National Information Infrastructure Development in Canada and the U.S.: Redefining Universal Service and Universal Access in the Age of Techno-Economic Convergence

This exploratory and descriptive research compares the policy-making processes and policy recommendations regarding universal service and universal access developed by the U.S. National Information Infrastructure Advisory Council (NIIAC) and the Canadian Information Highway Advisory Council (IHAC) in conjunction with related federal government agencies. respectively, the Councils were charged with " bringing forward " the concepts of universal service and universal access to adjust to the effects of deregulation, new and converged Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs), and neo-liberal economic competition and globalization that included acknowledging the private sector as the primary creator of the Information Highway. Both Councils were informed by the history and discourse pertaining to Universal Service and telephony; they received submissions from the public, private, and NGO sectors and individuals to complete their investigation; both Councils delivered policy recommendations to their respective governments, pointing to traditional information and public access institutions such as libraries, schools, and hospitals as the most feasible points to begin to guarantee access to the Information Highway. As its primary data this study relied on the Councils' preparatory briefing documents and their final reports as well as interviews with Council members, government agency, and NGO members. This qualitative study used as its methodology organizational, policy, narrative, and discourse analyses to create a picture of what universal service and universal access were and what they became in the hands of NIIAC, IHAC, and associated government agencies. The U.S. had started with a more clearly defined universal service tradition than Canada, and undertook a more complex policy-making process with more experienced personnel. It was also clear that IHAC had in many ways followed the U.S. model and arrived at many 2 similar recommendations as NIIAC. Because of the inevitability of technical, economic, and social change related to the Information Highway, no definitive outcome to the Universal Service and Universal Access " story " can be determined. Because the Canadian government did not follow up on some of IHAC's most crucial recommendations, the Canadian Information Highway " story, " in particular, has been left less complete. It is concluded that because the Information Highway was to be primarily the responsibility of the private sector in a rapidly developing global economy, largely directed by the U.S., the Councils' recommendations would be inevitably similar. It was clear that the U.S. was setting a new " standard " for international ICT policy. It became clear, too, that because of …