{"id":40658,"date":"2018-07-16T06:00:57","date_gmt":"2018-07-15T20:00:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.aspistrategist.ru\/?p=40658"},"modified":"2018-07-15T10:36:00","modified_gmt":"2018-07-15T00:36:00","slug":"oz-voice-in-the-asia-pacific-part-2-adjust-the-tv-picture","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.aspistrategist.ru\/oz-voice-in-the-asia-pacific-part-2-adjust-the-tv-picture\/","title":{"rendered":"Oz voice in the Asia\u2013Pacific (part 2): adjust the TV picture"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/figure>\n

For 25 years, Australia\u2019s international TV voice has been a political plaything and a broadcasting afterthought, constantly facing chops and changes.<\/p>\n

Australian governments have treated our international TV service more as a political game than a policy interest. Canberra\u2019s attention has been spasmodic and fickle.<\/p>\n

For the Australian Broadcasting Corporation, international TV has been a constant but quickly changing problem, and too often an afterthought.<\/p>\n

The government\u2019s review of Australia\u2019s media reach in the Asia\u2013Pacific<\/a> needs to peer into the future by taking lessons from history. Past performance may not be a reliable indicator of future performance (as superannuation industry advertising has to testify), but past stuff-ups can foretell future pitfalls. And in Oz international TV, the stumbles have a serial rhyme.<\/p>\n

A simple, stark illustration of the history of chop, change and political spasm is to run through the eight changes of identity and ownership over the 25 years of Australia\u2019s international TV<\/a> service.<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. First was <\/span>Australia Television<\/b> (ATV) in 1993, when the Keating Labor government gave the ABC start-up funding. Unlike the rest of the ABC, though, ATV carried commercials. Canberra wanted it, but didn\u2019t want to pay for it.<\/span><\/li>\n
  2. Channel 7 was given control in 1998 (twice\u2014once with news, then as a pure shopping channel). The commercial network made a hash of it, didn\u2019t make any money and lost interest. So \u2026<\/span><\/li>\n
  3. In 2001, it went back to the ABC as <\/span>ABC Television International<\/b>.<\/span><\/li>\n
  4. A year later, it was rebranded as <\/span>ABC AsiaPacific<\/b>.<\/span><\/li>\n
  5. Then came another name change: the <\/span>Australia Network<\/b> (2006).<\/span><\/li>\n
  6. In the 2014 budget, the Coalition cut all funding to the Australia Network. It closed, to be replaced by a drastically cut-down operation.<\/span><\/li>\n
  7. The Australia Network\u2019s replacement, <\/span>Australia Plus<\/b>, started in September 2014.<\/span><\/li>\n
  8. From 1 July 2018, the network has been renamed <\/span>ABC Australia<\/b><\/a>.<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    Neither side of Oz politics emerges with much credit from this zigzag. Canberra\u2019s level of interest has been as changeable as the name of the service.<\/p>\n

    The moment of creation under Labor 25 years ago illustrates the recurring themes of limited Canberra attention, political crosscurrents, and plenty of vision but little money.<\/p>\n

    Launching ATV to broadcast to the Asia\u2013Pacific, the Keating government and the ABC boasted of its significance for regional engagement and Oz interests, ranging from media and education to business and foreign policy. Confident talk wasn\u2019t matched by cash or commitment.<\/p>\n

    The ABC sought to establish an international version of its domestic service, but couldn\u2019t devote proper resources to ATV\u2014not least because the government didn\u2019t want to pay for what it knew Australia needed.<\/p>\n

    Programming suffered because the ABC had domestic copyright to broadcast programs within Australia, but didn\u2019t own international rights. The Keating government knew ATV was worthwhile, but wouldn\u2019t give anything more than start-up funding for the satellite service. Once established, it would have to pay its own way with advertising.<\/p>\n

    The refusal to launch ATV as a fully funded public broadcasting service (like the rest of the ABC) was telling. A hybrid design\u2014part ABC, part commercial\u2014was the half-arsed response of a half-hearted government. That half-in, half-out problem continued through the zigzagging history.<\/p>\n

    Domestic politics too often twists or derails discussion of Oz international TV. The Keating cabinet\u2019s debates about establishing ATV demonstrated the problem, veering off into rant-and-rave sessions about how ABC domestic reporting was hurting the Labor government. Much bile was directed at the managing director of the ABC, David Hill<\/a>, who\u2019d fought budget cuts to the corporation with a famous campaign proclaiming that the ABC cost each Australian only \u2018eight cents a day\u2019.<\/p>\n

    A couple of times when ATV was on the cabinet agenda, Hill came from Sydney to Canberra to support the idea. The trouble was, as one Foreign Affairs official told me, having the ebullient ABC head sitting in the cabinet anteroom was a disastrous provocation. After navigating past Hill, ministers would have another ABC hate session, then defer the international TV submission to another day.<\/p>\n

    Themes from the creation story recur over the 25 years:<\/p>\n

    Political change overturns constant policy:<\/strong> Each change of federal government\u2014Keating to Howard to Rudd to Abbott\u2014has been a chop-change moment for international TV. The foreign policy consensus on Asia\u2013Pacific interests shared by Labor and Liberal governments has never translated into agreement on the worth of our broadcasting service to the regions (Southeast Asia and the South Pacific, different audiences and different regions). Thus \u2026<\/p>\n

    The gap between big interests and little cash:<\/strong> The high rhetoric of Asia\u2013Pacific engagement is negated by the low commitment of dollars to Oz regional broadcasting.<\/p>\n

    Domestic ABC versus international ABC:<\/strong> All federal governments come to fear\/distrust\/hate the way the ABC reports on them; that perennial Canberra rant-and-rave problem obscures a clear understanding of what public broadcasting can do for Australia in the region. It\u2019s a problem that has a funny dimension: politicians know the power of the ABC, but they\u2019re not willing to use that power to the full to serve our international interests.<\/p>\n

    International ABC can\u2019t merely be domestic ABC:<\/strong> The ABC\u2019s domestic programming is vital to the international service, but that\u2019s the start, not the finish. Reaching and holding audiences in Asia and the South Pacific is about talking with<\/em>, not just talking to<\/em>. <\/strong>Diverse audiences have different needs. Programming has to be for<\/em> them, not just rebroadcast from<\/em> Oz.<\/p>\n

    Chop and change hurts Australian interests:<\/strong> International broadcasting is expensive and complex because a lot of power and riches are in play. Australia\u2019s constant and growing interests in the Asia\u2013Pacific demand a constant and growing broadcast conversation (using \u2018broadcast\u2019 as a catch-all term, because all media technologies are converging).<\/p>\n

    Times are tough in the foreign policy game and good policy responses are scarce. A strong, consistent voice in our region will serve Australian values as well as interests. Get the zigzag pattern off the screen and adjust the international TV picture.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    For 25 years, Australia\u2019s international TV voice has been a political plaything and a broadcasting afterthought, constantly facing chops and changes. Australian governments have treated our international TV service more as a political game than …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":79,"featured_media":40673,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mi_skip_tracking":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[880,143,730],"class_list":["post-40658","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-general","tag-abc","tag-asia-pacific","tag-media"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nOz voice in the Asia\u2013Pacific (part 2): adjust the TV picture | The Strategist<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.aspistrategist.ru\/oz-voice-in-the-asia-pacific-part-2-adjust-the-tv-picture\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Oz voice in the Asia\u2013Pacific (part 2): adjust the TV picture | The Strategist\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"For 25 years, Australia\u2019s international TV voice has been a political plaything and a broadcasting afterthought, constantly facing chops and changes. 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