This book is more than a history of litigation, however. The
author is a political scientist, and as the subtitle indicates, he is
concerned broadly with the politics of broadcast regulation. He
examines in some detail the "political environment" of the
FCC--the selection process by which commissioners are chosen
and their characteristics and the relationships among the FCC
and the White House, Congress, the industry, and citizen
groups.

Labunski is also a working broadcast journalist with ten years
of news experience in radio and television. He brings to this
study not only an academic background, but firsthand know-
ledge of the technical and commercial needs of the broadcast
media.

A major political concern has been to assure against abuse of
the quasi-monopoly powers that the media enjoy by reason of
public grant. This concern has been implemented by the FCC
"fairness doctrine" and guarantee of the right to respond to
personal attacks, plus the congressional statute providing for
equal time for political candidates. The fairness doctrine, upheld
by the Supreme Court in the Red Lion case, is generally approved
by the author, but he criticizes its abuse by the FCC in the NBC
pensions program incident.

There is a certain irony in the fact that government regulation
of broadcasting was justified initially because of the limited
number of broadcast channels, whereas anyone could start a
newspaper. Yet today in the United States, there are some
10,000 radio and television stations and only 2,000 daily news-
papers. Technical developments may soon permit a great num-
ber of additional channels, and this fact plus the current interest
in industrial deregulation may modify the current regulatory
situation. But the author concludes that for the near future, at
least, a constitutional distinction will continue to be drawn
between the print and the electronic media.

C. HERMAN PRITCHETT

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