Information to users

The Evolution of US Information and Comnunication Policy
In theory, information is borderless. That is,
information will move despite the barriers erected by
recognized geographical or political boundaries. But, there is a 'tension between what has come to be accepted as the 'borderless' nature of [information] and continuing attempts to place borders around it."1 These borders are often
created by entities of political governance, like
governments. This desire to establish borders is amplified by the perception that control of information bestows a type of power on the controller.
Since information flows are borderless, the traditional ways of understanding political relations do not apply. For example, over time, states have become an accepted way of conceptualizing political relationships, as markets have for economic ones. Information seems to transcend these borders.
1 Kenneth S. Rogerson and G. Dale Thomas. 'Internet
Regulation Process Model: The Effect of Societies, Communities and Governments," Political Communication 15, no. 4 (October -
December 1998): 427.
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Ideally, information is not subject to such boundaries.2 Because of this, governments - whose existence is based in the idea of politically relevant boundaries - have struggled with how to handle information issues; especially in the often uneasy confrontation between maintaining as much
sovereignty as possible to retain internal, domestic control on the one hand, and feeling compelled to relinquish some sovereignty in order to participate in an information
interdependent world on the other hand.
Much of the history of US information and communication policy is based on this tension between the desire to
control the flow of information and the borderless nature of information. In the past few decades, the United States has become more interdependent because of the expansion of
information technology and the exponential diffusion of different types of information. In fact, the very nature of information issues has exerted pressure on the United States to be more involved in the international arena and has
encouraged greater interdependent relationships, both in number and in substance.
2 Though in reality there are other types of boundaries which
are present when information is discussed, such as the requisite knowledge and training to find, use and interpret the information, as well as the equipment necessary to access it. These will be discussed in more detail later. The important point is that these 'borders" are different from those utilized in the political
realm.
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The story of US foreign information policy can only be understood through an examination of the international historical context in which it evolved. Unfortunately, this type of historically-based analysis has not always been characteristic of past scholarship. Scholars have tended to focus on more specific information issues (such as the
physical infrastructure necessary to assure universal
telephone access or getting the public on-line). While contributing to the dialogue, these actions tend to focus principally on the national/domestic arena and the economic sector. Though studies about information policy in the past have been
alert to such global problems as technology transfer,
transborder data flow and cultural dependency, the
discussions of those matters are largely technocratic,
administrative and only narrowly historical. . . .
There is [currently] little analysis that is deeply
social, political or cultural, and most of the
discussions of domestic and international policy
problems are presented from perspectives that, whether conscious or not, are ultimately protective of the
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fundamental structures and global status of the
American corporate welfare state.3
Addressing criticisms such as these is a challenge for
those looking at the United States and its policies. The perceptions of the nature and characteristics of information flow in the international arena are a key starting point to clarifying the policy issue area.
This chapter will set the historical stage in which US
foreign information policy developed. First international flows of information, both substantively to the United
States and theoretically, are important and relevant.
Second, US information policy evolved in two ways: 1)
domestically, that is, principally internal action which has international consequences, and 2) multilaterally, action in which the United States overtly participates with other groups in the world to formulate information policy or to create information standards. These distinctions are
somewhat artificial and are not temporally exclusive, but are helpful as heuristic categories for following the
chronological development of the ideas which provide the basis for US foreign information policy today. The outcome is that, as the United States became more involved in making
3 Willard D.Rowland. 'American telecommunications policy
research: its contradictory origins and influences." Media,
Culture and Society 8 (1986):170.
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policy decisions resulting from multilateral interactions, it continued to rely on the principles on which earlier domestic action was based.