One of the tasks entrusted to the Dutch Media Authority is to watch over the separation between the editorial and the commercial aspects of television and radio. It does this through the Media Law, which lays down rules for public and commercial broadcasters to follow, enforcing them at the national, regional, and local levels. The Media Authority is, additionally, also in charge of granting broadcasting licences for radio and television, and auditing the annual accounts of public broadcasting organisations.
Since 2002, the Media Authority has been publishing the Media Monitor, an annual report analysing ownership relations in the media market, with a specific focus on pluralism in news media. Since 2018, the Media Monitor has been primarily based on the Reuters Institute Digital News Report. Since 2005, separate studies have been carried out each year focusing specifically on the news market in the Netherlands. The most recent of these studies pertain to the representation of men and women on television, as well as filter bubbles. Since 2017, there is also a yearly study which looks at diversity on television as well as the satisfaction and viewing behaviour of the audience.
The Dutch Journalism Fund is heavily involved in research that monitors the Dutch news media market with a specific focus on the local and regional news supply. In the recent past, examples are 1) a 2014 study which mapped news use and news supply before and during the municipal elections (Landman et al., 2015); 2) a large-scale scenario study published in 2015 about the future of journalism (Kasem et al., 2015); and 3) a 2018 study of the news ecosystems in the four largest Dutch cities (Utrecht, Amsterdam, The Hague, and Rotterdam). Moreover, under the heading “State of the News media”, the Dutch Journalism Fund provides constant updates about the Dutch news media.[i]
