Modern broadcasting policy faces a number of challenges: how to regulate the growing commercial sector; the position and funding of public service television; and finding appropriate forms of public accountability in the changed media environment. Television and the Public Interest examines these challenges and how they are being addressed in the media systems of eight European nations. The authors' aim throughout is to identify the basic values that European policymakers, politicians, broadcasters and civic groups of all kinds regard as vulnerable in the new conditions and are striving to protect from market pressures. The book includes a wealth of information on broadcasting policy issues and practice in Western European nations and offers a major appraisal of the values enshrined in such policy, how they are protected institutionally in different systems, and how such systems are coping with the challenges of the new media landscape.
Foreword - Lord Rees-Mogg Introduction - Jay G Blumler Current Confrontations in West European Television PART ONE: WEST EUROPEAN TELEVISION IN TRANSITION Public Service Broadcasting Before the Commercial Deluge - Jay G Blumler Vulnerable Values at Stake - Jay G Blumler PART TWO: NATIONAL EXPERIENCE Protecting Vulnerable Values in the German Broadcasting Order - Wolfgang Hoffmann-Riem Broadcasting Regulation in Britain - Stephen Hearst Is there a Question of Vulnerable Values in Italy? - Gianpietro Mazzoleni The Netherlands - Denis McQuail Safeguarding Freedom and Diversity under Multichannel Conditions Vulnerable Values in a Changing Political and Media System - Stig Hadenius The Case of Sweden Television in a Small Multicultural Society - Ulrich Saxer The Case of Switzerland Values and Normative Choices in French Television - Dominique Wolton Vulnerable Values in Spanish Multichannel Television - Esteban Lopez-Escobar PART THREE: POLICIES AND DIRECTIONS Defending Vulnerable Values - Wolfgang Hoffmann-Reim Regulatory Measures and Enforcement Dilemmas New Roles for Public Service Television - Jay G Blumler and Wolfgang Hoffmann-Reim Toward Renewed Public Accountability in Broadcasting - Jay G Blumler and Wolfgang Hoffmann-Reim
`Given the enormous social, political and legal changes across Europe, which, as discussed in Part 1, have direct and substantial consequences for broadcasting orders in many countries, the book's attention to its subject matter is timely and welcome.' - Sociology `should be in the personal library of those interested in comparative media systems. It would also make a suitable text for an international course examining changes taking place in European radio and television.' - Journal of Communication
