More Media Reality From Commissioner Reding

Michael Hedges - January 18, 2007

The long and winding road to set a grand unified European media policy reaches a crossroads, now and again. The journey is fascinating, perhaps more than the destination. Each crossroad, though, becomes a defining moment for the multitude of media stakeholders.

Another was reached and breached in Brussels and Strassburg this week as definitions of media concentration and media pluralism forced, again, decisions about looking forward or looking backward.

DG Info Society Commissioner Vivaine Reding and Commission Vice-President Margot Wallström presented an approach to media ownership questions raised continuously by the European Parliament and the various NGOs mandated to protect special corners of that turf. Their working paper on “media pluralism in the member states of the European Union” studiously refrains from dabbling in national media law and cultural differences. With 27 independent nations in the Union, this understanding is not only wise but workable.

Rather than fall back on the long-standing zero-sum analysis, the Reding-Wallström approach views media pluralism, the broad goal, as separate from ownership concentration. Citizens make better informed decisions when information comes from more, and independent, sources. Likewise citizens have a right to know exactly who is telling them what.

The current project, focusing on the relationship between nasty ownership concentration and media pluralism, “could” result in a years time in a “media pluralism indicators.”

International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) General Secretary Aiden White released a statement criticizing the Commission’s lack of will to pursue cross-border media concentrators. Media ownership is not, he said, simply a national issue because it “involves transborder media ownership. We are seeing increasing concentration of media at the national level, where international companies are involved.”

Complaining that the Commission “does not want to lose friends in the media,” the IFJ chief asked for EU-level ownership rules as well as a “comprehensive package” supporting the independence of public broadcasters. Media concentration is only a problem, it seems, where “companies” are involved and not when public broadcasters dominate. Independence in Brussels-speak refers to financial independence and several national legislatures have recently been taking a hard look at the ever-increasing financial demands of public broadcasters.

“The Commission remained absolutely silent,” White reminded the politicians, during the Berlusconi years when the former Italian Prime Minister controlled, in effect, both the public broadcaster and the huge Mediaset empire.

“From a newspapers point of view, we don't see that there is a problem,” said European Newspaper Publishers' Association (ENPA) Director Valtteri Niiranen. “Newspapers are still operating at national markets and in national languages.”

“All EU countries have different rules; most have special cross-media ownership legislation while some apply regular competition policy rules.”

“While the media face radical changes and restructuring due to new technology and global competition, maintaining media pluralism is crucial for the democratic process in member states and in the European Union as a whole," said Commissioner Reding in a written statement. “This requires a sound understanding of the economic and legal reality of today's European media landscape.”

Commissioner Reding has long fought for reality, sometimes uncomfortable, in EU-level media policy. Platform neutrality and advertising liberalization, for example, are media realities, though the political process is inclined to go very slowly. Europe’s citizens, however, are increasingly taking control away from those who would return the media landscape to simpler, less productive times.

ftm Follow Up & Comments