Special Issue on “Recent Net Neutrality Polices in Europe and the US”

Abstract

This special issue presents five selected contributions from well-known scholars and policy experts to provide both academia and policy makers from the ICT sector with an overview of the economic impacts of recent net neutrality policy changes in the EU and the US. In both jurisdictions, fundamental policy shifts have been implemented in the last two decades with lengthy and controversial decision-making processes with strong political party affiliations on both sides of the Atlantic. This issue focuses on the history of net neutrality policy making in the EUand theUSwith a particular emphasis on themore recent 2015–2018 period duringwhichmajor policy changes occurred: The European net neutrality legislation was enacted in 2015. Its aim is to “guarantee the continued functioning of the internet ecosystem as an engine of innovation” by imposing net neutrality policies that prohibit any discriminatory uses of networkmanagement practices (such as blocking or throttling of lawful content) by Internet access service providers. In 2015, the US regulatory authority (Federal Communications Commission, FCC) enacted its 2015 Open Internet Order, in which the agency imposed the heavyhanded approach of adopting the 1930s-era rules for regulating monopoly telephone companies on broadband services. According to the Open Internet Order, strict net neutrality rules prohibit blocking, throttling and paid prioritization. Similar to the reasoning in the EU, the Open Internet Order should enhance a virtuous circle where “innovations at the edges of the network enhance consumer demand, leading to expanded investments in broadband infrastructure that, in turn, spark new innovations at the edge.” In 2017, the Federal Communications Commission’s Restoring Internet Freedom Order reversed its 2015 decision. Since then the regulatory regime in the US differs fundamentally from the rather strict regulations imposed in the EU.