Regulatory federalism in telecommunications

The liberalization of telecommunications and technological change have unbundled a vector of public interventions in this industry. Now different government levels interact. The economics of federalism shed light into this new landscape. The insights from this branch of research are used to analyze the European Union common telecommunications policy (as compared to the history of federal and state regulations in the US) and the role of local and regional powers in the promotion of broadband new generation networks. Decentralized non-specialized policies internalize policy externalities, whereas specialized centralized authority internalizes territorial spillovers. Preliminary empirical evidence shows that decentralization of policies inside member states is not detrimental for broadband investment in the European Union.