. These organizations produce popular indices that rank countries worldwide according to different sets of indicators examining freedom of expression and of the media. These indices are influential and much quoted in policy documents and they also have some impact on international relations. The aim of this paper is twofold: a) to present, for the first time, a ranking of European Union Member States, Montenegro and Turkey, in terms of media pluralism, deriving it from the results of the Media Pluralism Monitor conducted by the CMPF at the EUI (the 2016 round, published in 2017); b) to compare this new MPM ranking with the scores and rankings provided by the indices of Reporters without Borders and Freedom House published in 2017 and relating to the same EU and accession countries. The MPM ranking is clearly different from the other two indices. These two indices, at least in the results, appear very similar, showing very strong correlations. A comparison exercise shows that the relatively mild correlation between the MPM and the other two indices may be explained by external factors, like a country’s population and GDP per capita, and it provides a preliminary interpretation of the differences

Smart cities and sharing economy

The concepts of smart city and sharing economy are at the centre of a number of current debates, which touch upon, among others, issues like the current urbanisation trends, the particular economic situation we are facing in the last years, the spread of connectivity and of new technologies and the innovation process in general. This working paper looks at the different and common characteristics of both smart cities and sharing economy models, in order to explore their interaction and complementary dynamics. This is done by analysing the specific features of the two, as well as at regulatory and competition issues they trigger within our current legal framework. The final aim is to make some policy suggestions to the local governments, which are called to cope with these phenomena, and for which the latter could constitute a great opportunity to enhance the local welfare

Deregulating Telecommunications in Europe: Timing, Path-Dependency, and Institutional Complementarities

We investigate institutional and policy drivers of telecommunications deregulation in Europe. In particular, we focus on those determinants which received so-far a comparatively little attention: policy speed and timing, path-dependency, institutional complementarity. We find that: first, crosseffects from privatizations to liberalizations reveal to affect the liberalization process; second, the telecommunications industry is shown to play a ‘pivotal role’ in the liberalization patterns of European countries; third, ‘path dependency’ turns out to be a crucial driver for telecommunications’ liberalizations; fourth, liberalizations in telecommunications result to be linked across European countries; fifth, ‘institutional complementarities’ between liberalization initiatives and regulatory authorities are shown to significantly shape the telecommunications market structure. Finally, we interpret our findings in light of the evolution of the European regulatory framework and suggest that these results may represent important lessons for policy design in other network industries.telecommunications; liberalizations; competition; panel regression

Monitoring media pluralism in Europe : testing and implementation of the media pluralism monitor 2014

The Centre for Media Pluralism and Media Freedom (CMPF) has published a Report on the simplification and test implementation of a Media Pluralism Monitor (MPM). The tool is designed to identify potential risks to media pluralism in Member States. The Report tests the application of the tool in 9 Member States

ENTraNCE for judges 2021 : selected case notes

This working paper includes a collection of case notes written by those national judges who attended the European Networking and Training for National Competition Enforcers (ENTraNCE Judges2021). The training programme was organised by RSCAS between November 2020 and October 2021, with the financial contribution of the DG Competition of the European Commission. The case notes included in the working paper summarise judgments from different EU Member States that relate to diverse aspects of competition law enforcement. This working paper thus aims to increase the understanding of the challenges that are faced by the national judiciaries in enforcing national and EU competition in the context of the decentralised regime of competition law enforcement that was introduced by Reg. 1/2003

The future of 5G and beyond : leadership, deployment and European policies

Published online: 04 September 2023This paper discusses the need for a strategic rethinking of the policies that promote 5G development and deployment in Europe, as they are crucial in determining the future impact of 5G and later also 6G on the digital economy. Considering the current state of 5G deployment and insights that have emerged from the debate on 5G technological leadership, we discuss the need for a more effective and proactive policy from the European Union in this field. The main suggestion is to develop an industrial policy that contrasts fragmentation in the telecommunications sector by taking the whole European Union as the scale of action, instead of just the individual member states.This article was published Open Access with the support from the EUI Library through the CRUI - Elsevier Transformative Agreement (2023-2027)

How real will the metaverse be? Exploring the spatial impact of virtual worlds

Published online: 07 Jun 2023In this paper, we perform a preliminary analysis of the technologies, firms and industries that may be affected by the possible futures of the metaverse, attempting to derive some hypotheses on the spatial effects of this process. We distinguish between two possible evolutive scenarios – the ‘metaverse shaped by reality view’ and the ‘metaverse shaping reality view’ – and factors affecting them, deriving implications for public policy planning. The first scenario presents relatively traditional core policy challenges: ensuring homogeneous availability of network infrastructures as well as the skills indispensable to catch the new technological opportunities at the local level, accompanying the reallocation of factors of production associated to disruption and addressing inequalities. In the second, the main challenge is more radical: to ensure that desirable features are incorporated in the emerging virtual worlds from the start

Position statement on the European commission’s call for evidence for an impact assessment on standard-essential patents

On 14th February 2022, the European Commission published a ‘Call for evidence for an impact assessment’ (Call for Evidence) and Public Consultation related to a new framework for standard essential patents (SEPs). The Florence School of Regulation: Area Communications & Media (FSR C&M) of the European University Institute (EUI) is thankful for the opportunity to provide its feedback. Our team of researchers has significant research, policy and training experience in the areas of telecommunications regulation, standardisation and EU competition policy. In this paper, we focus on four specific points raised by the Call for Evidence: 1) the necessity and proportionalityof any SEP licensing policy measure; 2) the measures that increase the transparency of the SEP landscape; 3) the optimal level of licensing in the production chain; 4) the alternative dispute resolution mechanisms for Fair, Reasonable and Non-Discriminatory (FRAND) licenses. Our contribution aims to be a catalyst for the debate about the appropriate SEP licensing framework

Position statement on the Joint ITA–NIST–USPTO collaboration initiative regarding standards : notice of public listening and request for comments

On 11th September 2023, the US Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO), the International Trade Administration (ITA), and the National Institute for Standards and Technology (NIST) called for stakeholder input on the current state of U.S. firm participation in standard-setting, and the ability of U.S. industry to readily adopt standards to grow and compete, especially as they relate to the standardisation of critical and emerging technologies. The Centre for a Digital Society (CDS) of the European University Institute (EUI) is thankful for the opportunity to offer its comments. We would like to express our view on the legislative proposal of the European Commission (EC) for a Regulation on Standard Essential Patents (hereinafter, the Regulation) as it relates to question no. 1 of the Request for Comments on the impact of foreign IPR policies on US leadership and participation in international standard setting. Furthermore, concerning question no. 9 on possible standard-essential patents (SEP) transparency measures, we highlight the possibility of improving the USPTO patent register already in place