ABSTRACT
The localism principle in US broadcasting policy refers to the belief that broadcasters should be responsible to, and reflective of, their communities of license. At certain times in its discordant history, this policy doctrine included community review boards, a physical station present in the community, publicly available logs, advantages to stations using unpopular local frequencies, and a limit on how many local television stations one company could own. Today, however, the localism principle is a shell of its former self, having been successively chipped away over the previous three decades through various deregulatory efforts by the Federal Communications Commission. This chapter describes the life and death of the localism principle in the US. It begins by looking at localism’s philosophical foundations, finding its origins in Jeffersonian notions of self-governance and little republics. It then describes the attempts over the last 80 years to regulate broadcasting in the name of localism. The death of the localism principle is then exemplified in a case study of the Sinclair Broadcasting Group and its activities regarding ownership and local news. This chapter concludes with recommendations for how American regulators can breathe new life into the localism principle – a principle that is more crucial today than ever before.
