Maybe it’s just that I’m looking in the wrong places. In the UK for example I know I can get a generally robust overview of issues from the BBC, the Economist, or the Times or Guardian. Radio Four and Channel 4 supply decent news coverage, and I can supplement that with more specialist reporting anywhere from the inside pages of the FT to various regular programmes like the Politics Show. Even the think tanks are quite good once you know the particular angle they approach from.
So I decided to test my null hypothesis (that there are relatively fewer such sources in Australia) against the alternative hypothesis (that there are, and that I haven’t found them). The table below gives provides some both direct indicators and indirect proxies to test this theory. (By the way I know these measures are somewhat imperfect, but it’s just a bit of fun).
Judging by the results, the null hypothesis holds. In fact, it’s actually quite stark with the UK ahead on most of these measures vis-à-vis the other countries. Big standouts are the European’s lavish publicly-funded broadcasters, the depth of think tanks in the UK and US, and the Anglo speaking tendency for online blogs and journals. The UK’s strong across the piece, the French surprisingly weak. (A few measures are probably unfair on the French – for example they have a famous aversion to the internet – though if I had to be unfair to anyone, I’m glad it was the French). The clear and overwhelming strength for Australia is the number of blogs at almost 1 in 6 people. Evidently this is where I should go to source some more incisive analysis of what’s going on.
I’m sure there are probably some other indicators I might have missed – any ideas?
I’m sure there are probably some other indicators I might have missed – any ideas?
3 comments:
The French have it tough on a couple of the measures because of the language barrier, which limits the opportunities for trade (both exporting information and taking advantage of cheap information imports). Might also explain why there aren't as many books in their libraries and why they've been slower to adopt the internet.
Now I come to think of it, there's a pretty big language barrier between the Aussies and the rest of the world.
I will have to be a disgruntled Australian and beg to differ with you. I think the AFR, the ABC, the SBS are all of decent quality and I also think the Australian is worth a read. That's not bad for a country 1/3 the size of the UK.
Your measures are probably as good as you can get, but they obviously leave out quality (e.g. there are many newspapers in the UK, but most are more use as toilet paper). Assume they were true tho, what does the UK get for its extra literacy/quality journals? What outcome could you say that added public and private expenditure gave you?
Perhaps there's a sort of scale effect going on here. In the same way that the food's great in France because there's a sufficient mass of savvy French taste buds, the UK could be benefitting from its size, concentration of politics and culture of rigour and scrutiny. But despite a few notable exceptions in Australia, it's all too marginalised to take hold.
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