Exporting the Public Value Test: The Regulation of Public Broadcasters’ New Media Services Across Europe

Abstract

To start, Tim Raats and Caroline Pauwels provide an account of the state of comparative analysis in PSB research that is institutionalized within the RIPE network as well as the ECREA and IAMCR working groups, such as the Mapping Global Media Policy project. [Karen Donders] then outlines the history of the public value test that emerged in connection with the European Commission's state aid cases, pointing out an interesting contradiction, namely that the European Commission's demands for a more evidence-based framework for PSB, most apparently manifested in quantitative market impact assessments, which itself was not based on empirical evidence that the introduction of ex ante tests but was indeed the best way to achieve this policy goal. Subsequently, Ross Biggam re-examines the path towards the revised Broadcasting Communication, adopted in October 2009. In the last chapter in part one, Richard Collins links Mark Moore's concept of public value management to the introduction of the public value test in the UK, which in Collins' view "has delivered real benefits" (p. 49) in increasing openness and transparency while, at the same time, exemplifying a "missed opportunity" (p. 55) - words that may sound familiar to scholars of Canadian broadcasting policy- for re-enabling and revivifying the BBC. In part two, the book dedicates three chapters to Germany, while covering - as you would expect from a Nordicom publication - Denmark, Norway, and Sweden, the Netherlands, Flanders and, grouped together in one chapter, France, Spain, and Italy. Ireland and Austria are briefly mentioned. With regard to Germany, Renate Dörr, an advisor for the ZDF, regards the three-step test, Germany's variant of the public value test, as a success story, arguing that it constitutes "a dynamic tool of governance based on clear principles: transparency, openness and control" (p. 69). An entirely different view is taken by the academic Irini Katsirea, who describes the conduct of tests as "costly, self-glorifying procedures" (p. 63). This becomes most obvious when considering that the test for the joint ARD and ZDF multimedia offer Kikaninchen, aimed at children and equipped with an annual budget of about euro320,000, cost some euro300,000. In Germany, where, together with the UK, ex ante assessment is most advanced and professionalized, between June 1, 2009 and August 31, 2010, 41 three-step tests were conducted, with the consultancy Goldmedia involved in carrying out 11 market impact assessments. Of these, one assessment alone cost nearly euro500,000 (p. 76). This is in striking contrast to the respective British developments - not a single Gemían proposal was rejected. Considering the massive costs of market impact assessments, which, according to Stoyan Radoslavov and Barbara Thomass, have "no prominent significance" (p. 87), Katsirea has a point here.