Legal Regulation Of Monopoly Of China’s Telecommunications Industry

Telecommunication industry is one of the most important sectors which play avery serious role in the whole national economy and social development. Theanti-monopoly issues in telecommunication industry have been paid more and moreattention and the research on sector-specific regulation and anti-monopoly regulationhas been becoming a new problem both in economics and laws areas.First part is the introduction. The chapter launches from the phenomenon of highprice but low speed connection of the access to broadband services in China. And wemake a point that the upstream and downstream of telecommunication industry shouldbe discussed respectively taking into account the particularity of thetelecommunication industry.Chapter1is the theory of monopoly in telecommunication industry. The chaptertakes the NDRC anti-monopoly investigation of China Telecom and China Union asits entry and compares the three different views of fellow academics about the twocompanies’ behavior in access to broadband services, which are price discrimination,price squeeze and normal business behavior.Chapter2is the boundary of the legal monopoly in the upstream anddownstream of telecommunication industry. In the beginning of the chapter, weexplain the characteristics of telecommunication industry and point out that the traditional telecommunication industry has natural monopoly characteristics. With thedevelopment of the industry, technology, economics and other conditions, somebusiness in telecommunication industry have gradually lost the natural monopolycharacteristics and it is imperative to introduce competition. Then, we present theexperience of telecommunication industry reform in other countries and make adetailed analysis for the history of how three foreign countries broketelecommunication industry monopoly. In the end, we review the development oftelecommunication industry in China and the current situation, which thetelecommunication industry is still in a monopoly after resolution and reorganizationfor several times. And we propose that under the trend of tri-networks integration, thetelecommunication industry should be a fully competitive market, which means thedownstream should be completely open while the upstream still keep its originalstate-owned monopoly.Chapter3is effective regulation of illegal monopoly in the downstream oftelecommunication industry. In the chapter, we expound the present situation of legalregulation about competition law(including Antitrust law) and industry supervisionsystem based on Telecommunication Regulation. We analysis the defects of these tworules when regulating telecommunication monopoly behavior. There are conflictsbetween the two rules and the boundary should be clearly set, which will bringeffectiveness to the regulation. Then, we introduce four models used by othercountries when working with relationship between anti-monopoly law and industryregulation. We detail the advantage and shortcoming of these four models and underwhich conditions these models can be applied. We point it out that the core position ofthe anti-monopoly law should be established and its law enforcement agency shouldbe clearly specified, whatever concerning new law superior to old law. Legalhierarchy is not only a basic problem of jurisprudence but also an important premiseof the rule called "Lex superior derogat legi inferiori". The industry regulation wouldbecome adding principles.We end up with the conclusion that the development of telecommunicationindustry can not materialize without the regulation and anti-monopoly law. Illegal acts in the downstream competitive market due to natural monopoly in the upstream shallstrictly apply anti-monopoly law and the anti-monopoly law enforcement agency shallenforce the law, while the industry regulatory organization shall offer technicalsupport. And we also call the improvement of anti-monopoly law.