Public Interest And Broadcasting Regulation

Broadcasting regulation is significant and complicated since it is functional for the whole development of broadcasting media. It consists of a set of law, rules, policies and regulations relating to the operation of broadcasting media. The media regulation in a large scale, not only is a key to decide the entire media market structure, management goal, operational pattern and consequences, but also is a key to guide the daily communication activities. Broadcasting regulation consists of both structural and content regulation. The former is to control over the ownership and marketplace of broadcasting media, which is the precondition for media to achieve in public interest. The later is to regulate editorial decision making so as to achieve social and political goal of media.The legal base for governmental regulation over broadcasting is public interest. The goal of regulation is to mediate the conflict between the interest of broadcasting industry and interest of the public. The concept of public interest, being fundamental to all media-related regulations, is broad and ambiguous. It is, to some extent, a kind of relationship among government, media industries, society and the public. The scope of the concept is wide from the micro- level privacy protection and copy right etc. to macro-level structural control of political, economical and cultural powers. In particular, it refers to political and cultural diversity. However, the concept of public interest is used by varies political and industrial power to legitimate their own interests. And, as many cases demonstrated, public interest cannot be presented fairly in the policy-making process, which is the unsolved dilemma in governmental regulation.Since 1980s, neo-liberalism has raised campaign for "big market with small government", which accelerates deregulation on public policy. Pushed by new technologies such as cable, digital TV and the Internet, the US and UK lead the trend of deregulation on broadcasting media ownership as well as content. Neo-liberalism claims that the free market will meet the public interest requirements automatically. However, the deregulation doesn't bring about "consumer sovereignty" it promised, instead it causes media conglomerates andthe regime of global media. This kind of consequences is a result of an alliance of government and enterprise power other than "free market". It is the new technology and new market that tightens relationship between government and media corporations more deeply than ever. The media conglomerates itself is powerful enough to manipulate policy-making processes, which will marginalize public interests. Therefore, governmental role in protection of public interest is more doubtful. And what's more, the deregulation redefines the concept of public interest so as to make it fit in with the value of commercialization and consumerism.The dissertation discusses the relationship between the broadcasting regulation and the public interest. The author takes the US and the UK as cases to examine because they typify commercial model and Public Service model respectively. The dissertation develops in three parts.The first part is an analysis of the relationship between regulation and the public interest. Emphasis is put on the ambiguous and utility of the concept of public interest.The second part examines the regulation tools that protect public interest and their problems.The third part demonstrates the conflict between deregulation and the public interest.Market corruption as one of consequences of deregulation will hurt the public interest. And the concept of public interest has to be redefined in order to fit in with the changing commercial environment.