Until recently, the business was organized in a monopolistic fashion. At best, national telecommunications administrations extracted huge profits from incoming and outgoing traffic, in effect treating international telecommunication as a luxury to be taxed to support domestic postal or telephone operations. At worst, communication across national boundaries was viewed as a threat to the government's power and thus was carefully controlled and monitored. With the globalization of trade, the importance of unrestrained and efficient telecommunications has gained world recognition.
National monopolies are now on the defensive, and many are beginning to unravel.
On the world stage the United States has taken the lead in promoting a more competitive structure. The United States has opened up most of its own equipment and service markets and has deregulated some of its domestic industry. It is not unusual to hear U.S. government spokespersons criticize overseas monopolies and hold up our own fairly competitive system as a model for the rest of the world. It may come as a surprise, then, to learn that the U.S. government is responsible for one of the most formidable obstacles to free competition in international telecommunications. U.S. policy prevents competing satellite systems from carrying international public switched telecommunications traffic, that is, any services that in any way use the public telephone network.