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Reimagining the BBC
By Mark Evans at Aug 17, 2011 |
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What would the BBC look like if it were a genuine public service broadcaster? What would its basic institutional features be and how might they function? The participatory economic (parecon) model offers some answers.
Below is a proposal for a possible UK based IOPS project. I am seeking feedback so please comment, ask questions, criticise, etc... The proposal is still in its developmental stage so any help in refining the idea is much appreciated. Thanks in advance!
BBC News Watch
(A Proposal for a UK based IOPS Project)
"Propaganda is to a democracy what the bludgeon is to a totalitarian state"
Noam Chomsky
"They know they can trust us not to be really impartial"
Lord Reith
Where We Stand:
BBC News Watch supporters and staff believe that the BBC has not, and can not, perform its duty as a public service broadcaster because of its institutional features and internal structure. Due to these organisational factors we predict that the BBC will function in the interest of elites and not in the interests of the general public. We focus on the BBC because we believe that public sector media is open to progressive transformation in ways that private sector media is not. Whereas corporate sponsored media should be dismantled existing publicly funded media should be democratised.
The Four Functions of BBC News Watch:
By primarily focusing on the BBC News we will -
expose the distorted world-view of current affairs projected by the BBC.
pressure the BBC to publicly acknowledge distortions in its reporting / broadcasting.
present arguments for how this distorted world-view serves elite interests - as opposed to the public interest - which in turn acts as a barrier to meaningful democracy and progressive reforms both here in the UK and abroad.
encourage and facilitate the organisation of BBC workers (BBC staff) and consumers (BBC licence payers) into an effective campaign group that can exert sufficient pressure on the Government to force it to implement progressive structural reforms with the intention of moving us towards worker and consumer self-management [1] of the BBC and with this facilitating it to function as a genuine public service broadcaster.
Our Basic Activities:
Monthly - News Analysis Report. This will document important omissions [2], inaccuracies, out-and-out lies, etc. in the BBC News and current affairs programmes.
Annually - Institutional Analysis and Vision Report. This will present the argument for why we need structural reforms if the BBC is to function as a public service broadcaster and what these new institutions might look like.
On-going - Structural Reform Campaigns. This will involve BBC staff and licence payers being organised and developing a National strategy. [3]
What We Need:
Supporters - Financial contributions from local IOPS branches and donations from sympathetic members of the public / organisations.
Staff - Media Analysts / Writers / Campaign Organisers. []
Notes:
[1] By self-management we mean that workers / consumers have a say in decisions in proportion to the degree to which they are affected by the outcome of that decision. This notion of self-management is informed by the participatory economic (ParEcon) model which we believe will facilitate the BBC to function in the public interest whilst also accommodating media diversity, freedom of expression and creativity. This contrasts sharply with typical left-wing (Fabian / Marxist) proposals for workers control which tend to result in the centralisation of power, a narrowing of debate and general homogenisation of media culture.
[2] Important omissions could include the BBC’s failure to report on, and inform the general public about, corporate propaganda. This, of course, should be a primary function of any public service broadcaster with a commitment to meaningful democracy.
[3] Im thinking we could produce ten monthly News Analysis Reports per year (with two months annual leave) plus one annual general meeting where we present our Institutional Analysis and Vision Report to our supporters. Such a meeting could also be used as an opportunity for supporters and staff to review and develop strategic campaign options.
Great idea Mark.
By Le Guen, Yoann at Aug 18, 2011 17:38 PM
I think a lot of folks would like this and welcome it.
It's going to be diffciult to have it explicitly as an IOPS project I think in terms of attracting folks and getting funding.
Analysing the BBC reporting and internal structure will by itself highlight the problems of private ownership, patriarchy, racism, corporate elite and "representative democracy" etc... It would also hilight the too little emphasis on positive stories of self-management, local democracy, cultural diversity etc...
Reimagining the BBC should by itself leads to talk about self-management and alternatives to corporate structure and division of labour. Mentions of parecon and other models would naturally emerge when imagining hwo it could work.
How would members / contributors to "BBC watch" organise themsleves?
If enough funds are obtained to actually pay contributors then a self management aspect of the team would be good. The writers contributing to some of the admin of the project would be nice but overall I think it would need to be flexible on how they organise themselves. I think it mainly depends of who gets involved and realistically you'd only get a few UK-IOPs members to be contributors (mainly based on skills needed and time availability).
Realisitically I'd see the project being mainly volunteer run with little funds available for quite some time before enough funding can be secured to have a part-time team with each contributor being remunerated. Maybe I say that because I have very little experience of fund raising - I'll talk to other folks about this aspect. Maybe you're right and the project will start with enough funding to remunerate folks for their work.
More emphasis on gender equality and representation, racism and represenattion of politics would be great I think. I'd help but not good at wording these things.
That's it for now. To be continued.
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Re: Great idea Mark.
By Evans, Mark at Aug 18, 2011 21:05 PM
You raise a couple of issues saying -
“It's going to be diffciult to have it explicitly as an IOPS project I think in terms of attracting folks and getting funding.”
Perhaps we could set things up in such a way that allows for participation and financial contributions to also come from outside of IOPS? That said, given the international ramifications of BBC propaganda, this project could gain significant support from non-UK branches of IOPS. The point being that this project would not need to rely solely on support from UK members.
You also say -
“More emphasis on gender equality and representation, racism and represenattion of politics would be great I think.”
You are right! I probably should have described this as a parsoc informed strategy and not a parecon informed strategy.
Thanks!
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Re: Re: Great idea Mark.
By Le Guen, Yoann at Aug 28, 2011 12:46 PM
Here are some thoughts, written quickly,
BBC watch:
Discussing with some friends it feels like it would have to be something like Media Lens or better like FAIR
A focus on the BBC rather than all media is a very good idea I think.
I think insights from parecon and the paresoc project in general are valuable to such a project but I don't think they should be part of the project guidelines. I could easily become too narrow, analysis become ideoligically driven, or the content feel like people are using the same toolbox each time to analyse BBC content etc...
That's for BBC watch.
Reimagine the BBC fits more the IOPs project and require less input . A few essays being collected together could be a very nice one off project. Could be published into a little book/pamphlet etc... Some IOPs memebers coudl write some essay individually or collectively. Add to that request for essays by friendly media specialists.
You mention the corporate division of labour within the BBC and how that's affecting content. I agree that'd have an effect but I don't think that's a major component influencing what content is published, under what angle etc... Id' include that if articulated well in an essay under the Re-imagining BBC project, ideally written by an insider.
So I'd separate the two projects: BBC watch and Re-imagine the BBC.
BBC watch requires long term commitment, lots of specialised work and funding to pay for all that work. It could attract a broad spectrum of folks and should ideally be tied with a movement fighting for media reforms.
Re-imagine the BBC is an exciting project that a few folks can manage and produce outcome within a year or so. It wouldn't need funding as such but would benefit from having a publisher (AK Press?). Maybe funding would be good to pay for an editor unless the publisher's editor is happy to do all the work (but that's giving away potentially a lot of the control over to them).
That's me for now.
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Re: Re: Re: Great idea Mark.
By Zollman, Florian at Aug 29, 2011 21:18 PM
I think the proposal is a great idea!
Yoann, I don't underatand why you would want to split BBC Watch and a Re-imagining the BBC project, and also, as it seems to me, priorities the BBC Watchdog idea?
I think if we did that, we would largely have another Medialens or Fair project. While they are surely great organisations, it seems more important to focus on changing the BBC. As Mark wrote in his blog: " ...exposing media bias is one thing. It is quite another to articulate how the media could be reorganised so that it actually functions properly". Actually, most watchdogs and also most critical scholarship on the media expose bias without providing solutions for structural media change. In my opinion, BBC News Watch should fill this gap. This would require to expose bias but also, more importantly, to engage in changing the BBC.
So I think we should concentrate a large part of the work in BBC News Watch on changing the BBC. Mark's fourth function of BBC News Watch tackles this issue and I think we should think more about how to allign BBC News Watch so that it can develop in an effective campaign group without merely being another watchdog.
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Re: Re: Great idea Mark.
By Zollman, Florian at Sep 29, 2011 05:32 AM
And should we approach some of the critical scholars at the conference to hear what they think about the BBC Watch idea? Maybe some of them would act as supporters of the project?
Any further thoughts?
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