https://orcid.org/0000-0003-4485-9338
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Abstract
In this paper, we undertake a stakeholder analysis of the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission’s Digital Platforms Inquiry to understand the nature and influence of different forms of public input. Our findings show that nation-state regulation of digital platforms is now very much on the policy agenda worldwide, with a focus upon the competition policy dimensions of platform regulation. The second key finding is that the regulatory activism of the ACCC have ensured that the Inquiry and its findings have had maximum public impact. Finally, we argue that the key dynamic shaping the Inquiry was the competing demands of the traditional news media publishers and digital platforms, and that civil society input was relatively limited and secondary to the final recommendations.
Notes
1 The terms of reference for the ACCC Digital Platforms Inquiry, which were announced in December 2017 were that it would examine:
the extent to which platform service providers are exercising market power in commercial arrangements with the creators of journalistic content and advertisers
the impact of platform service providers on the level of choice and quality of news and journalistic content to consumers
the impact of platform service providers on media and advertising markets
the impact of longer-term trends, including innovation and technological change, on competition in media and advertising markets, and
the impact of information asymmetry between platform service providers, advertisers and consumers and the effect on competition in media and advertising markets (ACCC 2018, 2).
For an overview of the political origins of the Inquiry, see Flew and Wilding (Citation2021).