Some remarks on Internet-based territorial planning: the role of local public institutions on the diffusion of broadband access (In French)

This paper focuses on the market dynamics of broadband access and the implications on territorial planning. From the tools of the « economic geography of network », we study the supply conditions of internet-based infrastructures, taking into account the peculiar role played by local public institutions in this dynamics. We show that strategic interactions between suppliers, according to the geography and density of potential users and the nature of information flows in the demand side, engender a cumulative dynamics at the advantage of central regions relative to peripheral ones. We show also that the coming of local public institutions in the market dynamics of networks infrastructures can modify the interplay of strategic interactions, in that sense that we can observe a better diffusion from central regions to peripheral ones, but not a reduction of access inequality inside regions.