Dimensions: 6.5'' x 9.5'' 291 pages AEI Press  (Washington) Publication Date: February 1998 Hardcover ISBN: 0844740713 Price: $ 32.50 Add to Cart   Examination Copies

As telecommunications service markets in individual countries have become less regulated and more competitive, telecommunications equipment has developed a global market in which sales for new systems are hotly contested and competition, particularly technology-based competition, is fierce. The authors consider whether any special circumstances justify departure from free trade in telecommunications equipment and whether more efficacious means for addressing any such circumstances exist, apart from trade-related decisions.

The authors advise policymakers to take open trade as the baseline and to move away from it only when the gains are clear and the arguments compelling. Some restrictions on trade in telecommunications equipment can be supported, but it's not clear that opening the door to the possibility of such restrictions will not bring more costs than benefits.

Ronald A. Cass is dean and the Melville Madson Bigelow Professor of Law at Boston University. John Haring is a principal in Strategic Policy Research, an economic consultancy based in Bethesda, Maryland.