CULTURAL TELEVISION - WESTERN-EUROPE AND THE UNITED-STATES

Uncertainties within the French audiovisual sphere about the viability of ARTE, the Franco-German cultural television channel, crystallize the crisis in the legitimacy of cultural television within the European public service. Promoted by successive Mitterrand governments as compensation for deregulation and privatization, and as a tool for building Europe, ARTE is drawing very small audiences in France, and reviving accusations against French official culture of metropolitan elitism. Based in Strasbourg, the bilingual channel is also marred by struggles between two national groups of professionals about conceptions of culture and its relation to the state. Meanwhile, in the United States, PBS is enjoying something of a revival within the cluttered American television landscape. This article examines the different heritages of a common Frankfurt School debate about the fate of culture within the mass media.