Open AccessThe geopolitical hijacking of open networking: the case of Open RAN
Author(s) -
JeanChristophe Plantin
Publication year - 2021
Publication title -
european journal of communication
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.96
H-Index - 60
eISSN - 1460-3705
pISSN - 0267-3231
DOI - 10.1177/02673231211028375
Subject(s) - telecommunications , openness to experience , opposition (politics) , the imaginary , computer security , government (linguistics) , ran , geopolitics , interdependence , business , computer science , political science , law , computer network , linguistics , philosophy , politics , psychotherapist , psychology , social psychology
This article investigates how discourses on open networking technologies provide a social imaginary that industry and government actors mobilize in an attempt to expand their control over mobile telecommunications networks. The case of recent initiatives aiming to ‘open up’ radio access network (or RAN, a key component of telecommunications infrastructure) with an ‘open RAN’ model reveals how the US Government came to promote this nascent technology to create an opposition between its own ‘open’ telecommunications networks versus proprietary and presumed ‘untrustworthy’ networks based on foreign equipment, namely Huawei. While a closer look casts doubts on the benefits of open radio access network to increase network security or to open up the equipment market, this case reveals how openness is an ambiguous notion that can be used by governments to exclude foreign trade enemies, while advocating for trust in telecommunications networks.