The Network Neutrality Debate in the US: The FCC's Regulatory Transformation in Broadband Policy

Abstract

Over the past decade, the national communications agency in America, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), went through a period of significant regulatory transformation in the area of high-speed, broadband Internet regulation. This paper will describe some of the key elements and principles that created the modern Internet architecture, including the end-to-end principle and the layered regulatory model. In addition it will catalogue the relevant court cases and FCC orders that helped shape the FCC transformation, culminating with the FCC’s recent adoption of net neutrality rules found in the Open Internet Order. This paper argues that the transformation was the result of several compounding factors both within and outside of the FCC, but the net neutrality issue was the most important driving force behind the regulatory transformation, as well as a principal result of the transformation.