ABSTRACT
The media absorb over thirty hours a week in the average person’s life. They are central to the democratic life of Britain. They are a vehicle through which different social groups connect to each other, and join in the shared conversations of society. They are also major sources of pleasure and cultural fulfilment. How the media are organized and regulated matters. Yet public policy about the media is often presented as an arcane subject
to do with regulators, ‘governance’ and ‘externalities’. It seems to belong to a rarefied world where only experts are qualified to speak, and where complex issues are susceptible solely to technocratic solutions. But in essence the debate about how best to organize and manage Britain’s
media is exceedingly simple. It also involves choices that affect everyone. It is not something that can be left safely to specialists, powerful lobbies and politicians who – unexposed to public pressure – will tend to curry favour with media magnates. What follows is a summary of public discussion about media policy. It reports
not only the principal policy alternatives that are available, but also the thinking behind these. The aim is to provide a map that marks clearly the main points of entry into the democratic politics of the media. It also seeks to highlight the way in which media politics is no longer purely national – the exclusive concern of national government and national electorates – but is acquiring a significant European and international regulatory dimension.
