Localism and the Administrative Foundations of American Public Broadcasting

Abstract

Public broadcasting remains as controversial a public policy now as it has been throughout its twenty-year history.' Fears of inordinate government influence on broadcasting were quick to arise and have continued unabated. While some of these concerns may be attributable to ideological opponents of all public policies, proponents of public broadcasting have also expressed concern about a system dominated by the national government. was proposed as the administrative foundation upon which to build American public broadcasting precisely, if unsuccessfully, to allay fears of centralized control over programming content and station management. In the administration of public broadcasting, localism represents a special case of the administrative federalism that characterizes much of American policymaking. There is a national commitment to a public policy and some degree of financial support, but local agencies are responsible for program administration and share funding responsibility. We would argue that the structural arrangements devised for administering public broadcasting on the basis of local station predominance reflected an overall predisposition to limit the scope of any government-subsidized broadcasting. Localism was seen as consonant with traditional practices respecting federalism in public administration and as a safeguard against any official domination (big-brotherism) of production and programming. Unlike the commercial system where the stations are essentially affiliates of the networks, public broadcasting was to be a creature of individual stations. The requirement of local station autonomy would prevent the creation of a fourth network competing with ABC, CBS, and NBC.