Abstract
This chapter offers a reconsideration of the historic significance of the 1980 MacBride Report—UNESCO’s International Commission for the Study of Communication Problems: Many Voices, One World. The Report is argued to have embraced a spirit of hopefulness about possibilities for a better world, and the chapter highlights the importance of public institutions as means to ensure justice and the value of global communication as a means to generate knowledge, understanding, and mutual respect.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Similar content being viewed by others
Notes
- 1.
United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization.
- 2.
An earlier version of this statement was published by each of the authors of this chapter in Quaderns del CAC, Vol. 21, 2005, the journal of the Catalonian Broadcasting Council. For a contemporary review, see Nordenstreng and Somavia (2021). The authors thank Kaarle Nordenstreng for his earlier comments on this chapter.
- 3.
In 1968, UNESCO’s General Assembly called for a work program “to promote and undertake studies and research on the role, and present state and effects of the media of mass communication in modern society” (quoted in Nordenstreng, 1994, p. 3). This led to a series of meetings of experts on mass communication which would involve Luis Beltrán, S. O. Biobaku, Nabil Dajani, James D. Halloran, Tomo Martelanc, Elisabeth Noelle-Neumann, Kaarle Nordenstreng, Walery Pisarek, and Dallas Smythe, among others active in IAMCR.
- 4.
MacBride Report Background papers are available at https://unesdoc.unesco.org/ark:/48223/pf0000375643?3=null&queryId=N-EXPLORE-f9c4e4b0-542c-4626-9fb2-ddbabd3aa7d0. Accessed June 15, 2022. An account of deliberations of the Commission is provided by Harley (1992).
References
Calabrese, A. (1997). Creative destruction? From the welfare state to the global information society. Javnost—The Public, 4(4), 7–24.
Calabrese, A. (1999). Communication and the end of sovereignty? Info: The Journal of Policy, Regulation, and Strategy for Telecommunications, Information, and Media, 1(4), 313–326.
Calabrese, A. (2004). The promise of civil society: A global movement for communication rights. Continuum: Journal of Media and Cultural Studies, 18(3), 317–329.
Calabrese, A. (2008). UNESCO. In W. Donsbach (Ed.), International encyclopedia of communication (p. np). Blackwell Reference Online, Blackwell Publishing.
Calabrese, A., & Barnes, C. (in press). UNESCO. Oxford Bibliographies Online.
Calabrese, A., & Redal, W. (1995). Is there a US foreign policy in telecommunications? Transatlantic trade policy as a case study. Telematics & Informatics, 12(1), 35–56.
Halloran, J. D. (1978). The context of mass communication research. MacBride Commission Working Paper No. 78. UNESCO.
Hamelink, C. (1978). The new international economic order and the new international information order. MacBride Commission Working Paper No. 34. UNESCO.
Hamelink, C. (Ed.). (1980). Communication in the eighties: A reader on the “MacBride Report”. IDOC International. Reprinted in Whitney, C., Wartella, E., & Windahl, S. (Eds.). (1982). Mass Communication Review Yearbook, 3, p. 241–249. Sage.
Harley, W. G. (1992). Creative compromise: The MacBride Commission—A firsthand report and reflection on the workings of UNESCO’s International Commission for the Study of Communication Problems. University Press of America.
MacBride, S. (1979). Shaping a new world information order (Address to the “Forum 1979”). International Telecommunication Union, World Administrative Radio Conference.
MacBride, S., & Commissioners. (1980). Communication and society today and tomorrow: Many voices, one world: Towards a new, more just, and more efficient world information and communication order. Kogan Page, Unipub, UNESCO. (Reprinted by Kogan Page, 1981 and Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, 2004).
Mansell, R., & Nordenstreng, K. (2006). Great media and communications debates: WSIS and the MacBride report. Information Technologies and International Development, 3(4), 15–36.
Mayer, C. E. (1983, February 6). FCC chief’s fears: Fowler sees threat in regulation. Washington Post, p. K1.
Nordenstreng, K. (1994). The UNESCO expert panel with the benefit of hindsight. In C. Hamelink & O. Linné (Eds.), Mass communication research: On problems and policies—The art of asking the right questions—In honor of James D. Halloran (p. 3–19). Ablex Publishing.
Nordenstreng, K., & Somavia, J. (2021). Revisiting 45 years of history in communication policies. Media Development, 67(2), 5–10.
Roach, C. (1997). The Western world and the NWICO. In P. Golding & P. Harris (Eds.), Beyond cultural imperialism: Globalization, communication & the new international order (p. 94–116). Sage.
Schultz, G. (1984). Letter from US Secretary of State George Schultz to UNESCO Director-General Amadou-Mahtar M’Bow, announcing the decision of the US government to withdraw its membership from UNESCO (1983, December 28). Journal of Communication, 34(4), 82, 84.
WSIS. (2003a, December 8). Shaping information Societies for human needs. Civil society declaration to the World Summit on the Information Society (Plenary). World Summit on the Information Society. Retrieved 15 June 2022, from https://www.itu.int/net/wsis/docs/geneva/civil-society-declaration.pdf
WSIS. (2003b, December 12). Declaration of principles—Building the information society: A global challenge in the new millennium (Report). World Summit on the Information Society. Retrieved 15 June 2022, from http://www.itu.int/dms_pub/itu-s/md/03/wsis/doc/S03-WSIS-DOC-0004!!PDF-E.pdf
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2023 The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Calabrese, A., Mansell, R. (2023). The MacBride Report: Critical Scholarship and the Report’s Value to Future Generations. In: Becker, J., Mansell, R. (eds) Reflections on the International Association for Media and Communication Research. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-16383-8_14
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-16383-8_14
Published:
Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, Cham
Print ISBN: 978-3-031-16382-1
Online ISBN: 978-3-031-16383-8
eBook Packages: Literature, Cultural and Media StudiesLiterature, Cultural and Media Studies (R0)