The re-rise of noninclusiveness
A historical perspective on connectivity and physical networks
This post was written as an assignment for the course History of Technology Revolution at Sciences Po Paris. The course is part of the policy stream Digital & New Technology of the Master in Public Policy and is instructed by Laurène Tran, Besiana Balla and Nicolas Colin.
How do people interact with each other?
The interaction between people was always based on networks. In the beginning of human settlements, the interaction was mainly within these settlements and people were connected through social networks. In this post, however, I don’t want to focus on social networks, but physical networks.
Physical networks always had an important role in the interaction of people. Less within the city, but more between cities. Earlier in the days, cities were not that connected with each other. The first interaction between residents of different cities were probably face-to-face when people of one city travelled into another. The reasons for the travelling could have been curiosity, as today, but mostly it was as a matter of trade.
One of the first network that was used for trade, was a natural one: the river network. As most of the cities were settled on a river, the river network provided a natural connection between cities. Unfortunately, not all connections in this river network were navigable. That is why our ancestors were forced to build a second network, the road network. The travel along the road network wasn’t necessarily a quicker way to travel, but it created a land-based network that was the fundament for future interaction between cities.
For example, the roman network cursus publicus, was a road-based system, whose initial purpose was to enable the communication between all the provinces of the roman empire. The cursus publicus was created by the roman emperor Augustus and allowed the transport of persons, goods, tax revenues and messages. The roman courier service was first based on the Persian model, where messages where passed along the roads from one courier to another. Later Augustus decided to change it to a more secure service, where one courier was responsible for the full journey. The physical network of the cursus publicus still has its presence today, as it was the first form of today’s postal network.
Both of these man-made networks have one thing in common: they are not fully inclusive.
Initially, this is a natural reason, as the rivers network is not fully navigable. This made some cities more predestined for trade than others, which lead to a big difference in their regional importance. Some of the less important cities were then left out in their access to the man-made networks: First, cities were cut from roads, then even from information, which left them disconnected, without an easy way to interact with their surroundings.
Today, practically all cities, or even small villages, have access to the road network and most of them are somehow included in the postal network. One might argue that this is the outcome of the progressive expansion of physical networks — the alternative explanation, however, would be more regressive; namely that disconnected settlements have gradually died out. It is not my intention to discuss the historical explanation of the inclusiveness of road and postal networks. More important is, that we learn some lessons from history and try to prevent a regressive future of connectivity.
But let’s move forward some centuries to see what happened in the development of new physical networks.
In the1880s a man named Thomas Edison invented an electric generator, with which he could supply the Wall Street with electric light. It was the starting point for the electrification of cities and the development of a new physical network, that is still essential today: the electricity network (or electrical grid). In the last 138 years the electrical grid was heavily expanded, so that today 87% of the world population has access to electricity (World Bank, 2016). More than 120 countries are fully connected to the electrical grid — but the network is far from inclusive. One need to keep in mind that there are still countries where less than 10% of the population has access to electricity (namely Burundi, Chad and South Sudan).
This is particularly concerning, as electricity became the fundament of further technological development, which lead to new ways how people interact with each other. The telegraph, the telephone, the radio or the television — all these inventions of the 19th and 20th century are based on electricity and still today, not everyone is connected to these telecommunication networks. Telecommunication was an important part of the last century and revolutionized the interaction between people. And I didn’t even name the most important one: the inter-network (aka internet).
In the last 35 years the internet digitized and disrupted the previous telecommunication networks. Today we don’t need an access to the television network to watch tv. We wouldn’t need the telephone network to make our phone calls. Everything could be done online. The essential network that remains is the internet.
In 2016, having an internet access was brought to the UN Human Rights Counsil and today it is rightfully considered as a human right. It is the right not only to communicate, but also to access services, to do business or just simply to consume knowledge.
But what about the inclusiveness of the internet? How many people have access to the internet?
Let’s not be deceived by high percentages of internet access. Have you ever streamed a video that was buffering every 10 seconds? Have you ever made a skype call that interrupted all the time? Let’s not think any further on having a teleconference, working on cloud services or using artificial intelligence for your business model. High-speed connection is essential, that is why an inclusive internet need to provide broadband access to everyone. Slow internet might be enough to access Facebook or write an email, but it will not close the digital divide, that already exists today — neither between countries nor between regions. Because what we concluded for the electrical grid is more so true for the internet: further technological development will be based on high-speed internet. The ones, who don’t have a broadband access will be left behind, no matter if rural regions or even whole countries.
So what is the current state? Who has access to high-speed internet?
According to the Word Telecommunication Union, only 10% of the developed world but 59% of the developing world have no access to mobile broadband. When we look at fixed broadband, the numbers are even worse; 70% of the developed world and 92% of the developing world are without an access to high-speed internet. This numbers are concerning, and it seems as we have not learnt anything from the history of physical networks; an extensive part of the world is excluded from a network that is so important today and essential for the future…
…and in the meantime, we are thinking about solutions for international migration and overcrowded cities with horrendous housing rents.
Don’t get me wrong, a high-speed internet access is not solving two of the biggest challenges that we face today. But people realize when they are left out and they might see better perspectives in connecting to the network, than waiting to be connected. So, making high-speed internet more inclusive is also a matter of time, as there won’t be any investment in regions, where no one lives anymore. And investment is definitely necessary to reconnect the people.
One option to connect remote areas, is obviously to expand the physical infrastructure of high-speed internet, either through wired or wireless technology. However, the wired technology is often too costly and the wireless technology often too weak to reach out to remote areas.
The second option to connect remote areas is less obvious, so let’s take a last look back at history.
When we say that the internet has disrupted older telecommunication networks, we easily forget about the physical infrastructure, that made those networks actually “physical”. The internet did not remove telephone lines or television satellites. They are still very physical and would need to be removed to physically disrupt the networks.
Why am I saying that? Well, inventors apparently studied the history of physical networks as well. For instance, the wired internet technology has used the already existent telephone and cable television lines to provide access to internet. The second option to connect remote areas to the internet is also trying to reuse a disrupted network: the television network.
Since 2009, Microsoft has developed a strategy to use the so-called TV White Spaces spectrum to deliver wireless broadband internet over 600MHz tv signals. The TV White spaces spectrum is the unused space between the active broadcast channels. Its powerful bandwidth enables wireless signals to travel over hills and through buildings and apparently delivers an internet speed of about 25 MBit/s — fast enough to do almost everything online. Microsoft planned to deploy this technology in Jamaica, Namibia, the Philippines, Tanzania, Taiwan, Colombia, the UK and the US. Microsoft believes that TV White Spaces technology has the potential to provide high-speed internet for up to 80% of rural residents in the US.
The evolution of telecommunication networks illustrates that physical networks do not necessarily need to evolve in a consecutive manner. Networks are built up, they get destroyed, but the physical infrastructure of the old network is more robust and remains. However, this does not mean, that it is useless. Microsoft reuses the infrastructure and combines it with innovative ideas and can thus contribute to a more inclusive internet. This new approach shows that there is still hope in more inclusive physical networks.
Connectivity: an economic asset or a human right?
To conclude this historical perspective on physical networks, I want to take up a recent study that tries to quantify the economic impact of broadband internet. The study by Ericsson, Arthur D. Little and Chalmers University of Technology analyzes the impact of broadband speed on GDP growth and could conclude, that both broadband penetration and speed are drivers of the economy. According to their results, a 10 percent point increase in broadband penetration increases the GDP by 1 percent.
These are nice results, as they can push governments or businesses towards the necessary investments in physical networks. However, we should not focus too much on the monetary output of connectivity. What if there wasn’t a study that proves that output? Or what if they even got prove that there are high costs and only little return in terms of economic growth? Would we still take the investment, or would we maybe just wait until fate takes its course?
No one knows. But I think this article has demonstrated how important it is, to be connected to our physical networks. History had shown that they are the physical fundament of our technological development. If someone is disconnected from one network, it will be even more difficult to reconnect to the next one. Connectivity is a human right and to ensure that right, we need to make our physical networks inclusive.
This is at least the lesson that I have learnt from history.
