Television Across Europe

TV's role in underpinning democracy faces threat from media concentration as well as pressure on public service broadcasters (PSBs) to compete with commercial stations, George Soros' Open Society Institute (OSI) said Tues. The state of TV in 20 nations, including European Union (EU) members, transition countries, candidate states, and potential candidates such as Turkey was assessed by OSI's European Union Monitoring & Advocacy Program. PSBs enjoy a "special esteem" in a Europe concerned with democracy and European culture, OSI said. However, digitalization and convergence, plus pressure from commercial broadcasters, are blurring the distinction between PSBs and commercial TV in terms of program quality and content. The European Commission (EC) has upped the pressure by demanding more transparency in PSB financing and PSBs’ privileged position has drawn fire from the World Trade Organization and others. Across Western and Eastern Europe, PSBs increasingly are being reprimanded for having ties to government and for dumbing down programming as they try to keep up with commercial stations. And TV markets are highly concentrated in terms of ownership and viewership, OSI said. The EC has left media ownership regulation to member states, but even existing laws such as the TV Without Frontiers directive often are hesitantly or inadequately adopted into national law.
[SOURCE: Communications Daily, AUTHOR: Dugie Standeford]
(Not available online)

Find the report online at:
http://www.soros.org/initiatives/media/articles_publications/publication...