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Competition Versus Regulation: "Mediating Between Right And Right'* In The Wireless And Wireline Telephone Industries, Benjamin Douglas Arden

Federal Communications Law Journal

The wireline telephone industry in the United States is the most complete and sophisticated system in the world, built under 100 years of strict government regulation. While the wireline telephone industry was built under a scheme emphasizing regulatory control, the infancy of the wireless telephone industry has been subject to increasing deregulation and reliance on free market forces to guide the industry's development. It has been suggested that this shift in policy reflects the acknowledged failure of strict government regulation. This Note argues that the shift in regulatory policy reflects a difference in circumstances between the development of the wireless …