THE HISTORICAL CONTEXT OF INTERNATIONAL COMMUNICATION AND CREATING A GLOBAL COMMUNICATION INFRASTRUCTURE

IRL 4075A: MECHANISMS
OF INTERNATIONAL COMMUNICATION
THE HISTORICAL CONTEXT OF
INTERNATIONAL COMMUNICATION AND
CREATING A GLOBAL COMMUNICATION
INFRASTRUCTURE

Topics/Subtopics
Introduction
The historical context of International Communication
Privatization of telecommunications
Free trade in communication products and services
Liberalization of telecom sector
Global and Regional satellite industry and services
Globalization of telecoms
Implications of a liberalized global communication regime
Conclusion

Introduction
Communication has always been critical to the
establishment and maintenance of power over distance
Efficient networks of communication were essential for the
imposition of imperial authority as well as for the
international trade
Communication networks and technologies were key to the
mechanics of distributed government, military campaigns
and trade

Introduction cont.
In addition to official systems of communication, there have also
been informal networks of travelers and traders
The technologies of international communication may be
contemporary phenomena but trade and cultural interchanges
have existed for more than two millennia between the Graeco-
Roman world with Arabia, India and China
Information and Ideas were communicated across continents, as
shown by the spread of Buddhism, Christianity and Islam

Introduction cont.
By the eighth century, paper introduced from China began to
replace parchment in the Islamic world and spread to medieval
Europe
The printing revolution helped to lay the basis for the Reformation
and the foundations of nationalism (nation-state) and of modern
capitalism
The new languages, mainly European ones: Spanish, English,
French became the main vehicle of communication for the
European colonial power in many parts of the world

Introduction cont.
The transplantation of communication systems resulted in
undermining the local languages and cultures
The Industrial Revolution in Western Europe gave a huge
stimulus to the internationalization of communication
The growth of international trade and investment required a
constant source of reliable data about international trade and
economic affairs, while the empire required a constant supply of
information essential for maintaining political alliances and
military security

Introduction cont.
 Waves of emigration as a result of industrialization helped
to create a popular demand for news from relatives at
home and abroad and a climate of international
consciousness
 The postal reform in England in 1840 was marked by the
adoption of a single-rate, one penny postage stamp (The
Penny Black), irrespective of distance, revolutionized the
postal systems

Introduction cont.
To harmonize international postal rates and
to recognize the principle of respect for the
secrecy of correspondence, the Universal
Postal Union was established in 1875 in
Berne, under the Universal Postal
Convention of 1874

The Growth of the telegraph
The second half of the nineteenth century witnessed
an expanding system of imperial communications
made at place by the electric telegraph
The telegraph made the transmission of information
rapid and ensured secrecy and protection of codes
As usual, the business community was first to make
use of this new technology (current parallelism)

The Growth of the telegraph cont.
The speed and reliability of telegraphy were considered
essential for profit and international expansion
The rapid development of the telegraphy was crucial feature
in the unification of the British Empire
By the end of the century, as a result of the cable
connections, the telegraph allowed the Colonial Office and
the India Office to communicate directly with the Empire
within minutes

The new technology also had significant military
implications
The overhead telegraph, installed in Algeria in 1842, proved
a decisive aid to the French during the occupation and
colonization of Algeria
Undersea cables required huge capital investment, which
was met by colonial authorities and by banks,
businesspersons and the fast-growing industry

The role of private sector was evident, because cable
networks ware largely possessed by private capital
To regulate the growing internationalization of information,
the International Telegraph Union was founded in 1865 with
22 members, all European, except Persia
Control over cables as well as sea routes were also of great
strategic importance in an age of imperial rivalry

The cable technology was an essential part of the new
imperialism.
Colonial governments supported the cable companies,
either scientifically by research on maps and navigation, or
financially by subsidies
As British companies were losing their share of global cable,
the Americans increased their control on international
communication channels by leasing cables from British firms

The cables were the arteries of international networks of information, of
intelligence of services and of propaganda
Their importance can be measured from the fact that the day after the
First World War broke out, the British cut both German transatlantic
cables
After the war, the debates over who should control the cables dominated
discussions at the 1919 peace talks at Versailles and reflected the rivalry
between the British cable companies and the growing US radio interest
for ownership and control of global communications networks

The USA proposed that the cables be held
jointly under international control or
trusteeship and that a world congress be
convened to consider international aspects
of telegraph, cable and radio
communication

The Era of News Agencies
The newspaper industry played a significant role in the
development of international telegraph networks, to be able
to exploit the rapid demand for news, especially the financial
information required to conduct international commerce
The establishment of the news agencies was the most
important development in the newspaper industry of the
nineteenth century changing the process of news
dissemination, nationally and internationally

The Era of News Agencies cont.
The increasing demand among business clients for
commercial information on business, stocks,
currencies commodities harvest ensured that news
agencies grew in power and reach
The French Havas Agency (ancestor of APF) was
founded in 1835, the German agency Wolff in 1849
and the British Reuters in 1851

The three European agencies began as international one
subsidized by their respective governments, the three
European agencies controlled information markets in Europe
and were looking beyond the continent to expand their
operations
In 1870, they signed a treaty to divide up the world market
between them. The resulting associations of agencies
became known as the league of Allied Agencies

The basic contract set the “reserved territories” for
the three agencies
Each agency made its own separate contracts with
national agencies or other subscribers within its
own territory
Sometimes the three agencies shared territories in
which all three agencies had equal rights

However, Reuters tended to dominate. Its influence
was due to the British Empire
British control of cable lines made London itself an
unrivalled centre for world news
After the First World War, Wolff ceased to be a
world agency and AP started to challenge Reuters
and Havas Agency

The Rise of Reuters
Communication was critical to the expansion and consolidation
of modern European empires
The fortunes of Reuters, the most known international news
agency can be seen to run in parallel with the growth of the
British Empire
Reuters had been started in 1851 by entrepreneur Julius Reuter
It started sending news and commercial information from
Achen to Brussels via pigeon

The Rise of Reuters
The expansion of trade and investment had led to a huge
growth in the demand for news and contributed to the
commercialization of news and information services
Reuters exploited this demand helped by the new
communication technologies, especially the telegraph
The expansion of European capitalism had created a
pressing need for improved commercial intelligence

Case study: The Rise of Reuters
The relationship between capital and communication was an aspect of
what has been called the REUTERS FACTORS, which functions like a
multiplier that turns an increase in the supply of information into an
increase in businesses.
By 1999, Reuters was one of the world’s biggest multimedia corporations
dealing in the business of information,
It supplies global financial markets and the new media with a range of
information and news products, including real time financial data,
collective investment data, numerical, textual, historical and graphical
databases plus news and news video and news pictures

Reuters enjoyed very close relationships with the British foreign and colonial
administration to the extent that an official historian of Reuters considered it as an
institution of the British Empire
Though it claimed to be an independent news agency, Reuters was for the most
part the unofficial voice of the Empire, giving prominence to British views
Reuters’s Managing Director during the war years, George Jones, was also in
charge of cable and wireless propaganda for the British Department of Information
Apart from support from the government the major reason for the continued
success of Reuters was the fact that it sold useful information enabling businesses
to trade profitably

The role of technology was evident:
 New technology made it easier to send and receive more
international industrial and financial information at a faster
speed
In the post-war period, Reuters continued to focus on commercial
information, realizing that in order to succeed in a free trade
environment, it had to work towards integration of commodity,
currency, equity and financial markets around the clock and around
the world

Reuters’s news was gathered and edited for both business
and media clients in 23 languages
More than 3 millions words were published each day
Regional headquarters in London, New York, Geneva and
Hong Kong, and offices in 217 cities
It provides news and information to over 225 Internet
websites reaching an estimated 12 millions viewers per month

Radio and International Communication
Unlike cable, radio equipment was comparatively cheap and
could be sold on a mass scale
There was also a growing awareness among American
businesses that radio, if properly developed and controlled,
might be used to undercut the huge advantages of British-
dominated international cable links
Radio waves could travel anywhere, unrestrained by politics
or geography

At the 1906 International Radiotelegraph Conference in
Berlin, 28 states debated radio equipment standards and
procedures to minimize interference
Britain, Germany France, the USA and Russia had
imposed a regime of radio frequency allocation, allowing
priority to the country that first notified the
International Radiotelegraph Union of its intention to
use a specific radio frequency

Two distinct types of national radio broadcasting emerged:
 in the USA, the Radio Act of 1927 enshrined its established status as a commercial
enterprise, funded by advertising,
 while the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC), founded in 1927, as a non-profit public
broadcasting monopoly, provided a model for several other European and Commonwealth
countries
American private companies helped to write an agreement that allowed them
to continue developing their use of the spectrum, without regard to possible
signal interference for other countries
A major consequence of this conference was to reinforce US and European
domination of the international radio spectrum

The Battle of the airwaves
The strategic significance of international communication grew with the expansion of
the new medium
Since the advent of radio, its use for propaganda was an integral part of its
development, with its power to influence values, beliefs and attitudes
During the First World War, the power of radio was rapidly recognized as vital both to
the management of public opinion at home and propaganda abroad, directed at allies
and enemies alike
“During the war period it came to be recognized that the mobilization of men and
means was not sufficient.
There must be mobilization of opinion. Power over opinion, as over life and property,
passed into official hands” (Lasswell, 1927: 14)

 The Russian communists were one of the earliest political groups to realize the ideological and
strategic importance of broadcasting
 They took advantage of a medium which could reach across continents and national boundaries
to an international audience
 The world’s first short wave radio broadcasts were set out from Moscow in 1925
 The Nazis also used radio broadcasting in 1933, when they came to power
 The head of Hitler’s Propaganda Ministry, Josef Goebbels, believed in the power of radio
broadcasting as a tool of propaganda
 Propaganda means fighting on all battlefield of the spirit, generating, multiplying, and destroying
 The Second World War witnessed an explosion in international broadcasting as a propaganda
tool on both sides. Japan used it

The Empire Service had been established in 1932 with the aim of
connecting the scattered parts of the British Empire
Funded by the Foreign Office, BBC tended to reflect the government’s
public diplomacy
By the end of the war it was broadcasting in 39 languages
Until the Second World War radio in the USA was known more for its
commercial potential as a vehicle for advertisement rather a
government propaganda tool, but after 1942, the year the Voice of
America was founded

THE HISTORICAL CONTEXT OF INTERNATIONAL COMMUNICATION AND CREATING A GLOBAL COMMUNICATION INFRASTRUCTURE

THE HISTORICAL CONTEXT OF INTERNATIONAL COMMUNICATION AND CREATING A GLOBAL COMMUNICATION INFRASTRUCTURE

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