Power Without Responsibility Power Without Responsibility is a classic introduction to the history, sociology, theory and politics of the media in Britain. Hailed by the Times Higher as the ‘seminal media text’, and translated into Arabic, Chinese and other foreign languages, it is an essential guide for media students and critical media consumers alike. The new edition has been substantially revised to bring it right up-to-date with developments in the media industry, new media technologies and changes in the political and academic debates surrounding the media. In this new edition, the authors consider: the impact of the internet the failure of interactive TV media and Britishness new media and global understanding journalism in crisis BBC and broadcasting at the beginning of the twenty-first century. Assessing the media at a time of profound change, the authors set out the democratic choices for media reform. James Curran is Professor of Communications at Goldsmiths, University of London. Jean Seaton is Professor of Media History at the University of Westminster and director of the Orwell Prize for political writing and journalism. Praise for previous editions . the best guide to the British Media. Nick Cohen, New Statesman Many students and young people in and around the British media will make Power Without Responsibility into a new orthodoxy. Jeremy Tunstall, Encounter Excellent new study of the press and broadcasting. Tribune A classic text. Stage and Television Today An invaluable general textbook for the specialist student of communications as well as a guide into a complex area for social scientists. Teaching Politics Curran and Seaton’s writing, scholarly but not academicist, manages that rare and difficult task of rendering complex information and different theoretical approaches in a style open to teachers and post-16 students alike. No reading list for courses in media or the social sciences should be without Power Without Responsibility. It not only fuels the mind, it liberates it. David Lusted, Journal of Educational Television. ‘Every media studies student should be expected to read it [Power Without Responsibility].’ Peter Golding, Times Higher Education Supplement ‘Magisterial...itprovides a model’ Graeme Turner, British Cultural Studies ‘Invaluable . Even the most casual reader with no professional interest in the subject would find it interesting. For the teacher of the media it is essential.’ Media Educational Journal ‘A sacred text of media studies.’ Fred Inglis, Times Higher Educational Supplement ‘A readable and reliable guide to the history of the press and broadcasting, and the politics of the media in Britain. It is a book that anybody interested or involved in the debates about the future of democratic communications in these islands should study.’ Robert Hutchison, Times Educational Supplement ‘James Curran and Jean Seaton have cracked the canon.’ Harriet Swain, Times Higher Educational Supplement ‘Seminal media studies text.’ Huw Richards, Times Higher Educational Supplement ‘Students of politics, sociology, history and communications will find this Fontana original as thought-provoking and stimulating as anything that has appeared in print.’ Eric Hiscock, The Bookseller Power Without Responsibility Press, broadcasting and the internet in Britain Seventh edition James Curran and Jean Seaton First edition published 1981by Fontana Second edition published 1985 by Methuen & Co. Ltd Third, fourth, fifth and sixth editions published 1988, 1991, 1997 and 2003 respectively by Routledge This edition published 2010 by Routledge 2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon, OX14 4RN Simultaneously published in the USA and Canada by Routledge 270 Madison Ave, New York, NY 10016 Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business This edition published in the Taylor & Francis e-Library, 2009. To purchase your own copy of this or any of Taylor & Francis or Routledge’s collection of thousands of eBooks please go to www.eBookstore.tandf.co.uk. © 1981, 1985, 1988, 1991, 1997, 2003, 2010 James Curran and Jean Seaton All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers. British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data Curran, James. Power without responsibility : the press, broadcasting, and the internet in Britain / James Curran and Jean Seaton. – 7th ed. p. cm. ISBN 978-0-415-46698-1 (hardback : alk. paper) – ISBN 978-0-415-46699-8 (pbk. : alk. paper) – ISBN 978-0-203-87140-9 (e-book) 1. Press – Great Britain. 2. Broadcasting – Great Britain. 3. Digital media – Great Britain. I. Seaton, Jean. II. Title. PN5114.C84 2009 072 – dc22 2009008954 ISBN 0-203-87140-5 Master e-book ISBN ISBN10: 0-415-46698-9 (hbk) ISBN10: 0-415-46699-7 (pbk) ISBN10: 0-203-87140-5 (ebk) ISBN13: 978-0-415-46698-1 (hbk) ISBN13: 978-0-415-46699-8 (pbk) ISBN13: 978-0-203-87140-9 (ebk) Contents About the authors vii Acknowledgements viii Preface to the seventh edition ix Dedication x PART I Press history 1 JAMES CURRAN 1 Whig press history as political mythology 3 2 The struggle for a free press 6 3 The ugly face of reform 17 4 The industrialization of the press 23 5 The era of the press barons 37 6 The press under public regulation 54 7 Fable of market democracy 66 PART II Broadcasting history 101 JEAN SEATON 8 Reith and the denial of politics 103 9 Broadcasting and the blitz 120 10 Social revolution? 143 vi Contents 11 The BBC under threat 152 12 Class, taste and profit 164 13 How the audience is made 171 14 The first new media 189 15 Broadcasting roller-coaster 199 PART III Rise of new media 233 JAMES CURRAN 16 New media in Britain 235 17 History of the internet 252 18 Sociology of the internet 275 PART IV Theories of the media 291 19 Metabolising Britishness 293 JEAN SEATON 20 Global understanding 311 JEAN SEATON 21 The liberal theory of press freedom 326 JAMES CURRAN 22 Broadcasting and the theory of public service 341 JEAN SEATON PART V Politics of the media 355 23 Contradictions in media policy 357 JEAN SEATON/JAMES CURRAN 24 Media reform: democratic choices 370 JAMES CURRAN Bibliography 396 Index 429 About the authors JamesCurranisProfessorofCommunicationsatGoldsmithsCollege,University of London, and Director of the Goldsmiths Leverhulme Media Research Centre. He is the author or editor (some jointly) of Mass Communication and Society; The British Press; Newspaper History; Culture, Society and the Media; British Cinema History; Media, Culture and Society: A Critical Reader; Bending Reality; Impacts and Influences; Mass Media and Society; Cultural Studies and Communications; Media, Ritual and Identity; Media Organisations in Society; De- Westernizing Media Studies; Media and Power; Contesting Media Power and Media and Cultural Theory. He has been an amateur journalist, as a weekly colum- nist for The Times and editor of New Socialist, and a Visiting Professor at the Universities of California, Oslo, Stockholm, Stanford and Pennsylvania. Jean Seaton is Professor of Media History at the University of Westminster and Official Historian of the BBC. She is director of the Orwell Prize for political writing and journalism (theorwellprize.co.uk). She is author, editor or joint editor of Carnage and the Media: the Making and Breaking of News about Violence; The Media in British Politics; The Media of Conflict; The Prerogative of the Harlot: Politics and the Media; and What is to be done? Making the Media and Politics Better. She is an editor of Political Quarterly; has written widely on the media, wars and disasters, and their impact on children and women; media policy, and on the role of the BBC nationally and internationally. She broadcasts regularly. Her next book will be The BBC Under Siege. Acknowledgements This book has been more like a project that has arched over our lives than a simple volume. When we started it, we were young and various editions have punctuated our private and public existence. Our children were born and grew up during its lifetime. The media landscape has been transformed since the first edition: in 1981, the personal computer had only just been invented, and the World Wide Web existed in embryonic form only as a science fiction fantasy. Blogging had not been invented, but reporting and comment (which it is related to) had. Governments of the left and right have come and gone. Yet the compulsion to write and rewrite this book has remained constant because the media matter. Democracies depend on informed electorates; institutions become corrupt unless they are examined in public; individuals find their emotions and wants moulded in ways that can enhance or diminish their lives; all these things are influenced by the media. We started with the history of the press and broadcasting because history is a very good way of undermining fables about the past, and because we believed that without understanding the past it is difficult to be sensible about the present. We also believed that policy is important – that getting the right policies has a tremendous impact on how the media perform. Thus the destruction of the fairness doctrine in America in 1987 that had obliged broadcasters to be fair and balanced in their political reporting powerfully influenced America for a generation. On the way, over the years, many people have helped with the book (all acknowledged in previous editions). James Curran’s wife, friends, colleagues and students have all contributed very directly to its development (most notably, in this edition, Goldsmiths postgraduate student Joanna Reddern who provided key information for chapter 16).