In this concluding chapter, we evaluate our framework and reflect on the core questions we set out in the introductory chapter. First, we summarize the main conceptual contributions of our framework and its ability to specify and operationalize the interdependence between institutions and technologies, and its implications for the provision of expected services. The main building blocks of our comprehensive framework comprise the identification of critical functions, the interdependent dimensions of institutions and technologies, and the modalities of their alignment. Second, we reflect on the empirical cases detailed in the second part of the book, in order to learn lessons about what we gained from our framework when dealing with “real world” situations and potential ways that the framework could be improved. Through the variety of cases we selected, these empirical explorations showed the capacity of our framework to identify and analyze characteristics and difficulties proper to the network infrastructures investigated. Finally, we consider how our approach can provide guidance for public policy and private sector initiatives against the background of ongoing transitions in network infrastructures. We explore how the issues of coordination and alignment could be managed by private agents (consumers, firms, and other organizations) as well as public authorities.

In this chapter, we specify the nature of network infrastructures from our alignment perspective. We first pay attention to the expected services that network infrastructures intend to provide: they are the backbones of the economy and deliver services essential to its citizens. We show how the infrastructures and the services they are expected to deliver are embedded in societal values. We then discuss the two dimensions of network infrastructures, the technological and the institutional dimensions, and analyze the characteristic of complementarity that underlies their components. Complementarities require tight coordination. Furthermore, we discuss in this chapter the core of our argument: the modalities providing technological coordination, on the one hand, and institutional coordination, on the other hand, should be well aligned; otherwise, the fulfillment of critical functions is endangered. We need to better understand how network infrastructures operate and under which conditions they can achieve the expected performance. We focus on the interdependencies between the technological and the institutional dimensions; on the critical functions as requirements for the system to provide the expected services; and on the necessity to align the coordination arrangements in both dimensions, in order to fulfill these critical functions. Otherwise, expected services cannot be delivered.

This book is about network infrastructures. We consider network infrastructures as socio-technological systems characterized by the interdependence and complementarity of two dimensions: institutions and technology. Relying on a combination of nodes and links, these infrastructures require coordination along both dimensions in order to fulfill functions identified as “critical.” Critical functions determine the capacity of a network to deliver expected services in line with societal values. Thus understood, network infrastructures cover a wide range of sectors, from energy, water and sanitation, urban transportation, to telecoms and the internet. These networks provide the backbone of economic as well as social activities. The key argument underlying our analysis is that alignment between the two dimensions, institutions and technology, is central to the fulfillment of the performance expected from these networks. Misalignment can generate discrepancies or gaps challenging the integrity of a network and its capacity to meet its goal. This introduction posits our core hypotheses and concepts, and draws a general picture of the theoretical as well as empirical content developed in the coming chapters.

This chapter assesses factors of alignment between institutions and the technology of network infrastructures, and how to achieve or restore alignment. This is a significant challenge, since institutions and technologies are “two worlds apart” that need to be brought together. This is accomplished in three steps. First, we specify how technology and institutions are interrelated at three layers of analysis: structure, governance, and transactions. By connecting these three layers with the services to be provided, we are able to identify the conditions to be fulfilled within each layer, in order for the critical functions to be safeguarded. Second, we focus on characterizing different problems of coordination that develop either within the technological dimension, or within the institutional dimension. Our underlying argument is that modalities of coordination adopted to solve these problems may partially differ, depending on whether we are looking at the technological side or the institutional side, but that they ultimately need to share compatible characteristics if alignment is to be reached and the critical functions satisfied. Third, when disturbances of different orders challenge the existing arrangements, we provide indications as to how alignment can be reached, or reestablished, at the three layers we have identified.