Reinventing public service broadcasting in Europe: prospects, promises and problems

New information technologies, liberalizing policies and rapidly changing societies - from mono- to multicultural - entail serious consequences for the prospects of European public service broadcasters (PSB) in a network society. The European concept of PSB as a comprehensive and universal service is challenged by both European Union and national authorities at three levels: (1) mission and programme task (comprehensive or complementary programming?); (2) organization (central organization or distributed public service?); and (3) financing (licence fee, advertising or state aid?). There are pressures towards a more pure model of public service broadcasting and/or towards de-institutionalization of PSB and distributed public service. Recent pleadings for (e.g. in the Netherlands) and practices of (e.g. in New Zealand) new PSB policy directions will be evaluated. © 2008 SAGE Publications.status: publishe