How Do Public Service Broadcasters Make a Case for Themselves? An Analysis of BBC’s ‘Charter Manifestos’

As publicly-funded organisations operating in a sector characterized by ever-greater private-sector provision, public service broadcasters need to build a robust case for their continuing legitimacy. This paper examines the discursive strategies of the BBC in the UK in the context of the last three Royal Charter reviews. It shows that since the early 2000s, and particularly during the most recent Charter review, the BBC has deployed influential policy ideas on the creative economy to build a case that in keeping with the times emphasises its economic contribution as well as its more traditional role in fostering political and cultural citizenship

The Future of Public Service Media and the Internet

Utilising the eComitee platform, an active group of scholars and PSM experts discussed the future of Public Service Media and the Internet for a time period of two months. After the discussion in the four clusters was closed, Alessandro D’Arma, Christian Fuchs, Minna Horowitz, and Klaus Unterberger created a summary of the discussion. This summary is documented as chapter 5 in this chapter. Based on the summary, a first version of the Manifesto was created that was then further discussed on eComitee. This chapter is a scholarly foundation of the Manifesto that gives an overview of a range of issues concerning contemporary Public Service Media, the contemporary Internet, and the future of communication(s)

Making a difference? Public service broadcasting, distinctiveness and children’s provision in Italy and Spain

This article evaluates the performance of public service broadcasters in the area of children’s television in Italy and Spain. It asks: how distinctive is the output of public service children’s channels? As core area of public service provision, children’s television represents an important testing ground for wider debates about the distinctiveness of public service broadcasting in a digital age. Public broadcasters in Southern Europe have historically been more vulnerable to market pressure than their counterparts in continental and Northern Europe, and this is believed to have impacted negatively on their ability to maintain a distinctive public service profile. After engaging with debates on distinctiveness in order to develop a framework for the analysis, the article presents the results of a two-week analysis of the TV schedules of the main children’s channels operating in the two countries. It finds evidence that in both countries the output of public service children’s channels is distinctive to a degree, but also that there are important gaps in public service provision as well as some significant differences between the public service children’s channels analysed

Public Service Media as Enablers of Epistemic Rights

Growing concerns in recent years over threats to the foundations of democratic societies posed by misinformation, hate speech and other problems associated with digital communications have led to renewed calls for greater protection of epistemic rights within policy, advocacy and academic fora. Institutionally mandated to promote citizenship, public service media (PSM) organisations have an important role to play in supporting epistemic rights. We suggest four main conditions are required for PSM to fulfil this role. First, PSM are premised upon strong political commitment. At a time when this political commitment is dwindling, it is imperative that civil society, academia and international organisations continue to make the case for PSM strong. Second, we argue that PSM need to evolve with the times, and be allowed to use new transmission means, build new platforms and innovate. Third, we argue that PSM need to move beyond supporting epistemic rights, as they have traditionally been bestowed, and work to promote epistemic justice, by questioning the existing power structures of knowledge. Finally, PSM need to work together with other educational and cultural institutions towards the creation of an epistemic commons, countering the privatisation of communitive spaces and striving to make knowledge accessible to all

Why advocate for public service media? Perspectives from organizations for media development

In this commentary, we discuss how five prominent media development organizations (BBC Media Action, Council of Europe, DWA, PMA and UNESCO) define public service broadcasting (PSB)/public service media (PSM) and how they envisage its role and functions in their recent projects and reports. In view of the increasing challenges of the current media landscape, international donors are looking at models to provide a path to independent media and journalism and several international organizations support projects and institutional arrangements they label PSB/PSM. However, given the fundamental questions that existing PSBs face, is PSB a meaningful tool for media development? And how do these various advocates for PSB/PSM understand the concept and why do they feel that it is worth supporting? We find that there seems to have been a shift, common to all five organizations, towards defining PSB/PSM in terms of public service ethos, and we explain why this should be seen as a welcome development

Influence of a high‐impact multidimensional rehabilitation program on the gut microbiota of patients with multiple sclerosis

Multiple sclerosis (MS) is a neurodegenerative inflammatory condition mediated by autoreactive immune processes. Due to its potential to influence host immunity and gut‐brain communication, the gut microbiota has been suggested to be involved in the onset and progression of MS. To date, there is no definitive cure for MS, and rehabilitation programs are of the utmost importance, especially in the later stages. However, only a few people generally participate due to poor support, knowledge, and motivation, and no information is available on gut microbiota changes. Herein we evaluated the potential of a brief high‐impact multidimensional rehabilitation program (B‐HIPE) in a leisure environment to affect the gut microbiota, mitigate MS symptoms and improve quality of life. B‐HIPE resulted in modulation of the MS‐typical dysbiosis, with reduced levels of pathobionts and the replenishment of beneficial short‐chain fatty acid producers. This partial recovery of a eubiotic profile could help counteract the inflammatory tone typically observed in MS, as supported by reduced circulating lipopolysaccharide levels and decreased populations of pro‐inflammatory lymphocytes. Improved physical performance and fatigue relief were also found. Our findings pave the way for integrating clinical practice with holistic approaches to mitigate MS symptoms and improve patients’ quality of life

The Impact of the Implementation of the Dutch Combined Meeting Centres Support Programme for Family Caregivers of People with Dementia in Italy, Poland and UK

Objectives: The MEETINGDEM research project aimed to implement the combined Dutch Meeting Centre Support Programme (MCSP) for community-dwelling people with dementia and caregivers within Italy, Poland and UK and to assess whether comparable benefits were found in these countries as in the Netherlands. Method: Nine pilot Meeting Centres (MCs) participated (Italy-5, Poland-2, UK-2). Effectiveness of MCSP was compared to usual care (UC) on caregiver outcomes measuring competence (SSCQ), mental health (GHQ-12), emotional distress (NPI-Q) and loneliness (UCLA) analysed by ANCOVAs in a 6-month pre-test/post-test controlled trial. Interviews using standardised measures were completed with caregivers. Results: Pre/post data were collected for 93 caregivers receiving MCSP and 74 receiving UC. No statistically significant differences on the outcome measures were found overall. At a country level MC caregivers in Italy showed significant better general mental health (p=0.04, d=0.55) and less caregiver distress (p=0.02, d=0.62) at post-test than the UC group. Caregiver satisfaction was rated on a sample at 3 months (n=81) and 6 months (n=84). The majority of caregivers reported feeling less burdened and more supported by participating in MCSP. Conclusion: The moderate positive effect on sense of competence and the greater mental health benefit for lonely caregivers using the MCSP compared to UC as found in the original Dutch studies were not replicated. However, subject to study limitations, caregivers in Italy using MCSP benefitted more regarding their mental health and emotional distress than caregivers using UC. Further evaluation of the benefits of MCSP within these countries in larger study samples is recommended

DMTs and Covid-19 severity in MS: a pooled analysis from Italy and France

We evaluated the effect of DMTs on Covid-19 severity in patients with MS, with a pooled-analysis of two large cohorts from Italy and France. The association of baseline characteristics and DMTs with Covid-19 severity was assessed by multivariate ordinal-logistic models and pooled by a fixed-effect meta-analysis. 1066 patients with MS from Italy and 721 from France were included. In the multivariate model, anti-CD20 therapies were significantly associated (OR = 2.05, 95%CI = 1.39–3.02, p < 0.001) with Covid-19 severity, whereas interferon indicated a decreased risk (OR = 0.42, 95%CI = 0.18–0.99, p = 0.047). This pooled-analysis confirms an increased risk of severe Covid-19 in patients on anti-CD20 therapies and supports the protective role of interferon

The Hollowing Out of Public Service Media: A Constructivist Institutionalist Analysis of the Commercialisation of BBC’s In-house Production

This paper examines the recent commercialisation of the programme-making activities at the BBC in the UK as a major instance of a wider tendency that sees a market logic becoming increasingly embedded in public service media (PSM) organisations. Drawing on ideational approaches to policy analysis, this paper seeks to explain how and why the BBC came to conceive of BBC Studios, a new commercial subsidiary bringing together the majority of BBC’s in-house production units and free to compete in the wider market for programme commissions, as serving its long-term interests. It considers how BBC strategists engaged with dominant ideas in UK broadcasting policy on the economic value of the creative industries and the benefits of competition for creativity in television programme-making. It shows how changes to the institutional context over the past three decades, predicated on these very ideas, have constrained BBC’s room for manoeuvre. The main arguments put forward – the BBC’s growing reliance on economic arguments to justify its value and the path-dependent effects at work pushing the BBC towards advocating an institutional solution entailing the further hollowing out of its publicly-funded structures – are relevant to wider debates on the future role and organisational forms of PSM