Tony Bennett, Differing diversities - Council of Europe

Differing diversitiesas mass media. There is a need for a continuing programme of research into mediastructure with a multimedia, integrated and cross-national scope. Account shouldbe taken of ownership, other relationships, audience reach and economic performance.The relevant information is mainly in the public domain but it is very voluminousand constantly changing. What is needed is the development of a goodframework and sharp analytic tools (conceptual and methodological).Policy researchThe topic of media policy is a necessary and suitable object of study in the presentcontext, although it has to be said that it continues to be generally well covered indescription and assessment by ongoing research. 1 Of particular importance is aclose attention to the role and performance of public service broadcasting in relationto cultural diversity, especially because this is about the most effective toolavailable to democratic governments for influencing media cultural performanceand because it is increasingly under threat (Raboy and Atkinson, 1997). An activerelationship between research and policy can also be encouraged by designingevaluation research on particular aims of European media cultural policy. 2Media monitoringAlongside research into media structure is needed research that can perform amonitoring role on media output, essentially to chart the consequences of structuraland other change for key issues of cultural diversity as proposed byNordenstreng and Griffin (1999). There should be a wider remit than the effects onpublic broadcasting schedules and audiences or the imports of American contentthat have dominated research until now. Issues of violence, quality and implicationsfor young audiences should be taken into account. 3 Issues of gender andmulti-ethnic representation should also be covered in a monitoring programme. 4The role of the printed press, especially newspapers, has not diminished in theelectronic age and requires equal attention for its contribution to intercultural perceptionsand attitudes as well to political processes. The concepts and methods forpress monitoring are already well developed and can be applied to specific questionsof cultural diversity. 5Some indicated topics for monitoring include: the “image” of various minorities inthe media; content convergence and loss of diversity under conditions of competitionand concentration; degree and kind of access for relevant voices and groups;cross-national images, perceptions and stereotypes in the media.__________1. For instance Goldberg, Prosser and Verhulst, 1998.2. As in Biltereyst, 1998.3. See, for instance, Carlsson and Feilitzen, 1998.4. See Downing and Husband, 1999.5. The enormous scale of media dissemination makes any kind of monitoring a daunting task and thusunderlines the need for well conceptualised, methodologically sound and sharply focused (selective)studies. See Edwards, Golding and Howitt, 1999.84