20 YEARS AFTER THE BREAK-UP:

On January 1, 1984 the antitrust Consent Decree between the U.S. Department of Justice and AT&T resulted in the Divestiture (or break-up) of the unified Bell System. The telecommunications industry in the United States, and probably the world, was radically changed.

On the eve of the 20th anniversary of this momentous event, CITI has invited a panel of experts who played important roles in the reshaping of the telecom landscape to evaluate the Divestiture. They will consider questions such as:

• What was the break-up intended to do and how successful has it been in achieving the intended goals?

• What other resolutions to the antitrust litigation were considered and, in retrospect, would any have been better? Or worse?

• What have been the unanticipated consequences of the break-up?

• Is the legal theory upon which the antitrust case was based still valid today?

• If allegations similar to those made against the unified Bell System were raised today, what might the outcome be? What should it be?

• Overall, was the break-up worth it?

• Are there lessons for today’s telecom environment? For other countries?
  
  

Many of the panelists contributed to a 1991 book entitled “After the Break-Up: Assessing the New Post-AT&T Divestiture Era” (edited by Barry Cole). They will be invited to reconsider their earlier assessment. Panelists include:

• ROBERT BLAU, Vice President for Executive and Regulatory Affairs, BellSouth

• GERALD BROCK, Professor of Telecommunications, The George Washington University

• THOMAS COHEN, Principal, The KDW Group

• ROBERT CRANDALL, Senior Fellow, The Brookings Institution

• STANFORD LEVIN, Emeritus Professor of Economics, School of Business, Southern Illinois University

• ELI NOAM, Professor, Columbia Business School and Director, CITI

• MICHAEL NOLL, Professor of Communications, University of Southern California, and Director of Technology Research, CITI

• LEE SELWYN, President, Economics and Technology, Inc

• PHILIP VERVEER, Partner, Willkie, Farr & Gallagher

• LEN WAVERMAN, Chair, Department of Economics, London Business School