This essay appeared in the Warsaw Voice, May 7. It
is by Witold Zygulski, written from London.
The media competition in postcommunist Central and Eastern
Europe is forcing the grande dame of international broadcasting to restyle
itself.
“The BBC has no opinions on anything, except its future
existence,” quipped Eugeniusz Smolar, head of the Polish Section of British
Broadcasting Corporation radio. Judging by the plans for the coming years
being developed in London’s Bush House, the BBC’s role in former Soviet
Bloc countries and the former republics of the Soviet Union will remain
considerable. In spite of the historic changes that transformed the media
market in Central and Eastern Europe, the people at BBC believe that they
still have an important mission to fulfill in building a new system of
independent, objective information networks for both mass audiences and
the elite.
According to Mark Rayne, European regional editor for
BBC Radio, the postcommunist states are the main challenge for the company
right now. Like most of his colleagues, Rayne believes that the BBC’s biggest
advantage over the other radio broadcasters is that they present the problems
of the target country in an international manner. “Most Poles still think
that the world is centered around Warsaw; we must try to show them that
this is not the case,” said Rayne.
This year, for the first time in BBC history, the British
Foreign Office (which sets the corporation’s budget) agreed to drop the
system by which the station was obligated to broadcast a defined number
of hours in a particular language every week. Now it is up to the management
to decide themselves how much air time to give to every country’s audience.
The German language program, for example, was reduced by half when it was
decided that keeping up the program directed to listeners from the former
German Democratic Republic did not make sense anymore.
With the elimination of the language quotas, each section
has had to fight to prove its necessity. “The management might decide at
any time to reduce or close down our section,” said an employee at the
Polish Section. “The times when we were politically necessary are over.”
Fighting for listeners in a situation when the station
cannot afford to put up its own radio transmitters forces the BBC to seek
other forms of operation on Eastern European markets. Generally there are
three solutions: applying for a new frequency; renting transmitters or
establishing joint venture-type arrangements with local radio stations;
or re-transmitting BBC broadcasts, again in cooperation with local partners.
On the map of postcommunist listeners of the BBC, Poland
now has the third largest audience. According to Bush House information,
the number of regular listeners in Poland (a regular listener is defined
as one who tunes in at least once a week) is about 1.3 million. Only in
Romania (1.4) and in Russia (5.7) are there more listeners.
Twenty radio stations re-transmit BBC programs in Poland.
By comparison, in Romania there are 33 stations which do this, in the Czech
Republic -16, Slovakia -10, Hungary -11, Bulgaria -7, Ukraine -5 and in
Russia -4. In the Czech Republic, Bulgaria and Slovakia, the BBC also rents
independent radio transmitters. There are currently 25 hours of Polish-language
programs a week (in the Czech Republic, Hungary, Bulgaria and Romania there
are 17 hours, in Slovakia seven hours, and in the Russian Federation 59
hours).
The explosion of the free media market in postcommunist
countries took a considerable proportion of listeners from the London broadcaster.
This is especially true of urban listeners: Research shows that the BBC’s
average listener lives in the country. Smolar says that this situation
is natural -in major cities, such as Warsaw, Cracow or Poznan, there are
simply more radio stations than in rural areas.
The average BBC listener is likely to be a male university
or college graduate. The BBC people say that this is a result of the London
broadcaster trying to reach the more “conservative” public. All the aspects
of the station’s broadcasts, from the language used to the way the information
is presented, is targeted at the listener who seeks objective news, without
the emotional commentary present in the news programs of many of the BBC’s
competitors. Research studies show that a considerable number of BBC listeners
have been listening to the station for at least 10 years. The regular listeners,
say BBC management, form a core audience through which they will try to
gain new listeners.
“Our typical listener is 45 years old,” said Boris Maximov
of the Russian Section. “Since the average life expectancy of a man in
Russia is currently 59 years, if we don’t reach the young ones, in 15 years
we will lose this market.” Maximov, born in Great Britain from Russian
emigre parents, believes that the 5-percent share of the Russian audience
garnered by the BBC exactly mirrors the old joke that of all the people
in Moscow, there are 5 percent who know something, 45 percent who know
nothing and 50 percent who don’t want to know anything.
“We consider ourselves a kind of public service agency,”
added Maximov, who said that the BBC in Russia tries to teach political
culture to both its listeners and the politicians it tries to cooperate
with. This is not always possible; in some former republics, persuading
ministers to give an interview on the air is an almost impossible task.
On the other hand, BBC employees note that although
for nearly 70 years contacts with foreigners (much less a conversation
with a foreign journalist) were fraught with potential dangers, citizens
of the former Soviet Union now have no compunction about openly speaking
of their grievances. Maximov recalls the time when a survey was done by
phone in Vladivostok; hardly any of the people called refused to speak
directly on the air.
In Poland, where the local brand of communism was, especially
after 1956, much more benign, people do not have to be persuaded to speak
out. The problems arise when they have to be asked to keep their emotions
in check and conform with the principles of cultured and civilized debate.
Smolar says that many of those who make up the 35-strong Polish Section
today (of which 25 are broadcast reporters) had to be gradually brought
around to BBC principles.
The BBC’s first Polish language program was broadcast on Sept.
7, 1939. Since then the BBC has not been silent even for one day. During
World War II, one broadcast was a little late because 15 minutes before
it went on the air a German bomb came down on the neighborhood. However,
Polish listeners heard nothing out of the ordinary, with the exception
of a slight tremble in the newscaster’s voice.
After the war, the communist regime began jamming BBC
broadcasts, as it did with Radio Free Europe and the Voice of America;
this was only discontinued in the late 1980s. In 1989, the Polish section
of the BBC started cooperation with Polish Radio 4 and began to re-transmit
its programs. After a year, the BBC was replaced as PR4’s partner by Radio
Free Europe, which at the time had much more money. Since then the BBC
has established contacts with a group of local stations, proposing joint
undertakings. In Poznan its partners are Radio Merkury and Radio S, in
Warsaw Radio Dla Ciebie.
Rayne says that seeking permanent partners on the local
market is the best solution for both parties concerned. The BBC provides
its extensive experience to the newly founded radio stations, receiving
in exchange the ability to broadcast its programs. The system worked very
well in Hungary, where the audience of the BBC’s partner station Radio
Kossuth is growing. “According to polls, 70 percent of Hungarian members
of parliament are listeners; it seems that we have reached the political
elites in Budapest,” said Rayne.
One of BBC’s strategic goals in Poland is to set up
Info-Radio, a joint project of the BBC, PAP Polish Press Agency, the Rzeczpospolita
daily newspaper and the Polityka weekly magazine. The idea is to utilize
the network of the several hundred professional journalists of all of the
above-mentioned media. This would help, according to the outline of the
project, to create Poland’s first “every hour on the hour”-type news service.
Unfortunately, Info-Radio was not successful in its
first attempt to receive a license from the National Radio and Television
Council to operate in Poland. After the license had previously been confirmed,
the application was then rejected with five to four votes against. The
members of the council who voted against argued that Info-Radio could,
with its journalistic potential, threaten other broadcasters, and create
an information monopoly. This argument seems absurd in London. Members
of the Polish Section suggest that the new station’s strictly apolitical
character is not liked by some members of the council, who, in their opinion,
believe that new licenses should go to broadcasters who have a clear political
orientation.
In summer Info-Radio will fight its second battle in
the license war. Work to organize the station is in progress. So far, the
Polish Section of the BBC is busy setting up the Warsaw newsroom, which
should start operating in the next few months.