Debate: "RAI's public service contract: a chance to relaunch a real radio and television public service in Italy"

On 22 October 2006, a debate about the renewal of the service contract of Italy’s public service broadcaster RAI took place in Rome. The renewal is seen as an opportunity to relaunch a truly public radio-television service in Italy.

The debate was organized by Eurovisioni, the International Festival of Cinema and Television, in cooperation with IEM – Fondazione Rosselli, Punto.it, Articolo 21 and the Open Society Institute. It was centered on the content of the Italian chapter of the 2005 “Television Across Europe” report, published by the Open Society Institute’s EU Monitoring and Advocacy Program (EUMAP).

That report concluded that the political influence over the media in Italy, and particularly over TV, “has harmed the development of a healthy media structure.” In 2004, Italian Parliament sponsored and approved a law which put RAI under an even stricter control by the political establishment, the report read.

The event was attended by more than 80 participants, including representatives of the Italian government, parliament, NGOs, RAI, and foreign media, and academics, students and Italian journalists.

Programme
Debate: "RAI's public service contract: a chance to relaunch a real radio and television public service in Italy"
Dibattito: "Il contratto di servizio della Rai: l'occasione per rilanciare un vero servizio pubblico radiotelevisivo in Italia" (PDF)

The debate was opened by the representatives of the organizations that presented this event. They included:

• Erik Lambert from Punto.it
• Flavia Barca, the coordinator of the Institute for the Economy of the Media at Fondazione Rosselli
• Duilio Giammaria from Articolo 21
• Luciana Castellina, vice-president of Eurovisioni.

^{Marius Dragomir, Luciana Castellina, Emili Prado and a representative of RAI. (Click to enlarge.)}

The speakers stressed the importance of the ongoing process of renewing RAI’s contract of service. It needs to be changed in order to ensure RAI’s future independence from government political parties.

Miriam Anati of EUMAP briefed the audience on the scope and goals of the OSI report. The opening speeches were followed by interventions of foreign guests.

• Marius Dragomir, one of the editors of the EUMAP report, spoke about trends in the development of Public Service Broadcasting (PSB) systems in various European countries. He focused on mechanisms for ensuring the independence of public service broadcasters, highlighting some examples of good practices in contrast to numerous examples of political interference and pressures on the PSB.
• Mark Thompson, another editor of the report, spoke about the public service broadcasting system in the U.K., focusing on the mechanisms in place to ensure the independence of the BBC from the political establishment. He stressed that they have to be understood in the context of a general British culture of public service values, which has nurtured the BBC’s endeavor to remain an independent voice.
• Emilio Prado Pico from the Autonomous University of Barcelona presented the evolution of the Spanish public service broadcasting system, focusing as well on those structures in the Spanish PSB that have been established to ensure the broadcaster’s independence.

Read contribution
Mark Thompson: "The BBC and public service broadcasting: independence, digitalisation and the Royal Charter" (PDF)

Luigi Vimercati, the undersecretary of state in the Ministry of Communications, then briefed the audience on the status of RAI’s service contract renewal.

Laura Aria from the audiovisual and multimedia content department at AGCOM, the Italian Communications Authority, presented the standpoint of the regulator on the current reform of RAI.

They were followed by the two authors of the Italy chapter in the EUMAP report, Gianpietro Mazzoleni, professor at the University of Milan, and Giulio Enea Vigevani, professor at the University of Milan-Bicocca. They presented the conclusions of their research and the recommendations they made in the report.

The Italian report stated that although Italy is one of Europe’s richest television markets, with an abundance of generalist and niche networks poised to grow further thanks to the new technologies being introduced, diversity and competition in general are dented by the reigning analogue TV duopoly RAI-Mediaset. Mediaset is the largest broadcasting conglomerate in Italy, and is controlled by Italy’s former Prime Minister and current opposition leader, Silvio Berlusconi.

Mr. Vimercati responded to the conclusions and recommendations presented by the authors of the Italian chapter in the OSI report, referring to the bill recently presented by the government on the broadcasting landscape in Italy, which focuses on competition and pluralism. A second bill, specifically about the RAI, is due by the end of 2006.