Rescue our ABC from postmodernist clutches

It appears that remarkably little has changed since Martin Harrison published "Our ABC" a Dying Culture? in 2004. In that essay he quoted and endorsed the observation: "There are two cultures in the ABC: the managerial and the intellectual-artistic. They seldom meet." Even then he diagnosed the persistent malady: "Current ABC policies appear set against maintaining the specialist producers, the areas of knowledge, the technical skill and the commissioning budgets necessary for the ABC to have what was earlier termed a significantly creative editorial presence in Australian culture."

An additional difficulty is the greater attention that is habitually paid to TV on account of its immensely higher cost and an inappropriate, even debilitating, transfer of TV policies to radio (such as outsourcing of production); but it is more than that.

It is also the multiplication of outlets (the jargon is portals) through which the ABC distributes its programs. And this is a legitimate concern for management. So what is the solution? In 1988, Glyn Davis (now vice-chancellor of the University of Melbourne) argued in his book Breaking up the ABC for the complete separation of radio and TV into distinct organisations, but that solution now seems untenable if only because it implies myriad special units rather than expert and integrated departments that can provide fine material for every outlet.

However, unless a new kind of management is found - ideally one composed of experienced practitioners, people who know broadcasting and its values because they were good at it (the kind, indeed, that the ABC did have in the 1950s) - then we risk creating multiple crippled organisations from one.

The minimum requirement is that the federal Government, which is supposedly conducting an inquiry, should realise how serious the situation is and begin with radical surgery on the board, infusing new blood and transplanting fresh and vital new tissue.