tag:theconversation.com,2011:/us/topics/the-role-of-the-abc-8308/articlesThe role of the ABC – The Conversation2013-12-16T19:14:26Ztag:theconversation.com,2011:article/213122013-12-16T19:14:26Z2013-12-16T19:14:26ZDo Australians really need the ABC?<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/37839/original/ks4gjmgt-1387159902.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Is the existence of the public broadcaster necessary for a healthy democracy in Australia?</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">AAP/Tracey Nearmy</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Since 1803, when its first newspaper <a href="http://australia.gov.au/about-australia/australian-story/birth-of-the-newspaper">was published</a>, Australia’s media have been owned largely by private enterprise. Except for the <a href="http://australia.gov.au/publications/australian-government-gazettes">Government Gazette</a>, which was confined to publishing official government notices, newspapers were all privately owned. This remains the situation today.</p>
<p>Commercial media have been integral to Australia’s political, economic and social development. Some have not always been especially edifying – the [Sydney Monitor](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Monitor_(Sydney,_NSW) specialised in gruesome accounts of public floggings. But others have been conspicuously high-minded, at least in their aspirations. The Sydney Morning Herald <a href="http://www.smh.com.au/federal-politics/editorial/the-first-editorial-april-18-1831-20130228-2f7p1.html">declared on its masthead</a>:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Sworn to no master, of no sect am I. </p>
</blockquote>
<p>Not that it came close to living up to its promise. As Gavin Souter <a href="http://www.smh.com.au/news/national/enemies-in-corridors-of-power/2006/04/21/1145344273874.html?page=fullpage">wrote</a> in the Herald’s official history:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>It was against emancipists, penal reformers, Catholics and Blacks.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>In privately owned media organisations, choice of news (a preference for gruesome accounts of floggings) and choice of opinion (that penal reform is undesirable) are the prerogatives of the proprietor.</p>
<p>Choice of news is generally made on the basis that the stories chosen will appeal to the newspaper’s readership and will therefore continue to deliver to advertisers the audience that the advertiser has come to expect. There is nothing wrong with this, and it happens that a large amount of news is both important to the functioning of a liberal democracy and of genuine interest to audiences.</p>
<p>Take the recent revelations by the <a href="http://www.abc.net.au/news/2013-11-18/australia-spied-on-indonesian-president-leaked-documents-reveal/5098860">ABC</a> and <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/nov/18/australia-tried-to-monitor-indonesian-presidents-phone">The Guardian Australia</a> about Australian spying on Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, his wife and his cabinet ministers. This was a story of wide appeal – a glimpse into the secret world of spies, acute government embarrassment, a huge row with Australia’s biggest neighbour, and a raging political controversy. </p>
<p>It was also a story that raised questions of substantial public interest. In the post–September 11 world, have the intelligence agencies been given too much latitude, who is meant to be monitoring them, and is the monitoring effective?</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/37844/original/74rdnjb2-1387162869.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/37844/original/74rdnjb2-1387162869.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/37844/original/74rdnjb2-1387162869.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/37844/original/74rdnjb2-1387162869.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/37844/original/74rdnjb2-1387162869.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/37844/original/74rdnjb2-1387162869.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/37844/original/74rdnjb2-1387162869.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The revelations of the extent of Australia’s spying activities – including on the Indonesian President – was a story that had wide public appeal.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">EPA/Abror Riziki</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>In publishing this material and raising these question, the two outlets were performing what is called the <a href="https://theconversation.com/right-to-know-the-nation-the-people-and-the-fourth-estate-21253">“fourth estate”</a> function of the media – being a watchdog on others in power. Not everyone agreed that they were ethically justified in publishing this material, arguing that the harm done outweighed the good, but the <a href="https://theconversation.com/to-publish-or-not-to-publish-the-ethics-of-reporting-spying-20533">ethical arguments</a> in favour of publishing were likewise compelling.</p>
<p>Here, the choice of news was shared by a private enterprise outlet – The Guardian Australia – and a publicly funded outlet – the ABC. It is a good example of how genuinely important news transcends the economics of media. In fact, many large and important stories published by private media in Australia have been published not because they attract readers or advertising but because they are important. </p>
<p>The pursuit of the Howard government over the persecution of <a href="http://www.theage.com.au/news/national/howard-wont-apologise-to-haneef/2007/07/30/1185647802377.html">Dr Mohamed Haneef</a>, and the exposure of <a href="http://www.theage.com.au/business/former-securency-bosses-arrested-20110701-1gtr8.html">alleged corruption</a> in a subsidiary company of the Reserve Bank are examples of stories that are expensive to gather yet are unlikely to add anything to sales. The same could be said for the revelations of endemic corruption in Queensland by ABC television’s Four Corners in its program <a href="http://www.abc.net.au/4corners/stories/2011/08/08/3288495.htm">The Moonlight State</a>.</p>
<p>So in news coverage, Australia has been well served on the whole by its privately and publicly owned media.</p>
<p>However, choice of news is only one of the proprietorial prerogatives referred to earlier. The other is choice of opinion, and it is here that differences between privately and publicly owned media have their roots.</p>
<p>The ABC is required by law to provide an impartial news service. This means that the ABC does not have a corporate opinion on matters in the news. It publishes other people’s opinions, including the opinions of its individual staff. Some <a href="http://blogs.news.com.au/heraldsun/andrewbolt/index.php/heraldsun/comments/journalists_want_abbotts_boat_people_to_fail_now_theyve_just_done_their_bes/">critics</a> of the ABC say that this is a Jesuitical distinction: that the ABC publishes the opinions that suit its own world view and in this way promotes its own view.</p>
<p>Even if there were any merit in that argument – and there is scant evidence to support it – such second-hand and diffuse opinion is not qualitatively comparable to the opinion directed first-hand by a newspaper proprietor or the editors to whom he delegates this function. </p>
<p>This isn’t just code for Rupert Murdoch. Rupert’s father Sir Keith (though more in the role of managing director than owner), Kerry Packer, his father Frank, Sir Warwick Fairfax and his forebears going back to the early 19th century: all of them used their newspapers to promote their opinions and preferences.</p>
<p>While these preferences were sometimes governed by ideology, they were very often governed by commercial considerations. Nowhere was this clearer than in the pressure Kerry Packer and Rupert Murdoch exerted on the Hawke and Keating governments over <a href="http://www.kcl.ac.uk/artshums/ahri/centres/menzies/research/Publications/Workingpapers/WP36RodneyTiffen.pdf">media ownership policy</a>.</p>
<p>Australia now exists in a world where media technologies have converged in such a way that newspaper publishers broadcast audio and video as well as print newspapers, and broadcasters publish text as well as transmit radio and television programs. </p>
<figure class="align-right ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/37845/original/96x3xd8h-1387163014.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/37845/original/96x3xd8h-1387163014.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=900&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/37845/original/96x3xd8h-1387163014.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=900&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/37845/original/96x3xd8h-1387163014.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=900&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/37845/original/96x3xd8h-1387163014.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1130&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/37845/original/96x3xd8h-1387163014.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1130&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/37845/original/96x3xd8h-1387163014.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1130&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp has been running an aggressive campaign against the ABC.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">EPA/Ian Langsdon</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>At the same time, there is very little diversity of voice. Most privately owned media are in the hands of two big newspaper companies (News Corp and Fairfax), the commercial television companies and a couple of radio conglomerates.</p>
<p>In this converged and concentrated environment, the ABC adds a voice: a trusted voice.</p>
<p>An <a href="http://www.archive.dbcde.gov.au/__data/assets/pdf_file/0006/146994/Report-of-the-Independent-Inquiry-into-the-Media-and-Media-Regulation-web.pdf">analysis</a> of public attitudes to the media over 61 years from 1950 to 2011 shows that the ABC is by far the <a href="http://www.crikey.com.au/2013/01/22/our-trust-in-media-abc-still-leads-as-commercial-media-struggle/">most trusted</a> media organisation in the country. Where other media organisations struggle to get even half the people to say they trust them, the ABC consistently has anything from two-thirds to four-fifths of people saying they trust it as a source of news and information.</p>
<p>Over the decades, newspapers have been plagued by comparatively low levels of trust. The exact reasons for this remain a matter of speculation, but it is possibly linked to an enduring public perception that newspapers are more biased than television or radio. The possible link between trust and bias is reinforced by the fact that the ABC is perceived to be the least biased media organisation in Australia.</p>
<p>Because of technological convergence, however, the ABC is now in direct competition with the privately owned media in a much more comprehensive way than ever before. Murdoch’s News Corp takes particular exception to this, and has been running an aggressive campaign against the ABC, attempting to create a climate in which the ABC is seen as an unnecessary drain on the public purse and an encroacher on private commercial territory.</p>
<p>History tells us that while Murdoch has not been very successful in getting politicians to adopt his policy preferences generally, he has been very successful in getting them to do what he wants in the field of media policy specifically. For that reason, his campaign against the ABC is a matter of substantial public interest and calls for continual scrutiny.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/21312/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Denis Muller does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Since 1803, when its first newspaper was published, Australia’s media have been owned largely by private enterprise. Except for the Government Gazette, which was confined to publishing official government…Denis Muller, Senior Research Fellow in the Centre for Advancing Journalism, The University of MelbourneLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/214552013-12-15T19:07:30Z2013-12-15T19:07:30ZBeyond ‘impartiality’: how the ABC can benefit from editorial audits<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/37682/original/3fgk3fb6-1386902460.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">The ABC will be richly rewarded for its decision to monitor its coverage if the analysis is robust, empirical and multidimensional.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">AAP/Stefan Postles</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>The decision of the ABC to conduct <a href="http://www.abc.net.au/news/2013-12-11/spigelman-defends-abc-digital-presence/5149756">regular editorial audits</a> of its coverage of controversial topics is a great idea. </p>
<p>The ABC has a unique place in the Australian media landscape. Learning more about how it covers the big topics is important for both the organisation and the Australian public it serves.</p>
<p>How can the ABC get the most out of this process?</p>
<p>If we only had the bias equivalent of a geiger counter to run over a wad of ABC online news reports, or 7.30 segments. Oh, for something with a gauge and needle to show how much bias had been detected: something that beeped louder and more insistently as the bias levels went up.</p>
<p>But we don’t and never will have a bias meter. “Impartiality” and “objectivity” – the gold standards of public broadcasting – are not backed up by bullion in the central bank.</p>
<p>Try to define “impartiality” and you’ll find yourself chasing your tail. In the aftermath of the Alston affair, the broadcaster tried to get a grip on the concept. The ABC <a href="http://about.abc.net.au/wp-content/uploads/2012/06/QAProject3ImpartialityNewsContentJul2008.pdf">found</a> that, despite a vast literature:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>…surprisingly little tells you of what, precisely, impartiality consists.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>The ABC did its best to domesticate the idea, trading “impartiality” for terms such as “balance”, “fairness”, “lack of prejudgement” – all equally fuzzy concepts. For a definition with a ring of a potion class with Harry Potter’s Snape, read the BBC Trust’s <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/bbctrust/assets/files/pdf/review_report_research/impartiality_21century/report.pdf">80-page report</a> on the concept.</p>
<p>For methodology, the ABC used content analysis. Though widely applied in mass communication research, content analysis doesn’t tell you what to count. It gives no guidance on how to determine whether, for instance, the ABC favoured Tony Abbott or Kevin Rudd in the election debates, or where to start in evaluating the coverage of asylum seekers.</p>
<p>This means there is a tendency in content analysis to count what is easily counted - for example, numbers of words, articles, or seconds for a particular topic or speaker.</p>
<p>These things can be worth counting. In my <a href="http://mq.academia.edu/AnnabelleLukin">research</a>, based on the first two weeks of ABC TV news reports of the 2003 Iraq invasion, not one news item was solely devoted to covering Iraqi civilian deaths. There were four on the killing of a cameraman working for the ABC. Simple numbers can be telling.</p>
<p>But how do you determine whether the ABC presents diverse opinions on a hot topic? Count the number of times a speaker turns up in a corpus of news items? This was the method the ABC <a href="http://about.abc.net.au/reports-publications/quality-assurance-project-4-impartiality-topical-and-factual-content/">previously used</a>.</p>
<p>But what is the relative value of, say, appearing once for a lengthy interview, versus appearing briefly but frequently? Is it relevant to consider whether the speaker gets presented in his or her own words, or is paraphrased by the journalist? Over what span of news items is it reasonable to expect balance? Do all views deserve equal time?</p>
<p>None of these questions has a simple answer. But the issues are important, and the ABC must grapple with them to know the diversity and distribution of external voices in its news.</p>
<p>In my research, I wanted to know whose voices were heard when the ABC reported the Iraq invasion. Using the grammatical unit of clause, my researcher and I painstakingly reviewed the TV news items from the ABC correspondents in Washington and Qatar, as well as the journalist embedded with US troops. We calculated the proportion of each news item attributed to a source, coding the provenance of the sources, and noting if the source was unspecified.</p>
<p>The graph below shows the overwhelming dominance of official Coalition spokespeople in this coverage.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/37667/original/7wt8jcmc-1386897360.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/37667/original/7wt8jcmc-1386897360.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/37667/original/7wt8jcmc-1386897360.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=291&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/37667/original/7wt8jcmc-1386897360.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=291&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/37667/original/7wt8jcmc-1386897360.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=291&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/37667/original/7wt8jcmc-1386897360.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=366&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/37667/original/7wt8jcmc-1386897360.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=366&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/37667/original/7wt8jcmc-1386897360.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=366&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption"></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Harder still is the problem of how ideologies are invisibly reproduced in news reporting. When not presenting external voices, what words and phrases do journalists use? Carbon tax or carbon price? Global warming or climate change? Disputed territories or occupied territories? War or aggression? Terrorism or shock and awe? Iraqi soldiers or the enemy? Guerrilla fighters or insurgents?</p>
<p>Now the questions get considerably more complex. The evidence becomes diffuse and deep in our taken-for-granted ways of putting things into words. But the power of news to shape the zeitgeist means the hard questions must be pursued, and not simply <a href="http://about.abc.net.au/wp-content/uploads/2012/06/QAProject3ImpartialityNewsContentJul2008.pdf">by asking more journalists</a> whether <em>they</em> think the ABC’s news is OK.</p>
<p>“Impartiality” is elusive because it’s illusive. Language has no default mode, even when we are construing the ordinary and the everyday. Everywhere in language there are choices to make.</p>
<p>Sometimes words sound “biased” simply because they go against the flow. Sometimes the words used are there because someone, with vested interests, put them together and then left them lying around in the vicinity.</p>
<p>If the ABC’s analysis of its coverage is robust, empirical and multidimensional, and it asks of its data careful and precise questions, the ABC will be richly rewarded for its decision to go down this path. Ideally, it would make the data it collects publicly available, in easily searchable formats, for other researchers to use.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/21455/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Annabelle Lukin has received internal research funding grants from Macquarie University.</span></em></p>The decision of the ABC to conduct regular editorial audits of its coverage of controversial topics is a great idea. The ABC has a unique place in the Australian media landscape. Learning more about how…Annabelle Lukin, Senior Lecturer, Macquarie UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/212132013-12-12T01:00:35Z2013-12-12T01:00:35ZWhat would be the point of yet another ABC inquiry?<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/37374/original/tjzvkbkb-1386719017.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">There's no clear need for a review of the ABC's operations – and such calls have a long history.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Sarah Ackerman</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Prime minister Tony Abbott may be a <a href="http://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/too-many-reviews-expose-tony-abbott-to-process-addiction/story-fn59niix-1226778311116">fan of institutional inquiries</a> and a critic of <a href="http://www.smh.com.au/federal-politics/political-opinion/attacks-on-abc-serve-tony-abbotts-purposes-20131206-2ywjz.html">supposed ABC bias</a>, but he has nothing to gain by responding to <a href="http://www.smh.com.au/federal-politics/political-news/cut-abc-funding-urges-liberal-senator-cory-bernardi-as-coalition-ramps-up-attack-on-the-national-broadcaster-20131204-2ypet.html">calls</a> for yet another review of the ABC.</p>
<p>First, there’s no clear need for a review. Claims of ABC bias are always tenuous, especially given the extensive accountability framework developed over six years by former editorial policies director Paul Chadwick – after the <a href="http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2003/10/10/1065676163446.html">2003 inquiry</a> into allegations by former communications minister Richard Alston of biased coverage of the Iraq war.</p>
<p>Bias is a less persuasive rationale after yesterday’s <a href="http://about.abc.net.au/speeches/contemporary-challenges-of-the-abc/">announcement</a> about “editorial audits” on information programming. ABC chairman James Spigelman told the National Press Club that the ABC has already begun to commission industry experts to do up to four impartiality checks annually on coverage of contentious political issues such as asylum seeking.</p>
<p>That leaves <a href="https://theconversation.com/public-interest-or-public-choice-your-1-2bn-abc-21237">crowding out</a> in digital markets as a point of contention. However, this is also a weak rationale in the Australian context. </p>
<p>As creative industries pioneer Stuart Cunningham <a href="http://www.uqp.uq.edu.au/book.aspx/1237/Hidden%20Innovation-%20Policy,%20Industry%20and%20the%20Creative%20Sector">has argued in his latest book</a>, public service media like the ABC can have a sponsoring – rather than chilling – effect on innovation, at least where its competitors are not already in position to do research and development and where it isn’t the dominant market player.</p>
<p>Two examples illustrate this. The ABC’s online streaming service, <a href="http://www.abc.net.au/iview/">iView</a>, is a model for video-on-demand services that has yet to be matched locally for useability and functionality. The ABC has also set an accessibility benchmark with its television audio description trials for blind Australians.</p>
<p>Spigelman acknowledged yesterday that the ABC does compete to some extent in service delivery. Yet it was designed to do this after the 1982 <a href="http://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=1301&dat=19810604&id=JIZWAAAAIBAJ&sjid=n-YDAAAAIBAJ&pg=1553,620434">Dix Inquiry</a>, which <a href="http://www.news.com.au/national/theres-a-media-inquiry-we-do-have-to-hold/story-e6frfkp9-1226107720096">found</a> the national broadcaster was:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>…slow-moving, overgrown, complacent, and uncertain of the direction in which it is heading.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Dix triggered the then-Australian Broadcasting Commission’s transformation into a public enterprise, with innovation added to its <a href="http://www.comlaw.gov.au/Details/C2013C00136/Html/Text#_Toc353360751">charter</a>. This laid the groundwork for its digital expansion.</p>
<p>However, despite the <a href="http://blogs.news.com.au/heraldsun/andrewbolt/index.php/heraldsun/comments/the_abc_is_killing_private_media_and_stifling_diversity/">claims</a> made by News Corp columnist Andrew Bolt that the ABC stole fact-checking website <a href="http://www.politifact.com.au/">PolitiFact’s</a> thunder, its online news presence seems to have had little impact on the scope of competition. </p>
<p>Clearly it was not a deterrent to the UK’s <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/au">The Guardian</a> or <a href="http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2514118/The-Daily-Mail-Australia-launch-online-2014.html">Daily Mail</a> setting up online Australian editions. </p>
<p>Predictably, News Corp has led the push for an inquiry for ideological and commercial reasons. That, historically, has simply been its modus operandi. </p>
<p>Back in the 1930s, the then-CEO of the Herald & Weekly Times, Sir Keith Murdoch, <a href="http://www.abc.net.au/radionational/programs/backgroundbriefing/who-owns-the-news/3061842">argued</a> the ABC shouldn’t be broadcasting radio in competition with private operators, or delivering independent news. Now his son Rupert tweets his <a href="https://twitter.com/rupertmurdoch/status/386996593477840897">unhappiness</a> about state-funded and leftist media:</p>
<blockquote><p>BBC massive taxpayer funded mouthpiece for tiny circulation leftist Guardian. Meanwhile print media about to be gagged to protect toffs.</p>— Rupert Murdoch (@rupertmurdoch) <a href="https://twitter.com/rupertmurdoch/statuses/386996593477840897">October 6, 2013</a></blockquote>
<p>Yet the BBC, News Corp’s bête noire, has come up with a market value test that makes its developmental agenda more open to competitive scrutiny. This is something Rupert should applaud.</p>
<h2>Public value testing</h2>
<p>In 2005, the BBC introduced a two-step public value testing process that would help it justify the rationale for any new digital operations. Since then, its <a href="http://downloads.bbc.co.uk/bbctrust/assets/files/pdf/about/how_we_govern/pvt/assessment_processes_guidance.pdf">market impact assessment</a> model has been widely adopted across Europe as a way of increasing the transparency and rigour of product and service development.</p>
<p>But these so-called ex-ante tests have also generated long, costly and ultimately ritualistic verification processes.</p>
<p>In Norway, national broadcaster NRK’s 2011 <a href="http://merlin.obs.coe.int/iris/2013/1/article31.en.html">bid</a> to develop a web-based travel planner with three public sector partners took 18 months, four levels of review and royal intervention to resolve in its favour. The project folded shortly after approval. </p>
<p>Inquiries like this make blunt policy instruments and may undermine the process of innovation they were mean to serve.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/37512/original/s4225ty5-1386806006.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/37512/original/s4225ty5-1386806006.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=398&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/37512/original/s4225ty5-1386806006.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=398&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/37512/original/s4225ty5-1386806006.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=398&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/37512/original/s4225ty5-1386806006.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=500&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/37512/original/s4225ty5-1386806006.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=500&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/37512/original/s4225ty5-1386806006.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=500&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp has led the push for an inquiry into the ABC for ideological and commercial reasons.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">AAP/Dan Himbrechts</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Another inquiry?</h2>
<p>The ABC is one of the most scrutinised organisations in the country. This year alone the ABC’s regional commitment has been the target of two Senate inquiries, into <a href="http://www.smh.com.au/entertainment/tv-and-radio/less-fry-more-tassie-abc-senate-inquiry-hears-20130201-2dq1a.html">regional television production</a> and <a href="http://www.aph.gov.au/Parliamentary_Business/Committees/Senate/Environment_and_Communications/Completed_inquiries/2010-13/bsamendment2013/index">news services</a>.</p>
<p>In the last decade there has been a significant review or inquiry roughly every three years – including <a href="http://www.crikey.com.au/2006/11/21/leaked-kpmg-report-abc-efficient-but-underfunded/">KPMG’s funding adequacy investigation</a> (2006), and former communications minister Stephen Conroy’s <a href="http://www.archive.dbcde.gov.au/2013/september/what_is_the_digital_economy/australias_digital_economy_future_directions">Digital Economy: Future Directions</a> inquiry (2009) and the <a href="http://www.archive.dbcde.gov.au/2013/august/convergence_review">Convergence Review</a> (2012). This raises the question: what use would there be in another?</p>
<p>Reviews can certainly curb the scope of organisational ambition. The 1997 Mansfield Inquiry, for example, <a href="http://www.cjc-online.ca/index.php/journal/article/view/1198/1140">led to</a> major cuts to <a href="http://www.aph.gov.au/About_Parliament/Parliamentary_Departments/Parliamentary_Library/Publications_Archive/archive/radioaustralia">Radio Australia’s network</a> and forced ABC Online to develop under the radar for years, as a “non-core” service.</p>
<p>Reviews can also deliver unpredictable results. For instance, the Howard government’s 2006 internal KPMG funding review revealed the ABC needed A$125 million more over three years just to sustain its operations.</p>
<p>Furthermore, one of the only major policy outcomes from the Convergence Review was <a href="http://www.aph.gov.au/Parliamentary_Business/Bills_Legislation/Bills_Search_Results/Result?bId=r4992">parliament’s approval</a> of ABC and SBS <a href="http://www.abc.net.au/news/2013-03-12/conroy-announces-media-reforms/4567550">charter updates</a> earlier this year, which mandate them to deliver digital media services. This was a move that had bipartisan support.</p>
<p>So, at this moment it’s hard to see the public, rather than the private, value in yet another inquiry — or even the political sense in the idea.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/21213/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Fiona Martin is co-editor, with Professor Gregory F. Lowe, of a new collection "The Value of Public Service Media", to be published by Nordicom in December 2013. It includes debates covered at RIPE@2012, the international public service media scholars conference held in Sydney, and co-hosted by the Australian Broadcasting Corporation. </span></em></p>Prime minister Tony Abbott may be a fan of institutional inquiries and a critic of supposed ABC bias, but he has nothing to gain by responding to calls for yet another review of the ABC. First, there’s…Fiona R Martin, Senior Lecturer in Convergent and Online Media, University of SydneyLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/213042013-12-11T04:10:14Z2013-12-11T04:10:14ZABC could learn from BBC realpolitik over spy leak fallout<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/37319/original/dx4dm8vb-1386649544.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Known for good political antennae, ABC chief Mark Scott has come under fire for his decisions around the Snowden spying leaks.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">AAP/Alan Porritt</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>The current stoush between the ABC and the government sees two competing perspectives on the role of public service media in play.</p>
<p>The Coalition, on the one hand, regards the ABC as duty bound to serve Australia’s national interests in its news coverage of stories like the Indonesian spying revelations. </p>
<p>As government of the day, it takes upon itself the right to determine what the national interest is – in this case, not having Australia’s intelligence efforts against foreign governments made public, and certainly not in cooperation with The Guardian, a private news organisation with a global reputation as a progressive, left-of-centre outlet.</p>
<p>The managers of the ABC, on the other hand, define the national interest to be broader than whatever the current government says it is, implying that it may include blowing the whistle on the state security apparatus, in the event that the spooks have behaved inappropriately, illegally or both. </p>
<p>The ABC, <a href="http://www.abc.net.au/news/2013-12-03/abc27s-mark-scott-hits-back-at-australian-over-bromance-spy-st/5131014">says Mark Scott</a>, must have editorial independence in making this judgement, and cannot be seen to be dictated to by any government, regardless of ideological complexion. He says the ABC’s independence is crucial to the performance of its public service role, and to the ongoing credibility of its journalism.</p>
<h2>This isn’t partisan</h2>
<p>Had the Snowden revelations appeared during the Gillard-Rudd years – recalling that the ALP was in charge when the spying on Indonesia’s president is reported to have occurred – the response would have been more or less of the same: angry criticism from the prime minister, directed toward an organisation perceived to be unruly and disloyal.</p>
<p>In the UK, interestingly, the worst clashes between the public service BBC and the government over the former’s journalism happened under New Labour, during the war in Iraq. </p>
<p>Andrew Gilligan’s 2003 <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/media/2003/jul/09/Iraqandthemedia.bbc">reportage of the allegedly “sexed up dossier” which gave Blair’s government justification to invade Iraq</a> was <a href="http://www.channel4.com/news/articles/politics/domestic_politics/alastair%2Bcampbell%2Bversus%2Bandrew%2Bgilligan/3498447.html">condemned by Tony Blair’s communication director Alistair Campbell</a> and others. </p>
<p>The fallout saw the <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/news/2003/jul/19/guardianobituaries.iraq">suicide of the whistleblower</a>, and <a href="http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/politics/3448943.stm">the resignation of the BBC’s Director General and Chairman</a> in what was the <a href="http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/3437471.stm">worst political crisis in the BBC’s 90 year history</a>.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/37321/original/jrdj5py4-1386649769.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/37321/original/jrdj5py4-1386649769.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=391&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/37321/original/jrdj5py4-1386649769.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=391&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/37321/original/jrdj5py4-1386649769.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=391&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/37321/original/jrdj5py4-1386649769.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=491&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/37321/original/jrdj5py4-1386649769.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=491&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/37321/original/jrdj5py4-1386649769.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=491&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Former Director General of the BBC Greg Dyke leaving the BBC in January 2004. He resigned after heavy criticism of the BBC’s editorial decisions.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">EPA/Jeff Overs</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>So this is not a left-right issue. Recent research has shown slightly <a href="https://theconversation.com/whose-views-skew-the-news-media-chiefs-ready-to-vote-out-labor-while-reporters-lean-left-13995">more News Corp journalists than ABC staff support the ALP</a>. </p>
<p>Nor is it only a consequence of a conservative right-of-centre government wishing to have a pop at the public service (although Abbott and his colleagues do enjoy a bit of that when the opportunity comes along). </p>
<p>And can the fact that News Corp media are <a href="http://blogs.abc.net.au/nsw/2013/12/news-limited-steps-up-criticism-of-the-abc-fairfax-commentator-mike-carlton.html">engaged in a propaganda war against the ABC</a>, as they <a href="http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8227915.stm">have been in the UK against the BBC</a>, is not good enough reason to dismiss the critics as motivated by the financial interests of the Murdoch family.</p>
<h2>Legitimate questions</h2>
<p>The ABC is publicly funded, and does therefore have special duties and responsibilities over and above the commercial news media. </p>
<p>It is legitimate to ask if those responsibilities permit collaboration with a foreign news organisation to report a US whistleblower’s allegations about the Australian secret service’s spying operations on a close and powerful neighbour like Indonesia.</p>
<p>I say that as a strong believer in the democratic importance of public broadcasting, and public service journalism in particular. I’ll happily pay my taxes to support the ABC, as I did the BBC, on the basis that it is excellent value when compared to the cost of pay-TV subscriptions. </p>
<p>In the UK, Sky charges nearly four times as much for a yearly subscription as the cost of the BBC licence fee (the equivalent of about A$200 a year).</p>
<p>More importantly, public broadcasters are key to the kind of consensual political culture enjoyed in Australia, where fairness, balance and a degree of journalistic impartiality are rightly regarded as essential underpinnings of pluralism and multi-party democracy.</p>
<p>The privately-owned news media is also an integral part of any democracy, but the news and journalism on which we all rely for information and analysis of events should not be the exclusive plaything of billionaires, which is what would happen in Australia if the ABC was marginalised or abolished.</p>
<p>To avoid that, the ABC must take care to preserve its special place in the hearts and minds of the Australia people. In the current stoush it must justify its reportage of sensitive matters which may indeed impact on national security, and be very clear that it is on the right side of the argument. </p>
<p>The stakes are too high for mistakes, and the enemies of public service media too powerful and cocky at this stage in the political cycle to be given a shot at an open goal.</p>
<p>After the Gilligan controversy in the UK the BBC was muted, and remains so, not least because of its <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-20286888">obvious failings in the Jimmy Savile scandal</a>. Its managers know how close the broadcaster came to a catastrophic loss of political confidence in 2003/04, and how vulnerable they remain at a time of financial austerity and wholesale cuts to the public services.</p>
<p>ABC managers know that they too are vulnerable to the cost-cutting agenda of a right-wing pro-market government, and cannot afford to take the moral high ground without regard to the bigger political picture. It is not a time for offending the Coalition, or even being vulnerable to the accusation of same.</p>
<h2>On reflection</h2>
<p>The ABC must be scrupulously even-handed in its collaborations with the private sector. Co-productions and commercial partnerships on infrastructure are one thing – explosive journalistic exposes are another. The BBC, I suspect, would not have partnered with The Guardian on a story like this. </p>
<p>Its 2012 partnership with the non-profit Bureau of Investigative Journalism, in which false allegations of child abuse were made against a senior Conservative politician, <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-20277732">led to major errors, libel accusations and further political crisis for the broadcaster</a> in the wake of the Savile affair.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/37322/original/2d7y9pcr-1386650042.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/37322/original/2d7y9pcr-1386650042.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=369&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/37322/original/2d7y9pcr-1386650042.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=369&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/37322/original/2d7y9pcr-1386650042.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=369&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/37322/original/2d7y9pcr-1386650042.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=464&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/37322/original/2d7y9pcr-1386650042.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=464&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/37322/original/2d7y9pcr-1386650042.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=464&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">George Entwistle, another former BBC Director General, surrounded by reporters and police after resigned from his position in the wake of a BBC Newsnight documentary report on child abuse.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">EPA/Facundo Arrizabalaga</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The ABC, in partnering with the Guardian Australia, is not accused of journalistic failure like the BBC, but of <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/dec/01/abbott-criticises-abc-guardian-australia-spying">raising the profile and commercial prospects of the latter</a>. Is it the job of a public service broadcaster, ask the critics, to work so closely with one commercial outlet in a crowded market of struggling private providers?</p>
<p>The ABC should perhaps have contented itself with reporting the Guardian revelations second hand. That horse has bolted, however, so it might be prudent for the organisation to demonstrate soon that it can work in a similar way with News Corp Australia or Fairfax – that is, to cooperate in breaking a story that the powerful don’t want the Australian public to know about.</p>
<p>But the government is wrong to suggest that for the ABC even to report this story, with or without a partnership with The Guardian, is somehow un-Australian. </p>
<p>On the contrary, <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/dec/03/rusbridger-home-affairs-nsa-key-exchanges">as Guardian editor Alan Rusbridger insisted in London last week when asked if he “loved his country”</a>, it is an entirely patriotic thing to blow the whistle on unaccountable national security agencies when they begin to infringe on individual freedoms and privacy rights. </p>
<p>The real damage to the national interest would be in ignoring Snowden on the assurances of the spymasters that, actually, everything is okay.</p>
<p>As long as no actual harm was done to Australian security personnel in vulnerable situations overseas or at home, there is no reason why this story shouldn’t have been told by the ABC. All over the world the NSA leaks have prompted high level reflection on the checks and balances which exist to rein in our intelligence agencies, and to prevent creeping authoritarianism.</p>
<p>But the ABC also has to think about realpolitik, and the risks of being seen to be in any sense partisan. Its survival matters too much to us all.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/21304/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Brian McNair does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The current stoush between the ABC and the government sees two competing perspectives on the role of public service media in play. The Coalition, on the one hand, regards the ABC as duty bound to serve…Brian McNair, Professor of Journalism, Media and Communication, Queensland University of TechnologyLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/212372013-12-11T01:30:03Z2013-12-11T01:30:03ZPublic interest or public choice? Your $1.2bn ABC<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/37277/original/5nh52frv-1386631178.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Does the ABC have any business providing entertainment to the masses?</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">ABC TV/AAP</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Australia is about to have a debate on the role of government in business. That debate is going to be spread over several issues – Qantas’ junk bond status, Holden’s Australian manufacturing decision, the ABC’s crowding out of private news. These are all issues that are going to challenge the Abbott government over the summer.</p>
<p>From a free market perspective the case for government intervention is quite limited. Economists talk about “market failure” as being a justification for intervention. This has a very precise definition – not that particular business models are failing, but that the market system itself cannot operate to provide the benefits of voluntary exchange.</p>
<p>Adam Smith famously argued that government should only provide those economic functions which were “advantageous to a great society” but not profitable to undertake. While recognising that these functions would change over time he nominated national security, the rule of law, and education as examples.</p>
<p>The free market position, however, is a minority view – perhaps even amongst economists. After all, there are plausible arguments why government should play a larger role in the economy. Indeed in the 1930s there was a great controversy – <a href="http://www.abc.net.au/unleashed/3748856.html">the socialist calculation debate</a> – where it was argued government-owned enterprise could not only perform as well as private enterprise but even out-perform private enterprise. <a href="http://mises.org/econcalc.asp">Others argued this was impossible</a>.</p>
<p>The socialists won that debate.</p>
<h2>Government Inc</h2>
<p>There is no single conclusive theoretical argument against government ownership. To be sure there are arguments that free market economists find convincing that revolve around incentives and profit motives, yet the general population remains unconvinced.</p>
<p>The proof of the pudding is in the eating. We all understand that Soviet style economic planning doesn’t work. But what of planning at a more micro level? Would it matter much if the Australian government made (or continued to make) “co-investments” in Qantas, or Holden, or any other firm or industry?</p>
<p>It turns out that government is not particularly good at running businesses. Nor should we be surprised. Business is about customer satisfaction as measured by profit and entrepreneurial decision making.</p>
<p>Government doesn’t work on a profit basis and nor should it. Government works well when there are things that need be done that cannot be measured by profit. Good government is characterised by rules-based bureaucracy.</p>
<h2>Profits matter</h2>
<p>The easiest way to see the difference between government-owned firms and private firms is to look at the privatisation literature. The world’s leading expert in this area is <a href="http://faculty-staff.ou.edu/M/William.L.Megginson-1/">William Megginson of the University of Oklahoma</a>. After an <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Financial-Economics-Privatization-William-Megginson/dp/0195150627/ref=sr_1_7?ie=UTF8&qid=1386381531&sr=8-7&keywords=william+megginson">extensive analysis of the data</a> he concluded:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Almost all studies that examine post-privatization changes in output, efficiency, profitability, capital investment spending, and leverage document significant increases in the first four and significant declines in leverage.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>The same firms are better managed and run post-privatisation than they were pre-privatisation.</p>
<p>The difference is the profit motive. Government has no profit motive and so it doesn’t matter much if firms make stuff nobody wants to buy. Similarly, when government only provides finance – this has the effect of blunting the profit motive. Again, it doesn’t matter much if firms can’t sell their output – as long as the government will keep pumping money into the firm it can survive.</p>
<p>The problem is that co-investment is a fraud on taxpayers and workers. Taxpayers end up losing their money while workers end up investing their human capital in dead-end industries. All up it is a lose-lose proposition.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/37275/original/tn8xchcm-1386630132.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/37275/original/tn8xchcm-1386630132.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/37275/original/tn8xchcm-1386630132.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/37275/original/tn8xchcm-1386630132.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/37275/original/tn8xchcm-1386630132.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/37275/original/tn8xchcm-1386630132.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/37275/original/tn8xchcm-1386630132.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">ABC chairman Mark Scott has regularly appeared before senate inquiries to face questions about the broadcaster’s role and performance.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Alan Porritt/AAP</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Public interest or public choice?</h2>
<p>What of organisations such as the ABC? Surely government ownership of the media provides a healthy balance to private interests? Well, that is one view. </p>
<p>The public interest theory of media ownership suggests state-owned media enterprise results in a better informed population as it promotes less biased and more complete information provision than the private sector would provide. </p>
<p>By contrast the public choice theory of media ownership suggests government ownership exists to allow political elites to divert resources to narrow interest groups or distort and manipulate information to benefit and entrench those elites.</p>
<p><a href="http://scholar.harvard.edu/shleifer/publications/who-owns-media">Simeon Djankov, Caralee McLiesh, Tatiana Nenova, and Andrei Shleifer</a> untangle those two theories using data from 97 countries (including Australia). They conclude the evidence tends to support the public choice interpretation over public interest explanations for government ownership.</p>
<p>This, of course, will come as a shock to an Australian audience. After all we keep hearing that <a href="http://about.abc.net.au/who-we-are/abc-fast-facts/">a large percentage of the population believe the ABC provides a valuable service</a>. It isn’t clear, however, what that actually means – a large percentage of the population doesn’t actually consume the ABC’s output. I think the steady stream of UK television re-runs has been very valuable. In a world of box DVD sets, and pay-on-demand video, that value will diminish somewhat over time.</p>
<p>The ABC fails Adam Smith’s test. To be sure, it isn’t profitable – but that is by choice, not an inherent feature of the business itself. Many of the ABC’s competitors are profitable. So here is the thing; the ABC does not provide many services the private sector couldn’t provide. But it does provide those services at a cost of some A$1.2 billion to the taxpayer.</p>
<p>The public interest argument for the ABC is those news and current affairs shows that it runs that the private sector wouldn’t run. The overwhelming majority of ABC activities are simply more-of-the-same activities that the private sector does just as well, and probably better. The government simply has no business in providing entertainment to the masses (or tiny elites in the case of the ABC). A review of the ABC would have to ask the question as to what exactly the public interest argument for the ABC is, and whether that is worth A$1.2 billion.</p>
<p>Government provision of goods and services is always likely to be captured by narrow interest groups. Service standards, however, have not increased in line with the volume of public funds that get poured into these areas. Government businesses simply do not make stuff people want to buy. These are not bugs, but rather a feature of government intervention.</p>
<p>In the end, it is easy to point to examples of apparent market failure and call for government intervention. The thing is that intervention fails too – it is only by comparing actual real world alternatives that we see that markets tend to work well and that the scope for successful government intervention is quite limited.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/21237/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Sinclair Davidson is Professor of Institutional Economics at RMIT University and a senior fellow at the Institute of Public Affairs.
He has previously been funded by the Australian Research Council.
He watches Doctor Who and re-runs of Yes Minister and Yes Prime Minister on ABC television.</span></em></p>Australia is about to have a debate on the role of government in business. That debate is going to be spread over several issues – Qantas’ junk bond status, Holden’s Australian manufacturing decision…Sinclair Davidson, Professor of Institutional Economics, RMIT UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.