A Service of Leibniz-Informationszentrum econstor Wirtschaft Leibniz Information Centre Make Your Publications Visible. zbw for Economics El-Moghazi, Mohamed; Whalley, Jason Conference Paper The International Radio Spectrum Management: A Regime Theory Analysis 30th European Conference of the International Telecommunications Society (ITS): "Towards a Connected and Automated Society", Helsinki, Finland, 16th-19th June, 2019 Provided in Cooperation with: International Telecommunications Society (ITS) Suggested Citation: El-Moghazi, Mohamed; Whalley, Jason (2019) : The International Radio Spectrum Management: A Regime Theory Analysis, 30th European Conference of the International Telecommunications Society (ITS): "Towards a Connected and Automated Society", Helsinki, Finland, 16th-19th June, 2019, International Telecommunications Society (ITS), Calgary This Version is available at: http://hdl.handle.net/10419/205176 Standard-Nutzungsbedingungen: Terms of use: Die Dokumente auf EconStor dürfen zu eigenen wissenschaftlichen Documents in EconStor may be saved and copied for your Zwecken und zum Privatgebrauch gespeichert und kopiert werden. personal and scholarly purposes. 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Sofern die Verfasser die Dokumente unter Open-Content-Lizenzen (insbesondere CC-Lizenzen) zur Verfügung gestellt haben sollten, If the documents have been made available under an Open gelten abweichend von diesen Nutzungsbedingungen die in der dort Content Licence (especially Creative Commons Licences), you genannten Lizenz gewährten Nutzungsrechte. may exercise further usage rights as specified in the indicated licence. www.econstor.eu The International Radio Spectrum Management: A Regime Theory Analysis∗ Mohamed El-Moghazi#1, Jason Whalley*2 #NTRA of Egypt, Egypt *Newcastle Business School, Northumbria University, UK & Institut Mines Télécom Business School, Evry, France [email protected] [email protected] Abstract The international radio spectrum management regime is one of the oldest existing regimes with the main treaty of the regime, the Radio Regulations (RR), being 113 years old in 2019. However, there have been calls that the Radio Sector of the International Telecommunication Union (ITU-R) has become irrelevant to today’s wireless world. In terms of regime theory, there are three schools of international regime analysis, namely, liberalism, realism and constructivism. With this in mind, this paper’s main research question is quite straightforward, to ascertain which of these three schools applies to modern international spectrum management? To achieve this, the paper adopts a qualitative inductive approach that is based on primary data collected from 58 semi-structured interviews with the main stakeholders from the ITU-R. The examination of the empirical data supports the existence of a post- positivism perspective in regime theory regarding the international spectrum management regime, where hegemonic countries have a mutual interest in having global harmonized spectrum for their technologies, standards and systems. Accordingly, they utilize their lobbying power to promote their ideas. While the regime decision-making procedures have started not to reflect advances in wireless technology, most of the regime’s actors prefer to operate according to those procedures advocated by ITU-R so that they can get their technologies approved and legitimated. Unlike other international organisation (e.g., Security Council), developing countries feels more powerful in the ITU-R due to the one-vote per country rule. The ITU-R Bureau plays an important role of encouraging and reaching a compromise and providing data on the application of the RR. Finally, the paper shows that none of the three schools of theory can solely capture the essences of the international spectrum management regime. Thus, our analysis provides empirical support to a (tentative) synthesis of these schools. ∗ The authors are solely responsible for the opinions expressed in this paper. 1 1. Introduction Radio spectrum is a key component delivering wireless ICT services. The governance of the spectrum used on a global basis is the responsibility of the Radio Sector of the International Telecommunication Union (ITU-R), which aims to achieve efficient and economic use of the spectrum (Cave, Foster, & Jones, 2006). The roots of the current system of international governance started at the first International Radiotelegraph Convention in 1906, which established the right of states to transmit on unused frequencies throughout air space without disturbing the services of other radio stations (Zacher, 1996). The instrument of the ITU-R is the Radio Regulations (RR). The RR provide the minimum treaty-level agreements required for the function of the global telecommunication system while facilitating the development and application of new technologies (MacLean, 1995). In terms of regime theory, the international radio spectrum management regime is one of the oldest existing regimes with the main treaty of the regime, the Radio Regulations (RR). There have, however, been calls that the Radio Sector of the ITU-R has become irrelevant to today’s wireless world, especially with some countries planning their 5G frequencies without waiting for World Radiocommunication Conference 2019 (WRC-19) decisions. There are three theories for international regime analysis, namely: liberalism (interest-based), realism (power-based), and constructivism (knowledge-based). While (neo)liberalism focuses on a regime’s functions such as reducing transaction costs, (neo)realism studies the influence of a hegemonic power. On the other hand, constructivism analyses a regime in terms of cognitive frameworks that influence how actors define problems and their solutions. The former has been dominant in the literature with respect to the telecommunication industry while envisioning the ITU-R as a technical organisation that is based on mutual interest. With this in mind, the paper’s main research question is ‘what is the dominant regime theory that applies to modern international spectrum management?’ In order to achieve this, the paper adopts a qualitative inductive approach that is based on primary data collected from 58 semi-structured interviews with the main stakeholders within the ITU-R. The paper is also built on participant observation by the first author, who has followed ITU-R activities for more than a decade. The rest of the paper is organized as follows. Section 2 provides a brief overview of the main schools of international regime theory, while Section 3 explores the international spectrum management regime. Section 4 focuses on the research method adopted. Section 5 conducts a regime theory analysis of the international spectrum management regime, while Section 6 examines the role of the ITU-R Bureau (BR) as one of the main stakeholders in the regime. Section 7 focuses on the decision-making procedures of the regime. Section 8 is a discussion that reflects on the international spectrum management regime in the light of the empirical data. Conclusions are drawn in Section 9. 2 2. Regime Theory Regimes can be defined as sets of implicit or explicit principles (beliefs of facts, causation, and rectitude), norms (standards of behaviour defined as rights and obligations), rules (specific prescriptions and proscriptions for action), and decision- making procedures (prevailing practices for making/implementing collective choices) around which actors’ expectations converge in a given area of international relations (Krasner, 1982; Zacher, 1996). Zacher (1996) explains that there are hierarchical characteristics associated with principles, norms, rules and decision-making procedures. While principles are general standards of behaviour, norms are the most general prescriptions and proscriptions relevant to an issue area and they are implemented at a lower level by rules and decision-making procedures. International regimes are defined as regimes pertaining to activities of interest to members of the international system (Young, 1982). There are three main theories when it comes to studying international regimes. Liberalism is based on the cooperation and the role of non-governmental actors (Ratto-Nielsen, 2006). Neoliberals envision that interdependencies and mutual interests of creating international technical standards could motivate increased international cooperation (McCormick, 2007). In such cases, the gains from cooperation grow sufficiently for states to be increasingly willing to trade off policy autonomy for economic welfare (Zacher, 1996). On the other hand, realism focuses on the state’s role and power as the basis of international systems (Ratto-Nielsen, 2006). Neorealists argue that mutual interests are not the crucial foundation on which international regimes are built. Instead, they are built on the dominant state’s gains and their power to impose acceptance of the regime and compliance on other states (Zacher, 1996). Neorealism also considers that states, as the main actors within the regime, have as their goal their survival and autonomy and that the distribution of power between states is a major influence on