AIB The Channel January 2003 - page 10

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Brave new world
for the BBC’s new global news division
BBC Chairman Gavyn Davies talks about how the organisation
is responding to the changing world that needs more news, more
often, in more places
I
n November 2002, the BBC
celebrated the 80th anniversary of
the launch of our domestic radio
services. December saw another
important birthday. It was 70 years
ago, in December 1932, that the first
international radio broadcast took
place on what was then called the
Empire Service. So it took John
Reith’s fledgling BBC only 10 years
to realise that broadcasting to Britain
alone was not enough - that the BBC
had the capacity to fulfil a role on the
world stage.
UNSecretary-General KofiAnnan has
said that the World Service was
“Britain’s greatest gift to the world in
the 20th Century”, quite an accolade.
But if we are to live up to that
demanding billing in the 21st Century
- and we are determined to do so -
changes are needed in the BBC’s
global role. Radio alone is no longer
enough. Increasingly, we need to view
radio, television and online as a
package, and to manage them jointly.
Those first five short-wave
transmissions on the opening day on
19 December 1932 were brief and
were focused on reaching key British
colonies overseas. But an important
landmark had been passed. From that
point on, the BBC would be a global
broadcaster. From the very outset, we
offered something different from the
state controlled system of the soviets
or the nationalism that sometimes
characterised American broadcasts.
As with the domestic output of the
BBC, there was a determination to
establish a service which was both
independent and distinctive.
Lord Reith immediately saw that the
guiding light of the BBC’s
international service was that it should
always speak the truth, and must give
propaganda a very wide berth. For its
time, it was a remarkable insight. And
it worked. The values that underpinned
the Empire Service from the start have
made the BBC World Service the
world’s most popular source of news
and information.
The 21st Century has ushered in a
new world. The single undisputed
superpower feels more vulnerable
than for a generation, whether from
international terrorism or a lone
sniper.
It is an increasingly interdependent
world, but one in which many turn
their backs on international news. It
is also a world awash with
information, but where understanding
and tolerance are scarce resources.
This globalised world increases the
scale of international business and the
specialisation of trade, which could
be of immense benefit to the standard
of living of all the world’s citizens.
But it also increases the speed of
social change, the potential for a rapid
spread of bigotry and other bad ideas,
and the impact with which cultures
can collide. Britain is as vulnerable
as any other western economy to the
threats posed by these changes.
The foreign services of the UK and
other countries have recognised these
stark truths. And they have realised
also that a key requirement in
addressing these problems will be to
foster mutual understanding across
international borders and cultural
divides. Very few organisations in the
world are currently well positioned to
make a contribution to this healing
process. But the global news service
of the BBC is one such organisation.
The challenge for the BBC is to make
The BBC’s challenge is to make sense of a
confusing and contradictory world - providing
a forum for the exchange of ideas across
cultural, linguistic and national boundaries
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