Regulation of Remote Sensing of the Earth from Space: International Practice

Abstract

The article is devoted to the results of the study of international experience in regulating activities in the field of remote sensing of the Earth from space. The institutional and legal approaches of a number of countries and regional associations with a developed remote sensing sector are considered. The purpose is to identify models of regulation and experience useful for russian context. The source base consisted of more than 100 official documents (normative legal acts, strategies, programs, official reports, other materials), as well as academic publications related to the issue under consideration. General scientific research methods, content analysis, formal legal analysis, and comparative legal approaches were used to solve the research tasks. Summary information (on the main regulatory legal acts and institutions regulating remote sensing, features of licensing procedures, approaches to the storage and dissemination of remote sensing data) is presented in tabular form. Authors consider the approaches of states to remote sensing regulation can be described by a limited number of core models (three legal models, two institutional approaches), but international practice differs in a wide variety of details that reflect the specifics of the national context. Authors found the essential similarity of approaches to the regulation of space activities of the two space powers – the Russian Federation and the United States, so the analysis of American failures with the privatization of remote sensing in the late 1970s and 1980s can be useful in determining the ways of development and commercialization of this sector in Russia. The relevance of attention to the international practice of remote sensing regulation is justified by the importance of creating favorable legal mode for the development of this sector in Russia facing the challenges of rapid growth of the market for active Earth observation from space, as well as sharp expansion in the number of users and applications of remote sensing data.