Page 135 - Communication Commerce and Power The Political Economy of America and the Direct Broadcast Satellite

124 Communication, Commerce and Power

resist both foreign and domestic competition. One of the more unsa-
vory examples of this resistance during the 1980s was the role played
by US cable television companies in monopolizing local markets,
dominating national programing activities, and subsequently conspir-
ing to block competitive DBS developments.
Modifications to state structures usually follow a complex of exter-
nal political-economic pressures and domestic realignments. How this
process has taken place in US foreign communication policy consti-
tutes the undercurrent issue flowing through the next two chapters. As
indicated thus far, as a result of mostly economic and technological
developments, US foreign communication policy was brought to the
political-economic fore in the 1980s. Established distinctions between
domestic and international information-based commodity activities
became increasingly blurred as the activities of a broad range of
American corporations were being globalized and/or becoming more
and more dependent on international communications. Intra-state
jurisdictions became obscured while new state agencies directly parti-
cipated in communication policy making. To sort out these shifting
state mechanisms, Chapter 6 focuses on mostly domestic develop-
ments, while Chapter 7 will tend more to analyze the international
forces at work. Again, DBS constitutes a focal point for much of what
follows.

NOTES
I Dante R. Fascell, 'Modern Communications and Foreign Policy,' p. 3R.
2 Hearings on 'Satellite Broadcasting: Implications for Foreign Policy,' p. 3R.
3 See, for instance, Hearings on 'The Role and Control of International
Communications and Information.'
4 Joel H. Woldman, 'The View Ahead: Direct Satellite Broadcasting and
International Communications.' Report to the United States Senate.
Committee on Foreign Relations. Reprinted in United States Congress.
Senate. Committee on Foreign Relations. Subcommittee on International
Operations. Hearings on 'The Role and Control of International com-
munications and Information,' 95th Cong., 1st sess., June 1977, p. 46.
5 Ibid., p. 48.
6 Gardner quoted in Hearings on 'Satellite Broadcasting: Implications for
Foreign Policy,' pp. 64-5.
7 Michael J. Stoil, 'The Executive Branch and International Telecommunica-
tions Policy: The Case ofWARC "79",' in John J. Havick (ed.), Commu-
nications Policy and the Political Process (Westport, Conn.: Greenwood
Press, 1983) p. 90.