British Broadcasting and the Public-Private Dichotomy

This text offers a theoretical engagement with the ways in which private and public interests - and how those interests have been understood - have framed the changing rationale for broadcasting regulation, using the first century of UK broadcasting as a starting point. Unlike most books on broadcasting, this text adopts an explicitly Foucauldian and genealogical perspective in its account of media history and power, and unpicks how the meanings of terms such as 'public service' and 'public interest', as well as 'competition' and 'choice', have evolved over time. In considering the appropriation by broadcasting scholars of concepts such as neoliberalism, citizenship and the public sphere to a critical account of broadcasting history, the book assesses their appropriateness and efficacy by engaging with interdisciplinary debates on each concept. This work will be of particular significance to academics and students with an interest in media theory, history, policy and regulation, as well as those disposed to understanding as well as critiquing the neoliberalization of public media.

Simon Dawes is Maître de Conférences at the Université de Versailles Saint-Quentin-en-Yvelines (UVSQ), France.

1. Broadcasting Regulation, History and Theory.- 2. Geneology, Critique and the Public-Private Dichotomy.- 3. Broadcasting and the Public Sphere.- 4. Broadcasting, Citizenship and Consumption.- 5. Broadcasting and Neoliberalism.- 6. Problematising Public Control, Service, Interest and Value.- 7. Problematising the Public, Citizens and Consumers.- 8. Problematising Monopoly, Competition and Choice. - 9. The Social, the Political and the Public Sphere.- 10. Individualization, Voice and Citizenship.- 11. Neoliberalization as Discursive Process.- 12. Why the Public-Private Dichotomy Still Matters.