NORMATIVE MODELS OF MEDIA AND JOURNALISM AND BROADCASTING REGULATION IN CENTRAL AND EASTERN EUROPE

1993) differ from country to country, depending on the nature of media policy goals and public definitions of the media (McQuail, 1987, 1994). In totalitarian/authoritarian societies, media regulation usually serve to subordinate the media to the interests of the ruling minority. In democratic societies, regulation with a light touch is usually confined to protection against abuse of media freedom (protection against defamation, protection of privacy, regulation of court coverage, national security and order, obscenity and insult to public morals, blasphemy and racism), with most other things left to market mechanisms. Additional regulation may be introduced to guarantee media freedom (ac-cess to information). There may also be interventionist regulation serving to promote the public interest, defined, as the case may be, as enhancement of media pluralism, prevention of undue concentration, facilitation of access to the media, etc. Public definitions of the media which, of course, encompass many dimensions (relations of media to state and society, social and cultural values, organizational and technological fea-tures, conditions of distribution, reception and use, social relationship of sender and receiver) have direct implications for, among other things, their legal regulation. There is, for example,