Page 250 - Comparing Media Systems THREE MODELS OF MEDIA AND POLITICS

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The Three Models

including the BBC, is increasingly affected by market logic, though the
publicservicesystemremainsstrongerinBritainthaninmuchofEurope.
In Canada and Ireland concerns about national culture have modi-
fied the logic of the Liberal Model. Both are small countries proximate to
much larger countries with the same dominant language, and both have
feared with some justification that purely market-based media would
inevitably be dominated by U.S. or British media industries. In Canada,
thephilosophythatitwas“eitherthestateortheUnitedStates”hadapar-
ticularly important influence on broadcasting policy. Canada has always
had a dual, commercial and public broadcasting system. But the pub-
lic Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC) dominated broadcasting
through its early history (it was both public broadcaster and regula-
tory authority for commercial broadcasting until 1958), and remains
stronger than U.S. public broadcasting (with a 9 percent audience share
in 1997, for instance, in contrast to the 2 percent share of PBS). Canada
has protected its domestic print media through legislation that made ad-
vertising expenses tax deductible only when placed in Canadian-owned
publications, and that restricted the import of “split-run” editions of
U.S. magazines with advertising directed at the Canadian market. The
World Trade Organization (WTO) ruled against this policy recently, and
Canada has been trying to revise it. American magazines account for
about 80 percent of the Canadian market. Canada has also had more
debate than the United States about regulation of press ethics and press
concentration, but without in the end enacting such regulation. It does
have an Official Secrets Act similar to that of Britain, and more restrictive
libel laws than those of the United States.
Irelandisapostcolonialstate.Itspoliticalculturecombinesatradition
of liberalism with a strong official ideology of nationalism. It also has
a history of economic dependency and weak development of domestic
capital, which like other postcolonial societies – Greece, for example –
has resulted in a postindependence tradition of an interventionist state
(Bell 1985). Public broadcasting has therefore been strongly dominant
in Ireland, with free-to-air commercial television introduced only in
1998, although Irish public broadcasting has a high level of commercial
funding, 66 percent in 1998 (see Table 2.4). 14 Unlike Canada, Ireland
has not protected its print industry, although at one time censorship of
publications considered by the Catholic Church to be immoral served

14
The late introduction of commercial television was also due to the small size of the
Irish market, particularly given the fact of competition with British television.

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