Communication Policy in Developed Countries

Abstract

This book contains studies of the communication systems of 7 developed countries: the US the UK Canada Sweden the Federal Republic of Germany (FRG) Australia and New Zealand. Each chapter combines a description of present-day policies with critical discussion of those policies and methods of policy formation. The variety of approaches illustrates the scope for policy analysis from different perspectives. The 7 chapter overviews while they reveal similar trends within industrial countries demonstrate how unique communication systems have emerged as a result of cultural differences. Throughout the chapters there is a recurrent theme that relates to the 2 distinct sources from which a nations communication policy is studied: official statements about goals and means embodied in legislation regulations reports of commissions and committees parliamentary speeches and the like; and the observable results of communications decisions and practices. The difference often is between rhetoric and intention and as in the international area no apparent fit between explicit and implicit communication policies can be assumed. In Australia and the FRG for example explicit policies often have been expressed and then watered down or undermined in practice. On the other hand the UK has been hesitant to develop explicit communication policy statements. Sweden has an explicit basis for its communication policy -- that of the maintenance of strong libertarian values including the right of people to participate in decisionmaking in society and to be well informed for that purpose. These rights are protected by direct state intervention in media systems. Most mass media systems in Sweden enjoy some form of state support but that support is given in order to guarantee a diversified flow of information and the state has limited its role to this function. The FRG provides a case study in conflicts and contradictions. The dominance of strong private interests over communication media is regarded as undesirable yet efforts to control press monopolies have met with failure. Both Australia and New Zealand present a less ideal political picture than Sweden or the FRG. Decisions on communication policies in both countries have particularly in recent years been subject to the different political values of the 2 major parties and a determination to use the media for political purposes and favors. Another common strand runs through the chapters on Canada Australia New Zealand and to a lesser extent Sweden and the FRG i.e. the influence of the US and British communication systems upon these countries. While the US has difficulty coming to terms with or even acknowledging the international implications of its free marketplace ideology even the non-English-speaking countries of Sweden and Germany are not free from the impact of US cultural products and technology.