Admission control is a key component for QoS delivery in IP networks because it determines the extent to which network resources

are utilized and whether the co ntracted OoS characteristics are actually delivered. Unlike most of the existing approaches, we adopt a holistic view and position the admission control in a un ified architecture, where traffic engineering and service management interact in different levels of abstraction and timescale. Distinguishing between service s ub scription and invocation epochs, the applied admission logic is based on a fe edback model, the operation of which can be tuned by operational policies and bu siness strategies. The validity of the approach is supported by a scalability an alysis while it has also been verified by a prototype system. In this paper we propose a DiffServ architecture for the support of real time tr affic (e.g., video) with QoS constraints (e.g., bandwidth and delay) over an IP domain. The main goal of the paper is to identify solutions which provide QoS gu arantees without requiring per flow processing in the core routers (as is common ly done in IntServ solutions) and which are thus scalable. In the paper, we defi ne and compare different options for supporting per-hop forwarding behaviors (PH B). First, we define packet classification functions and traffic conditioning fu nctions, with particular emphasis on shaping at border routers. Then, we propose different approaches for call admission control (CAC) and resource allocation. These approaches are all consistent with the DiffServ model, but place different processing and signaling loads on edge and core routers.