Managing media and prioritising societal values: market and non-market solutions

Many media organisations are businesses driven by commercial motives. But the activities of media have both economic and socio-cultural ramifications. While the industry is made up of both non-market participants (such as the BBC) and commercial firms, questions about ethics and values apply to both constituencies because, whether media organisations like it or not, the ability to communicate with audiences, which is their raison d’être, is inseparable from concomitant welfare implications for society. Not surprisingly then, media organisations are subject to various forms of intervention on the part of state authorities. Such interventions reflect not only the usual sorts of economic and industrial policy concerns such as growth and efficiency, but also a wide range of special considerations stemming specifically from the unique and important ways in which mass communications can affect society. This chapter analyses how conflict may arise between the objectives of profit maximization, which naturally shape the activities of many media firms, and promotion of wider societal aspirations and values. It also examines some of the main solutions and measures through which public interest priorities can be brought into alignment with self-interested corporate goals