Regulating on the run: The transformation of the CRTC as a regulatory institution

This article examines the transformation of the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) as a regulatory institution caught in the midst of massive technological change in the converging broadcasting and telecommunications industry. Focusing on the last decade, the article assesses institutional change in relation to five aspects central to current regulatory institutional analysis: 1) the contemporary nature of an independent regulator in relation to ministers, regulated interests and the public; 2) the characteristics of both quasi-judicial and quasi-political regulatory functions; 3) changing views of regulatory compliance; 4) changing relations between competition and other framework regulators; and 5) the internationalization of regulation both through international trade regimes and through the effects of globalization on regulated industries. The analysis shows that the CRTC is being transformed as a regulatory institution but that it has not been as pared back as have some other federal regulators, nor have the changes gone as far or as fast as the telecommunications revolution would lead one to expect. Each of the five institutional features examined conveys part of the reasons for change, but they also show how institutional directions and trade-offs for the CRTC do not all pull in the direction of deregulation and contraction