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This dissertation examines how public interest and neoliberal values shaped cellular network regulation in the United States through the examination of the histories of 1G and 4G and the case studies of the head start problem for the first commercial cellular networks and the first cellular, mobile, public safety broadband network dedicated to first responders using historical analysis and critical discourse analysis. In terms of methodology, this dissertation uses critical discourse analysis to analyze the Commission’s documents and the public comments submitted to the case studies selected for analysis: Dockets 79-318 and 12-94. In addition to critical discourse analysis, this dissertation also used historical analysis to capture the histories of the regulation of 1G and 4G by examining the FCC’s proceedings and primary sources and literature on the innovations and technologies that culminated in these two networks. This dissertation finds that since the inception of cellular network regulation the public interest has been gutted as a guiding regulatory value in favor of neoliberal discourses. Notions of “nationwide” have functioned as regulatory values and goals of the Commission in building the first commercial cellular networks and the first public safety communications network, yet though the word nationwide evokes public interest assumptions such as equity and universal access, in practice nationwide has been used by the Commission to justify neoliberal notions of competition, costs, and efficiencies. Industry commenters have co-opted the public interest to mask self-interests; however, commenters that represent State or regional government offices tend to embrace the public interest as a guiding value when making recommendations to the FCC. The regulation of the first commercial cellular networks in the 1G era was defined primarily not by the FCC but by AT&T and its head start, due to the Commission’s neoliberal approach to “letting the market to decide.” The regulatory path to implementing the first public safety communications network in the 4G era reflected the Commission’s desire to remain “technologically neutral” which resulted in creating uncertain conditions that led to the Commission’s failure and its rejection of its mandate by Congress to ensure that FirstNet built out its infrastructure to rural communities equitably nationwide. |
