A Curious Case of American Exceptionalism: Ideology, Policy and Practice in American, Australian and Canadian Community Radio

Abstract

Community radio in the United States has been struggling from crisis to crisis throughout most of the last decade. Yet, the community radio sectors in many other countries have not experienced anything like the difficulties faced in the U.S. In some countries the opposite is true. There are three main causes of the problems community radio faces in the U.S.: a hostile broadcasting environment defined by an extreme form of deregulation and the absolute dominance of commercial media over broadcasting law and policy, the lack of a clear and effective policy to define and govern community radio and the lack of effective community outreach and mobilization of existing community support. When compared with community radio in Australia and Canada , solutions to the difficulties faced in the U.S. become easier to envision and the lessons of the American experience can be made useful for those participating in community radio in other countries.