Regulatory Reform In Canada

From the Introduction: This study examines the nature of and prospects for regulatory reform in Canada. In particular, we are concerned with the elimination of liberalization of direct regulation in such industries as telecommunications, airlines, trucking, and agriculture ... In focusing our attention on the prospects for reforming direct regulation in Canada, we do not wish to slight the potential value of reforming the regulatory process. But most procedural reforms focus on the margin or flow of new regulation while deregulation proper is aimed at reducing the enourmous stock already in existence ... Within the field of direct regulation we have further narrowed our analysis to the role of the federal government as regulator.

InContinentalizing Canadian TelecommunicationsVanda Rideout examines active political resistance to the radical, neo-liberal transformation of Canadian telecommunications that has been orchestrated by the federal government, big business, and their powerful lobbyists over the last two decades. Rideout focuses on the protection of the public interest, a crucial element neglected by most recent studies, and shows that although alliances have been formed between labour, consumers, and public interest activists, significant disagreements over issues such as free trade, long distance and local competition, and a targeted subsidy program for very low-income Canadians have meant that this united front has not been able to counter the forces of the new neo-liberal telecommunication policy regime.Continentalizing Canadian Telecommunicationsdetails the complex relationships between the various corporate and government interests, shows how the changes they brought about have locked Canada's telecommunications system into the orbit of the US system, and discusses the implications this has for Canadians.