Necessary Knowledge for Communications Policy: Information Inequalities and Commercial Data Access and Usage in the Policymaking Process

This project was conducted with the support of a grant from the Social Science Research Council, as part of its Necessary Knowledge for a Democratic Public Sphere Program, which is supported by the Ford Foundation's Electronic Media Policy Portfolio. I. INTRODUCTION II. RESEARCH AND POLICYMAKING III. EXTERNAL STAKEHOLDERS AND POLICY RESEARCH IV. INFORMATION ASYMMETRIES AND POLICY RESEARCH V. PRIVATIZATION OF DATA VI. CASE STUDY: MEDIA OWNERSHIP VII. THE NEED FOR IMPROVED ACCESS TO COMMERCIAL DATA SOURCES FOR POLICY RESEARCHERS VIII. RECOMMENDATIONS IX. CONCLUSION I. INTRODUCTION The communications policymaking process is becoming increasingly research-driven. (1) As has been seen across all policy sectors, policymakers rely heavily upon both internally- and externally-generated empirical studies in the formulation of, and justification for, specific policy decisions. (2) This has proven to be a controversial trend, both within and beyond communications policymaking, as debates have arisen about the appropriate role, usage, and capabilities of empirical research in policymaking. (3) Regardless of these disputes, it is safe to say that both the demand for--and utilization of--research have become more pronounced in communications policymaking. Consequently, stakeholders seeking to have an impact on policy outcomes find themselves increasingly reliant upon research to effectively support their policy arguments. (4) One aspect of this trend that has been neglected, however, involves the growing importance of data generated by large-scale commercial data providers to policymaking and policy analysis. That is, market, audience, and content data gathered and aggregated by commercial organizations such as Nielsen Media Research, (5) BIA Financial Network, (6) Arbitron, (7) and Kagan Research (8) play an increasingly prominent role in the research submitted to--and conducted by--the FCC. These data providers often are the sole source of specific information that is central to developing portraits of media markets, audience behavior, or content availability, (9) and are at the core of policy decision making, analysis, and advocacy. However, these data sources also are often enormously expensive and are thus difficult to access. And, in some instances, the access terms can be very prohibitive--in ways that can undermine the effective dissemination of the research. This Article considers the implications of the prominence of commercial data in the communications policymaking process. Specifically, this Article considers the kinds of imbalances in policy advocacy and policy decision making that may be created by unequal access to these important data sources by the various stakeholders involved in the policymaking process. Drawing upon theoretical and empirical work related to information asymmetries and knowledge utilization, this Article argues that the contemporary communications policymaking environment is one in which the disparity in resources across various stakeholder groups is amplified by the associated imbalances in access to the commercial data sources that are increasingly central to policy decision making and to persuasive policy advocacy. This Article therefore proposes a number of solutions to correct this imbalance and thereby reduce the information asymmetries that characterize contemporary communications policy analysis and policy advocacy. The first Part of this Article provides background on the policymaking process and the role of research in this process, drawing upon the growing body of literature that focuses on knowledge utilization in policymaking. This Part documents the increasingly empirical orientation that has characterized policymaking as a whole and communications policymaking in particular. This Part also documents the importance of external policy analysts (i.e., scholars, advocates, industry associations, think tanks) and their research to policy decision making. …