The
timing of direct access slots is clearly of paramount importance. A broadcast
when everyone is asleep or at work will be of little use to anyone. As with
commercial advertising, everyone will aim for "prime time".
All
this is obvious, yet it is surprising how often it is overlooked. In the 2000
Zimbabwe referendum campaign, the Yes vote campaign (supported by the
government) almost invariably received slots at around the time of the main
evening news. The No campaign had to go to court to get its own broadcasts
aired - yet the ruling did not specify when these were to be aired, so they
received less advantageous times.[i]
The
issue may not only be when a slot is broadcast, but also what is on the other
channels. In the 2000 presidential elections, Serbian television tried to
reduce audiences for broadcasts by opposition candidate Vojislav Kostunica by
scheduling them simultaneously with a popular soap opera.
Yet
the issue can be exaggerated. In Chile's 1988 plebiscite, broadcasts were
deliberately put out at obscure off-peak times in order to dampen down
political enthusiasm. But a population denied any active political debate for
15 years was not to be deterred and watched them eagerly.[ii]
The
key point is equality of access to the best slots, whenever these may be. A
popular way of achieving total equality is by drawing lots - an approach that
is most common when there is also equality in the amount of time allocated.
A
mechanism that found favour in the past was the simultaneous broadcast of party
election broadcasts on all channels. This approach has something to recommend
it, but has been generally abandoned in favour of a philosophy where viewer choice
is sovereign. In practice, the proliferation of television channels in many
countries made it unenforceable.
A
second issue is the length of broadcasts. There are two competing trends here.
Traditionally, the purpose of law and regulations has been to ensure that slots
are long enough for parties to get their message across.
But in
the age of slick advertising and sound bites, it is increasingly felt that the
10-minute election broadcast is a thing of the past. Previously in the United
Kingdom, the main parties were allocated five 10-minute slots - but only
actually broadcast for five minutes of each of them. If the rules permitted
they would no doubt take 10 five-minute slots, but they do not. So the parties
preferred to forego half their time allocation in order not to repel the voters
by going on at too great length. More recently, timeslots have been shortened
to under five minutes.[1]
In the
United States, there are moves to ensure a minimum length for political
advertisements in order to compel politicians to make appeals to the voters'
reason rather than their emotions.
For
the regulator, there are two alternative approaches. One is to specify
precisely the time slot available - say a five-minute broadcast - and then it
is up to the party to fill it. If they choose not to, then they lose the time
not used. The second is to give an overall allocation of time that the party
can then use as it chooses. The problem with the second approach is that it
makes planning on the part of a broadcaster almost impossible.
A
third approach might represent a compromise between the two. Parties could be
given a total allocation of broadcast time in accordance with an agreed system.
That time allocation could then be broken into different length time slots,
allowing parties a mixture of lengthy and reasoned argument on the one hand and
snappy advertising messages on the other.
[1] http://www.broadcastersliaisongroup.org.uk/guidelines.html
[i] “A question of
balance: The Zimbabwean media and the constitutional referendum” (Media
Monitoring Project Zimbabwe report, Harare, March 2000)
[ii] “Guidelines
for Election Broadcasting in Transitional Democracies”, (London: ARTICLE 19,
1994),16
