Non-for-profit media in Spain. Legislation overview in the context of EU-policies (Nuria Reguero)

From Civilmedia

The lack of a normative regime has characterized the non-for-profit media in Spain over the last decades. Furthermore, their subsistence became more complicated since the Digital Terrestrial Television (DTT) application, especially after the approval of the Spanish plan for local digital TV (Plan Técnico Nacional de la Televisión Digital Local, PTNTDL). That plan obliges the non-for-profit media to compete – at a disadvantage- with local commercial operators in order to obtain an emission license.

Nevertheless, these circumstances seem to improve with the new law on the promotion of Information Society (ley de Medidas de Impulso de la Sociedad de la Información, LISI of 20 December 2007). The LISI recognizes for the very first time in Spain the specificity of non-for-profit media’s activity, conferring to them a legal framework.

At the same time of the LISI approval, the European Parliament published The State of Community Media in the European Union study (2007), which preceded the Resolution of 25th September 2008 on protecting Community Media in Europe , the first dealing specifically with this issue at EU level. The European Resolution uses the term Community Media to referring the “media that are non-profit and accountable to the community that they seek to serve”; it also considers their activity as a bottom-up solution to promote pluralism and other democratic rights, such as the participation of citizens in the public sphere. Despite this Resolution is not binding regulation it could represent a watershed on CM’s legal status, specifically within the Member States where the sector is not regulated and where the access to the radio spectrum is almost impossible. The Spanish’s case exemplifies this situation. cover letters

The present article reviews the Spanish legislation on non-for-profit media since its origins (1979) up to the LISI approval. The case study is set in the context of EU policies directly or indirectly relating to these media, (2007-2008) , specifically, focusing on the activities of the European Commission (Audiovisual and Media; Culture) and the European Parliament (Committee on Culture and Education).

You can find an article I wrote with a colleague about EU policies on Community Media in the following link: http://www.ecrea2008barcelona.org/guide/abstract.asp?id_callfor=1388&id_seccion=2&id_subseccio=16