人民的广播属于人民

所属教程:金融时报原文阅读

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2020年07月07日

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人民的广播属于人民

这是英国广播公司（BBC）深受英国和世界信任的原因。

测试中可能遇到的词汇和知识：

shortsighted 目光短浅的

externality 外形

analogue 模拟

suffrage 选举权

subscription 订阅

marginal 临界的

ghettos 限制区，贫民区

devastate 摧毁

阅读即将开始，建议您计算一下阅读整篇文章所用时间，并对照我们在文章最后给出的参考值来估算您的阅读速度。

Public broadcaster belongs to the people （791words）

By Martin Wolf

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Protect the BBC. If it did not now exist, we could not invent it. That makes preserving it even more important. The BBC is among the UK’s most remarkable achievements. Its mission to “inform, educate and entertain” remains as relevant today as when it was founded in 1922. Above all, the government must remember that it is not its property. It belongs to the public, now and in generations to come.

Some two decades ago, I believed that digital technologies would undermine the case for a public service broadcaster free at the point of use. That now seems shortsighted. The case has changed. But it has, if anything, strengthened.

As Gavyn Davies, a former BBC chairman, explained at the time of the last review of the organisation’s charter, the BBC was created to supply a classic public good and generate some powerful “externalities”.

A public good is a product that would be undersupplied in a competitive market, because it is “non-excludable” and “non-rival”. You and I cannot eat the same steak. But we can experience the same programme. That is what it means to say that a broadcast is non-rival. In the analogue days, broadcasting was also non-excludable: anybody could pick up a signal. The combination of high fixed costs with zero marginal costs of distribution made broadcasting a natural monopoly. The BBC was the solution.

With its public service remit, the BBC also supplied hugely positive externalities —— benefits to society over and above those individuals would pay for. Those externalities included building an informed citizenry, bringing politicians to account and creating a range of shared experiences. The BBC made a vital contribution to the health of our new universal-suffrage democracy.

The BBC is a public institution but not the government’s lackey. That is what made it trusted in the UK and around the world. The BBC is not the elite’s property. It belongs to the people because the people pay for it directly.

Has new technology and the passage of time weakened these arguments? In one respect, yes. In other respects, no.

While still non-rival, broadcasting is excludable. It is technically possible to turn the BBC into one, or many, subscription services. But, as Mr Davies notes, it is still non-rival and the marginal costs of broadcasting are still zero. A shift to subscription would eliminate large amounts of surplus value.

All other arguments for a public service broadcaster have become even stronger. In 1922, the UK was a homogeneous nation united by a recent war. Today, it is far more diverse. The need to bring the people together is even greater now than it was then. If one wishes to understand what takes place if the media divide the country into ghettos of the mind, look at what has happened to the US since the death of the networks and repeal of the “fairness doctrine”.

Daniel Patrick Moynihan, the US senator, said: “Everyone is entitled to his own opinion, but not to his own facts.” That seems no longer to be true in the US. To the extent it is true in the UK, it is partly because the BBC provides the common facts and a shared arena for debate. The corporation is imperfect. But it is not as imperfect as politicians pretend: the fact that right and left agree it is especially biased against their side demonstrates that. It is far better than any likely alternatives.

Again, the digital age has devastated the economics of information. With advertising shifting from newspapers to a few giant platforms, the ability of commercial media to fund the gathering of information has been gravely weakened. Moreover, much of what remains is concentrated in a small number of huge businesses that have their own commercial and political agendas. The ability of the BBC to fund a full range of news gathering and analysis is therefore even more vital now than before.

There are questions about the proper scope of BBC activities. In addressing them, the government has to remember the essential. In an age of growing national diversity, of fierce pressure on the profitability of the business of generating information and of hugely dominant commercial enterprises, a successful public service broadcaster is increasingly important. Moreover, a reliable and independent source of revenue remains indispensable. The licence fee is, even now, the worst possible arrangement except for all the others. And, again, so long as the licence fee remains, the BBC must be seen to serve everyone.

The argument I am making is one that should appeal to disciples of Edmund Burke: the value of tried and tested institutions ought to guide any Conservative government. The BBC is a great legacy from past generations. It must be passed on even stronger into the future.

请根据你所读到的文章内容，完成以下自测题目：

1. Which one is not included for BBC’s mission?

a. inform

b. innovation

c. educate

d. entertain

2. Why should the author give an example of eating a steak?

a. to prove broadcast’s non-excludable

b. to prove broadcast’s non-rival

c. to prove BBC’s entertain mission

d. in order to attract the audience

3. What made BBC trusted in the UK and around the world?