The subject of government-supported broadcasting has risen out of seemingly nowhere over the past year. Several high quality reports have appeared, including those by Senator Richard Lugar, Shawn Powers, and the Lowy Institute in Australia. Over at Layalina, I put in my nickel on the discussion with regard to the challenge faced by the new leadership of America’s non-military government broadcasting.
There is a new governor in town, eight of them in fact. For the first time in six years, all of the top jobs at the Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG) are filled. Half of the seats sat empty for up to four years, including the chairmanship for the past two. This fresh beginning provides some breathing room for the BBG, which manages all U.S. government, non-military international broadcasting. The Board is taking this honeymoon seriously: it has already held two meetings and is actively reviewing the state of international broadcasting, before putting its programmatic and managerial stamp on its operations.
I describe in the article the need for the BBG to establish its relevance in today’s competitive information environment of increasingly shallow news, improve relations with Congress, and do its part to empower the U.S. Advisory Commission on Public Diplomacy, a body charged with providing Congress and the American public insights and recommendations on public diplomacy, including government broadcasting.
Read the whole article at Layalina or download it as a PDF.
Your comments are appreciated.
All noble thoughts, but the agency will never transform even remotely near to what you describe given the attitude and lack of skills/competence demonstrated by a large portion of its management and workforce.