Economic crisis and changes in regional televisions in Spain within the european context

Abstract

The economic crisis affecting Europe and particularly Spain, with no sign of short-term recovery, is overlapped with the significant legal change that has intervened in the Spanish audiovisual market with the Audiovisual Communication General Act enacted in 2010. This new legal framework confers a large degree of autonomy to the Spanish regional autonomous institutions on deciding the ways and means of the management of the broadcasting and media companies that directly depend on them. This paper analyses the constitutional basis of regional television in Spain, its necessity and its economic sense in times of crisis, while reflecting on the consistency of policy changes that are occurring in accordance with the new regulation. In order to properly develop this contents it is key to understand, too, what kind of government is accepted by European Union law and also to analyse whether the development that can be observed in Spain is in accordance with the principles that governs liberalized markets of general economic interest, as it is currently considered to be the television industry.