Action for Children's Television and the Federal Communications Commission: A comprehensive assessment from 1968-1992.

摘要

The purpose of this study was to study the regulatory interaction between the interest group Action for Children's Television (ACT) and a federal agency, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), from 1968 to 1992. This specific time frame encompasses the entire life span of ACT. A generic interest group framework was developed and compared with ACT to try to determine if ACT was similar to most interest groups trying to influence policy making at the federal level. This framework was also used to try to determine if ACT's similarities or differences from the framework could have made it easier or more difficult for ACT to gain access to the regulatory arena. The FCC policy making procedures were then examined and compared with the more general Administrative Procedures Act (APA) guidelines to try to determine if any FCC variation from APA standards could have allowed ACT to influence decision making at the federal agency level. It was determined that neither ACT's unique characteristics nor any FCC deviation from the APA policy making guidelines allowed ACT to influence the regulatory policy making concerning children's television programming. External societal factors were found to have played the greatest role in allowing ACT access to FCC decision making. It was also determined that many of the same external societal factors a place today, which leads this researcher to believe that ACT's successor, the Center for Media Education (CME) has an opportunity to influence decisions currently being made by the FCC concerning children's television.