The most common feature of “grand alliances” is that they collapse under their own weight. The number of parties needed to make the bargain work is large and each of these is intent on getting more out of the deal than it puts in. Creating the alliance requires heavy administrative costs at the front end, which group members have to recoup over its short life. Parties who sense the short time horizon will shrink from any heavy investments. It is unlikely that any legislative coalition will be able to paper over group differences, or ensure that the original deal will survive changes in external circumstances or shifts in political power.

Nor is there, particularly in the field of telecommunications, a good reason to form such a deal, especially on the terms that Eli Noam proposes: tax incentives for more open infrastructure. Here are some of the stumbling blocks that lie in the path of this deal. The first one deals with the indefiniteness of the terms. Everyone, myself included, is in favour of “reasonable” arrangements. In truth, after the fact it is often possible to assess the benefits and costs of a particular scheme and conclude that its broad distribution of gains makes it a “reasonable” one.