Page 60 - Communication and Citizenship Journalism and the Public Sphere

RETHINKING THE MEDIA AS A PUBLIC SPHERE 49

concept behind this system is seductive, it is not without problems.
Broadcasting organizations which lost audiences to TROS began to
imitate its commercial entertainment formula, thereby weakening the
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diversity of the broadcasting system as a whole. The relatively high
level of Dutch audiences attracted to cable TV, with a heavy diet of US
programmes, also indicates a certain level of consumer dissatisfaction
with Dutch broadcasting. 53
The third approach is the regulated market economy, represented by
the Swedish press system. The thinking behind this is that the market
should be reformed so that it functions in practice in the way it is
supposed to in theory. Its most important feature is that it lowers
barriers to market entry. The Press Subsidies Board provides cheap loans
to under-resourced groups enabling them to launch new papers if they
come up with a viable project. The Board has acted as a midwife to
seventeen new newspapers between 1976 and 1984, most of which have
survived. The second important feature of the system is that it tries to
reconstitute the competitive market as a level playing field in which all
participants have an equal prospect of success. Since market leaders
have the dual advantage of greater economies of scale and, usually, a
disproportionately large share of advertising, low-circulation papers
receive compensation in the form of selective aid. The introduction of
this subsidy scheme has reversed the trend towards local press
monopoly. 54
A number of safeguards are built into the system in order to prevent
political favouritism in the allocation of grants. The Press Subsidies
Board is composed of representatives from all the political parties. The
bulk of its subsidies—over 70 per cent in 1986—is allocated to low-
circulation papers, with less than 50 per cent penetration of households
in their area, according to automatically functioning criteria fixed in
relation to circulation and volume of newsprint, irrespective of editorial
policy. Beneficiaries from the subsidy scheme include publications from
the marxist left to the radical right: the paper which has the largest
subsidy is the independent Conservative Svenska Dagbladet, which has
been a consistent critic of successive Social Democratic governments.
The subsidy scheme is funded by a tax on media advertising. 55
The twin precepts on which the Swedish press system is based— the
facilitation of market entry and the equalization of competitive
relationships—could be extended to broadcasting, even though spectrum
scarcity prevents the creation of a full broadcasting market. Indeed, this
is already in the wind. In 1989 the European Commission issued a
directive calling for member countries to introduce a system whereby