A Quadratic Method for Evaluating the New Hungarian Act on Electronic Communications with Respect to the Policy and Regulatory Objectives

Abstract

Hungary transposed the new EU regulatory framework package on electronic communications in 2003. It was approved by the Hungarian Parliament in November 2003, entered into force on 1 January 2004 (except a few paragraphs). The new EU directives created an integrated regulatory system for the telecommunications, broadcasting and cable tv-distribution by introducing new terminology built on the collective term electronic communications but not including postal services. Thus, the former Act on Communications, more or less complied with the regulatory framework of 1998, was replaced by two new Acts: the Act on Electronic Communications (Eht) and the Act on the Postal Services.

In the course of expressing opinion on the draft bill and the final text of Eht we have not only evaluated it article by article (this was done by a wide circle of commenting operators and state administration bodies) but we also examined the prospected fulfilment of electronic communications policy and regulatory objectives. We took the objectives in the general framework directive (Article 8) for basis and completed them for handling national particularities. In this way a wellbalanced set of 20 objectives arranged into four groups has been identified.

A two-dimensional evaluation method has been elaborated (basic idea derives from the Gartner’s Magic Quadrant method used for the evaluation of companies on a defined market) that systematically analysis and scores the suitability and the feasibility of the legal solutions applied to the objectives by points ranging between 1 and 10. The evaluation is carried out by experts for each objective using the scoring criteria defined for both suitability and feasibility aspects.

The pairs of scores for the objectives are represented on a 10 by 10 square. The square is divided into harmonic, pragmatic, theoretic and partial quadrants depending on the high or low scoring of the suitability and feasibility. In addition, the domains of the five quality grades of the solutions are also determined. Various mean, deviation, and correlation statistics are calculated, so that a quantitative evaluation and well-based conclusions can be drawn. The procedure, referred to as quadratic evaluation method, can be generally used for evaluating legal, policy or strategic documents, where the clarity and completeness of the concept (suitability) and the abilities to the implementation of the concept (feasibility) are equally important. Here we apply it for the evaluation of the Eht with respect to the 20 policy objectives and the legal and regulatory tools provided for the national regulatory authority in Hungary (NHH).

The paper presents the policy and regulatory objectives identified, the quadratic evaluation method used and the results of scoring for the public draft and the final version of Eht.