This paper examines the need for telecommunications and international trade policies in the Information Age and presents a model for developing such policies. The first of seven sections discusses the need for an Information Age Model, and the technological changes that are giving rise to increasingly integrated Information Age networks are examined in the second. The third section then reviews the Federal Communications Commission's (FCC) efforts in its "Computer III" decisions to adapt telecommunications policy to facilitate the advent of intelligent networks and advanced integrated systems. The fourth section shows how trade policy is gradually addressing the technological advances and resulting changes in the marketplace, while the FCC's current efforts to define an appropriate telecommunications and trade model are examined in the fifth section together with its track record in past attempts to influence U.S. access to foreign markets. Threshold principles that might be incorporated into a possible model for U.S. decision-makers are discussed in the sixth section, and the final section concludes by reemphasizing Digital Corporation's hope that this paper will serve as a catalyst for forward-thinking analysis of a sound U.S. approach for the Information Age. (194 footnotes) (EW)