The World on the Box: International Issues in News and Factual Programmes

A report on factual international programmes shown on UK TV in 2003 reveals that the total of hours broadcast is similar that of previous years. However, there has been a drop in the number of programmes on developing countries, and the definition of 'factual international' covers a misleadingly wide range - including game shows and travel programmes. The amount of developing country coverage on terrestrial TV is the lowest since the measurement began in 1989. Many serious programmes on developing countries are now shown exclusively on the new BBC digital channels. It appears that ITV is no longer fulfilling its public service remit to broadcast programmes covering 'matters of international significance and interest'. The proportion of foreign coverage in television news increased in 2003 across all bulletins, as a result of the Iraq war.     

Minority Interest Nation: The Changing Contours of Reporting Scotland on BBC and STV

Scotland's media has traditionally provided one of the central aspects of Scottish distinctiveness, autonomy and identity. This has often historically been viewed unproblematically and uncritically, but in recent times, the selective discourses of the mainstream media have come under increasing scrutiny and challenge, particularly in the recent independence referendum. This article examines the changing output of BBC and STV, considering in detail the evening news and current affairs programmes of both channels, and charting how they have evolved in media content and output. It also examines wider output and representation by BBC and STV, and concludes by addressing the evolving political and media environment.     

Class,Politics and the Progressive Dilemma

This article considers contemporary class inequalities and how they might shape a progressive politics in the UK. Drawing on findings from the BBC Class Survey, it outlines changes in the class structure, class mobility and class identities. It is argued that the class structure is increasingly polarised and fragmented, with a wealthy elite, a vulnerable precariat and fragmented middle and working classes in between. Declining upward social mobility is a source of anxiety for middle‐class and working‐class parents alike. Class identification, especially working‐class identification, has weakened over time, although class snobbery is far from dead. Class has changed and the class basis of politics is changing now too. A progressive politics is possible if the political parties of the centre‐left appeal to the majority of the electorate rather than one class, acknowledge common concerns and worries and appeal to shared hopes and dreams that straddle class boundaries.     

Trustworthiness: the Commentators

Mark Thompson deplores the decline in the public trust of government and of public service institutions such as the BBC. But there has also been a decline in another form of trust: government's trust in the ability of professionals such as doctors and teachers to deliver high quality public services. And, unlike Thompson's type of trust, this decline was inevitable, because it was based on untenable assumptions concerning professional motivation. The author discusses the importance of trust in an unwritten constitution, including trust in the use made of public resources, trust that appointments are being made on merit, trust that the civil service is ‘speaking truth unto power’ behind the scenes and ultimately trust that it retains the ability to serve future governments. In a world where trust in institutions is diminishing, there are still surprising levels of trust in the world of private philanthropy. The public are only too ready to give donations without seeking to question, especially in the wake of major disasters. Yet the nature of aid agencies has changed dramatically in the past thirty years into major global enterprises with sophisticated media and marketing operations. In this case a greater degree of scepticism from those who donate and paradoxically less trust might actually result in better outcomes from aid and better use of funding. Trust is critical to the mission of the FCO. The public needs to trust the competence and sound judgment of the professional diplomats. The diplomats themselves need to be able to rely on the commonsense of their fellow colleagues. Ministers and diplomats need to trust each other. And other governments need to have confidence in the discretion of their British counterparts. This is an increasing challenge in the world of instant news. Trust can be quickly lost by indiscreet or self‐serving revelations. But the key is to be as open and transparent as possible about the processes of diplomacy. A new survey commissioned by the British Journalism Review demonstrates that public confidence in journalism has collapsed over the last five years. This is particularly true for the commercial broadcasters ITV and Channel 4, whose journalism has traditionally commanded as much public esteem as the BBC. Trust in the BBC and print journalists has also declined, and journalism suffered more than any of the other 16 occupational groups being assessed. This is partly due to the cumulative effect of various “fakery” scandals that have afflicted broadcasters over the last 18 months and partly down to a more widespread cynicism directed at those in authority.     

Gendering transnational radio: women listeners and the BBC Empire and Overseas Services, 1932–1967

ABSTRACT

The BBC World Service, today a respected broadcaster on the global stage, had its origins in the BBC Empire Service of the 1930s. Shortwave radio broadcasts from London explicitly targeted isolated white men in the geographically dispersed British colonies and dominions, with the intention of strengthening them in their imperial endeavours. BBC staff positioned women at the margins of programming and scheduling decisions. Yet for some women listeners radio was a crucial constitutive element of their multi-sensory empire (and post-empire) experience. This paper draws on the BBC Written Archives collection to explore the neglected topic of gender in relation to international broadcasting, focusing on how white women ‘exiles’ and settlers used and understood radio in their daily lives from the 1930s to the 1960s. BBC Overseas broadcasting, as the Empire and later General Overseas Services, provides a fruitful channel into further exploration of the gendered nature of the transnational domain, illustrating women's agency in the complex webs of empire.     

Culture and Consumerism: Citizenship, Public Service Broadcasting and the BBC's Fair Trading Obligations

The authors examine the future of public service broadcasting in the context of current debates about, and commercial pressures on, the BBC. They describe the European Community constraints on public service broadcasting and the need for a clearer definition of such broadcasting, noting that such a definition is not currently provided in UK law. The BBC is also under increasing pressure from fair trading rules derived from competition law, some of which may weaken its ability to deliver its public service mission. Original research undertaken within the BBC suggests that external and internal pressures have undermined the conditions for a distinctive public service output, although there remains the basis for such an output within the culture of programme-making. The authors develop theoretical bases for a redefinition of public service broadcasting centred on the principles of citizenship, universality and quality in relation to services and output, and examine the implications for the structure of channels in the digital era. Finally, the authors discuss the legal and regulatory implications of their analysis in the context of the Government's Communications White Paper, arguing that the social and cultural purposes of public service broadcasting must not be made subordinate to competition-based concerns.     

An Uncertain Future for the BBC World Service

In recent years, the BBC World Service has undergone the most radical overhaul of its governance, finance and working practices since the Second World War. In examining these changes, the Foreign Affairs Select Committee report on The Future of the BBC World Service articulates ‘clear differences’ between it and the BBC about how the World Service should be governed, and ‘serious reservations’ about the transfer of funding in April this year from government grant‐in‐aid to the licence fee. With a new BBC Charter due in 2017, will the distinct ethos and culture of the World Service survive this major reorganisation?     

Preserving Curious Institutions

Reviewing the BBC 'Impartiality' review and the OFCOM report on the future of news the piece argues that impartiality remains a vital tool of maintaining standards of public service news, which in the end have to be objective. Sustaining journalism that reveals new knowledge is the problem and vital to the maintainance of democratic discussion.     

Representations of intergenerational care on BBC children’s television

This paper contributes to research on media representations of care with a textual analysis of BBC children’s television. As a public service broadcaster, the BBC is tasked with the fostering and sustaining of citizenship. This paper argues that representations of care are an important way by which the BBC can potentially meet its remit and inform children’s perceptions of informal care. It takes a focused look at the portrayal of grandparent–grandchild relationships of care in three programmes: Mr Alzheimer’s and Me, Katie Morag and Topsy and Tim. All three programmes show narrative moments which map onto Tronto’s concept of good care, including attentiveness, responsibility, competence, responsiveness, solidarity and trust. Grandparents and grandchildren are shown to be caring for each other. However, programmes do not challenge the inequalities which continue to structure the realities of informal care work. Neither the inequalities of power between carers and care receivers, nor the lack of public and government support for carers is addressed, and adult informal care is gendered. This paper argues that while BBC children’s programmes provide important opportunities for children to learn the meaning of good care, in order for it to meet its public service remit, it should also provide opportunities to learn about the relationships of power that structure informal care.     

A shifting enemy: analysing the BBC’s representations of “al-Qaeda” in the aftermath of the September 11th 2001 attacks

This article seeks to explore how the BBC made sense of the al-Qaeda phenomenon in its flagship “News at Ten” bulletin during the aftermath of the September 11^th 2001 attacks. Using Critical Multimodal Discourse Analysis, it shows how the BBC’s representations function as a dynamic and continually shifting site upon which a range of fears, identities, discourses and forms of knowledge and power struggle and contend, and through which a number of different “al-Qaedas” manifest themselves. In particular, three shifting modes of visual and verbal representation are identified within the BBC’s coverage which each correspond to a separate understanding of al-Qaeda: the “Islamic” mode, the “Personalised” mode and the “Elusive” mode. These representations both draw upon and challenge the dominant discourses surrounding Islam, non-state terrorism and the identities of terrorist suspects, providing audiences with a variety of often conflicting ways of seeing and speaking about this entity. As such, the article provides insight into the complex nature of the BBC’s representations of al-Qaeda during its coverage of the September 11^th 2001 attacks, and shows how such complexity serves, albeit inadvertently, to legitimise the far-reaching counterterrorism policies that were enacted in the aftermath of these attacks.