Dear All, members of the list might be interested to this report on 'Promoting social cohesion. The role of community media', authored by Peter Lewis, that has just been published on the Council of Europer website at http://www.coe.int/t/dghl/standardsetting/media/MC-S-MD/H-Inf(2008)013_en.pdf (Home page of the Media division at http://www.coe.int/t/dghl/standardsetting/media/) Best Wishes, Salvo ------------------------------------------------------------------- Executive summary 1. The report was commissioned by the Group of Specialists on Media Diversity (MC-S-MD) to: • identify the most important issues concerning the relationship between media and social cohesion; • summarise existing definitions of “third sector media” and classify the sector according to aspects such as ownership, structure, funding, content/programming, audience involvement and different platforms, including new media; • discuss the positive and negative effects of third sector media with regard to social cohesion; • describe existing measures to support third sector media. 2. The report draws on academic studies and reports from UNESCO, AMARC (the World Association of Community Radio Broadcasters) and other NGOs and begins with a summary of some of the relevant theoretical concepts that relate to social cohesion, such as identity, community and citizenship. 3. Citing a claim that Europe is currently, as a result of migration, witnessing “a change in the nature of national cultures and their capacity to sustain traditional boundaries and identities”, the report argues that the inability, for various reasons, of public service and commercial broadcasting to meet the needs of marginalised and disadvantaged social groups means that third sector media are becoming the focus of official attention. 4. The report opts to use “community radio” and “community media” as terms in use by UNESCO and AMARC, while discussing the connotations of other descriptive labels. AMARC’s Community Radio Charter for Europe is provided as Annex 1, and the organisation’s summary definition of community radio is cited. Community radio: should not be run for profit but for social gain and community benefit; it should be owned by and accountable to the community that it seeks to serve; and it should provide for participation by the community in programme making and in management. 5. Characteristics of community media are discussed in turn, the most important being enabling legislation, regulation and policies. A table of 22 European countries shows the size of the sector, its legal status, whether there is funding and the presence or not of a national association representative of the sector. There follow sections on ownership, content, funding sources for local projects, audience involvement and audience research, the public profile of the sector, training, and some examples of multiplatform initiatives. Examples are drawn mainly from Europe but also from India (whose policy guidelines for setting up community radio stations constitutes Annex 2), the USA, Canada and, in particular, from Australia, where recent research into community audiences provides a model of method and some findings relevant to the European context. 6. On the question of whether third sector media contribute to social cohesion or threaten it, the evidence points to the sector being an important factor in social cohesion and citizenship, particularly for minority ethnic communities and refugee and migrant communities. The discussion draws on examples of multicultural programming by the Intermedia project and practice in Europe and Australia and underlines the importance of music and news in connecting newly arrived communities to their original cultural capital as well as drawing in the native communities. 7. Measures to support third sector media suggested by AMARC, the Community Forum for Europe (CMFE) and the Culture and Education Committee of the European Parliament are summarised and it is suggested that the Council of Europe should encourage member states to: • create legislative infrastructure, without which community media cannot develop; • preserve analogue frequencies that may in some countries continue to be needed after the digital switchover, and to ensure that community media are not disadvantaged in the digital environment; • recognise the social value of community media and its role as a form of local public service by committing funds to support the sector, both directly, with schemes such as the French levy on the commercial audiovisual sector (FSER), the allocation of a portion of the licence fee (Ireland, some German Länder) or by lowering the cost of licences, and indirectly, through funding projects as part of government programmes directed towards health, community development, education, social inclusion, support for minority ethnic communities, etc. More specifically, the Council of Europe should consider: • commissioning studies of best practice in community media, surveys of emerging needs such as multicultural programming and audience research on the Australian model; • supporting a trans-European network to monitor policy, a community media observatory; • encouraging training schemes as part of lifelong learning and media literacy; • supporting programme exchange within the European community media sector and beyond, with regions which are the “homelands” of diasporic communities; • supporting the exchange of staff and volunteers for short periods between community media projects; • facilitating workshops to study funding opportunities; • inviting representatives of AMARC and the CMFE to attend relevant committees as observers and to participate in meetings and conferences.