European Union Media Law in Terms of European Union Audiovisual Policy

Abstract

The Treaty of Rome did not grant the Community any specific powers in the field of audiovisual policy. At the start of the 1980s, the development of new broadcasting and distribution techniques and the realization that the European Community was falling further and further behind the United States in the making of television programmes prompted the Community institutions to take new initiatives with technological, economic and cultural aspects. In 1984, the European Commission presented a Green Paper on the establishment of a common market in broadcasting. In the same year the Council adopted resolutions concerning the development of a European programme-making industry, measures to combat audiovisual piracy and the harmonisation of the rules on the distribution of films by the various media. It was in 1986, with the proposal for a Television without Frontiers directive that the first real reference was made to a "Community audiovisual policy". The Television without Frontiers Directive is the cornerstone of the European Community's audiovisual policy. This Directive was adopted in 1989 and revised in 1997. In this paper the historical development of the Law of EU Media and audiovisual policy is analysed by theoretical study.