British Broadcasting Corporation

British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC). Britain's key media organization, which oversaw the introduction of radio (1922) and television (1936), and set standards of broadcasting admired throughout the world. Founded in 1922 as the British Broadcasting Company, funded by a licence fee under government auspices, it became a corporation with a royal charter five years later. From the start it was a monopoly organization designed to regulate the British airwaves, to avoid what was seen as the ‘chaos’ of free enterprise broadcasting in the USA. Whether this strictly regulated ‘public service’ approach to broadcasting—symbolized by the BBC's nickname ‘Auntie’—has proved conservative and paternalistic or a safeguard against shoddy commercialism is a continuing subject of debate.

The tone for the BBC was set by its founder, John Reith, managing director of the company 1922–6, and director-general of the corporation 1927–38. His Scottish presbyterian values ensured that the BBC fulfilled its remit to inform, educate, and entertain, and observe due impartiality in politics, news, and current affairs. The BBC's reputation for news coverage was made in 1926, when the General Strike halted other forms of news production; and received international recognition during the Second World War, when the overseas broadcasting service (established 1932) and foreign-language section (1938) came into their own.

To ensure its impartiality, the early BBC was banned from dealing with controversial issues, and even when the ban was removed by the government in 1928, the BBC trod so carefully that many felt it did a totally inadequate job of dealing with the domestic and international crises of the 1930s. Only certain maverick producers in the devolved regional services, such as Olive Shapley in the north-west, dared to feature the experiences of the unemployed on air.

The BBC introduced more varied fare to supplement its Home Service during the war, with a forces programme of light music (to become the Light Programme in 1945) and a Third Programme of high art and classical music. This pattern remained until the 1960s saw it reshaped into Radios 1, 2, 3, and 4 (with the addition of Radio 5 in the 1990s) and the start of BBC Local Radio in 1967. In television, BBC broadcasting became popular with its post-war relaunch, with innovations such as schools educational TV from 1952, and a second channel, BBC2, from 1962.

Though technically independent of government control, with its own—government-appointed—board of governors, the BBC has been subject to varying degrees of political pressure at times of crisis such as Suez, the Falklands War, the Ulster crisis, and has reacted with varying degrees of independence or compliance.

In general the BBC has tried to steer a middle course, reflecting the spirit of the times—thus being noted for its liberal and progressive approach in the 1960s under Director-General Hugh Greene; while from the 1980s, it has had to adapt to the free market values of Thatcherite Conservatism under Michael Checkland and John Birt. In the era of cable, satellite, and interactive media, the BBC's privileged status as a publicly funded body is increasingly questioned.

Douglas J. Allen