1/ The Decision (EU) 2017/899 of 17 May 2017 on the use of the 470-790 MHz frequency band in the Union has declared that “Spectrum is a public good”. See Recital (6) here:
2/ Later on, UNESCO’s MONDIACULT 2022 conference on cultural policies and sustainable development called on the UN Secretary General to “firmly anchor culture as a global public good”. See Article 19 on page 7 here: https://www.unesco.org/sites/default/files/medias/fichiers/2022/10/6.MONDIACULT_EN_DRAFT%20FINAL%20DECLARATION_FINAL_1.pdf
3/ “Public” as an adjective is usually intended to mean “accessible to all”. Pablo Raphael toyed with these concepts in his contribution – entitled “The dilemmas of culture as a public good” – to the 2024 study published by the “International Federation of Arts Councils and Culture Agencies” (IFACCA):
Among relevant quotes to be found therein:
“According to Rainer Olaf Schultze, common good (in Latin bonum commune) refers in general to the good (wellbeing) of all members of a community and to the public interest, as opposed to private and particular interests.” (Schultze Rainer-Olaf (2014), The Common Good, chapter 10 of Fundamentals, Theory and Political Ideas, Volume I, Mexico, p. 157.)
“If culture is understood more as a common good, it means that the encounter between cultures can serve as a guarantee and mechanism of public justice that protects the security and freedom of individuals within a given community. On the contrary, if culture is understood as a public good, we must think about those cultural policies, legislative reforms and new relation schemes between the State and society that guarantee the existence of common good.”
4/ In light of the above, it doesn’t take a genius to figure out that if spectrum and culture are fit for the common purpose of serving the general interest they are meant to join forces, just like “birds of a feather flock together”. More precisely, once spectrum has been defined as a public good of finite dimension (despite its global reach) it follows, of necessity, that activities equally qualifying as public good shall be given priority access to it. Fractions of this public good of finite dimension that are left unused by public good providers may then be made available to suppliers of non-public good.
5/ As the Fribourg Declaration makes clear in its Article 2 https://droitsculturels.org/observatoire/wp-content/uploads/sites/6/2017/05/declaration-eng4.pdf
“The term “culture” covers those values, beliefs, convictions, languages, knowledge and the arts, traditions, institutions and ways of life through which a person or a group expresses their humanity and the meaning they give to their existence and to their development.” Public good is associated with people or groups of persons, not with algorithms or robots. Big Tech may well weave new connectivity infrastructures around the world to meet the needs of its ever growing armies of bots [at the expense of other public goods such as water or electricity, but this is another conversation], this by no means gives them precedence on using the public good of finite dimension that spectrum is.
6/ Needless to say, a public good is expected to work for the well-being of the community concerned at all times, never to harm its members. This may explain why culture has been deemed to be a public good, not smart phones: abusing culture is indeed a victimless practice, as Pic de la Mirandole tried to exemplify, whereas phone addiction is a growing threat to cohesive societies.
7/ Industries other than the cultural and creative bunch may well try and paint claims by culture to be given precedence on the use of spectrum as a public good with the colours of an anti-digital, anti-innovation campaign. In order to nip such efforts in the bud, suffice it to quote Article 18 of the MONDIACULT 2022 Declaration that “calls upon UNESCO to assist Member States in harnessing the digital transformation of the cultural sector”.
