FCC To Relax Media Ownership Restrictions

by Akhilesh Upadhyay

On June 2, the five-member Federal Communications Commission (FCC) is expected to vote in favor of lifting a ban on cross-ownership of television stations and newspapers, a move that its critics say will certainly give conglomerates a larger share of the media pie in more than 100 cities across the United States.

Critics of the FCC proposal say deregulation has always worked in favor of big companies. In 1996, when the Telecommunications Act deregulated radio ownership, one company, Clear Channel, owned 40 stations -- it now owns 1,200, giving it the largest market share in U.S. radio, says Rachel Coen, a media analyst with the group FAIR (Fairness & Accuracy in Reporting).

"FCC was founded in 1934 to watchdog the public interest but they have grown too close to the media industry they are supposed to be watch-dogging," she told IPS.

Already, hundreds of thousands of people opposing the FCC move have asked the agency to delay its action to allow an open national debate on the high-stakes vote and to reveal all the details of its proposed amendments. But FCC chairman Michael Powell -- the son of U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell -- is unlikely to defer the vote, according to news reports.

"The vote should be postponed as long as it takes to have a decent national conversation on the topic," says Eli Pariser of MoveOn.org, an advocacy group. "We fully expect that the overwhelming result of that conversation would be a refutation of Commissioner Powell's approach," he added in an email interview.

MoveOn.org has reportedly received 150,000 online comments against the proposed move.

"Without regulations that prohibit media monopolies, a very few corporations will control our access to news and entertainment," says Pariser. "Those corporations will likely have ideological biases."

This, he argues, will undermine "our ability to understand the world as it is. It could have disastrous effects on democracy, which at its core relies on an informed citizenry."

A study by the Center for Public Integrity (CPI) found that FCC officials maintain cosy relationships with the broadcast and telecommunications industry on many levels.

According to the May 22 report, "Well-Connected," FCC officials have accepted 2,500 trips paid for by industry companies and trade groups, and the agency increasingly relies on industry-generated data to justify sweeping deregulation proposals.

The Center laments the proposed relaxation in media ownership, pointing out that broadcasting and cable behemoths such as Viacom, Clear Channel and Comcast already dominate many of the nation's media markets.

This week, Howard Dean, the former Vermont governor who is running for president, joined the opposition ranks, asking Powell to postpone the vote.

At stake are two time-honored regulations: that no company would be allowed to own a newspaper and a broadcast station in the same market, and that no company could own enough television stations to reach more than 35 percent of households nationwide.

While permitting one entity to own a newspaper and a broadcast station in the same city, the amendment would also relax the ceiling for TV station ownership to 45 percent. Additionally, a single company would be allowed up to three stations in large cities such as New York and Los Angeles.

Some of the world's largest media conglomerates could become more powerful at the expense of democracy and pluralism if the proposals are approved, warns the International Federation of Journalists (IFJ), which represents more than 500,000 journalists in more than 100 countries.

It has called on Powell to fully disclose plans to amend the regulations, saying they are being kept secret ahead of the vote.

Supporters of the amendment, who include major broadcast networks and some large news conglomerates, say the decades-old FCC regulations are obsolete. Unless they are able to grow, they argue, free television might be a thing of the past, with expensive programming migrating to subscription services offered by cable and satellite companies.

Critics counter that despite a huge proliferation of cable and satellite broadcasters along with the Internet in recent years, a handful of large corporations continue to dominate the making of content that goes into these channels. Controlled by large multinationals, the argument goes, the media giants promote corporate interests, denigrating journalism and blocking news that they deem unpalatable.

The gung-ho jingoistic reporting of the recent U.S.-led invasion of Iraq by many broadcasters is one example of that, numerous critics have argued.

According to Robert McChesney, author of 'Rich Media Poor Democracy', the strategy of the global media giants is twofold: First, get bigger so you dominate markets and your competition cannot buy you out. Disney and Time Warner (owners of ABC and CNN respectively, for example, almost tripled in size in the 1990s.

Second, McChesney adds, diversify into numerous media industries, such as film production, book publishing, music, TV channels and networks, magazines and newspapers.

IFJ also fears the conglomerates for what it calls their increasing interference in the editorial policies of their media outlets, citing a number of instances worldwide.

In Canada, CanWest Global Corp has imposed a "one size fits all" editorial policy on its newspapers and TV stations across the country; in Italy, Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi faces conflict of interest accusations because he owns most of the country's TV stations; in the United States, the Rupert Murdoch-owned News Corporation, which controls Fox News and the 'New York Post' newspaper, has a "notorious history of editorial interference", according to the IFJ.