POLITICAL INFLUENCES ON THE
DEVELOPMENT OF TELEVISION

 This chapter will identify how television has been influenced by the political situation in Brazil, and will concentrate its attention on the Médici (1969-1974) and Geisel (1974-1979) administrations.

The broadcast media in Brazil have been influenced and used by such political leaders as President Getúlio Vargas (1930-1945; 1951-1954), and by the presidents following the revolutionary movement of 1964, such as President Emílio Médici. (1) Getúlio Vargas, who, by means of a coup d'état in 1937, established a dictatorial regime, used radio to facilitate his political career.(2) At that time the social and political situation was controlled with strong censorship. Since 1964, however, both radio and television have been used by the military regime as a tool for its political, economic, and social purposes, in accordance with the National Security Council's objectives (discussed in chapter 2).

Brazilian Political Characteristics

This section summarizes the principal characteristics of the political system in Brazil after the Second World War. (3) Thus, in order to facilitate a better understanding of the political situation, I divided it into two periods, the 1946-1964 period, and the 1964-1979 period. According to the military regime's spokesmen, everything that has been done in this second period has, among other things', been aimed at the restoration of democracy and the salvation of Brazil from "communism, corruption and chaos." (4)

According to the classification developed by José Odelso Schneider, the first period was a liberal one characterized by: (1) liberal democracy with a presidential regime; (2) multiple political parties; (3) political instability and administrative corruption; (4) industrial expansion; (5) occupation of the national territory starting with the construction of Brasilia; and elaboration of the first plans of economic regional development (which were not realized because of the lack of administrative continuity).

The second period, from 1964 to 1979, was a period characterized by: (1) technocratic-military government; (2) concentration of power in the executive branch; (3) emphasis on an ambitious national plan of economic development; (4) reduction of the number of political parties to only two; (5) the National Security Council as the moderator. 5 The second period of Brazilian politics can be further divided into three phases: (1) the 1964-1967 period, in which emphasis was given to the economic-capitalist and institutional reorganization; (2) the 1968-1973 period, which was characterized by fast growth and by efforts to promote national integration; and (3) the 1974-1977 period which was considered a transition phase in the economic readaptation related to the world-wide energy crisis, as well as in relation to the new stage of industrial development.(6) According to Brazil: 14 anos de revolução, this last stage could be prolonged. (7)

The Proliferation of TV Stations

 Brazilian TV has undergone several transformations since its beginning, in which technological, economic, social, and political changes have contributed directly or indirectly to its growth.

According to José Marques de Melo, the initial growth of Brazilian television may be attributed to political favoritism, which called for the concession of television channels without any preconceived plan.(8) In this sense, the proliferation of Brazilian TV stations has paralleled television growth in numerous other countries.

The proliferation of television stations began before the military regime’s takeover, during the administration of President Juscelino Kubitschek. After the establishment of the Ministry of Communications in 1967, television channel licensing began to take into account not only national necessities but also the National Security Council's objectives of national development and integration. Table 5 shows the concessions of television channels in Brazil between 1955 and 1979.

During Kubitschek’s term in office, Brazil underwent a period of optimistic development. Television represented progress so businessmen made investments without any serious consideration of the social, economic, or political implications of the new medium.

During the first four years of the sixties, the Brazilian political and economic situation was unstable. Inflation was uncontrolled, strikes were commonplace, and an internal tension was increasing. It was during that time that the government elaborated the first code of telecommunications (see Chapter 3).

TABLE 5

Number of TV Stations Licenses,by Period and President
Period  and President(s)	Number of Licenses
1955-1960 Café Filho:1954-1956 J. Kubitschek:1956-1961	8
1960-1964 J. Kubitschek:1956-1961 Jânio Quadros:1961 João Goulart :1961-1964	14
1964-1969 H.A. Castelo Branco:1964-1967 A.da Costa e Silva:1967-1969	23
1969-l974 Emilio G. Medici: 1969-1974	20
1974-1979 Ernesto Geisel: 1974-1979	47
Total	112
Source: SSR/Secretary of Broadcast Services of the Ministry of Communications.

In 1964, when the military revolution replaced President João Goulart, there was a radical change in the political situation. This change affected television stations directly because both the political system and the socioeconomic situation of the country were totally modified. As a result, the revenue from advertising was decreased, and stations needed to find other ways of solving financial problems. The military regime established a new political system in which mass media communications were accepted as agent of modernization and as a tool for the maintenance of national integration, national security, and social peace.

During the first six years of the new political system, Brazilian telecommunications services underwent a technical transformation. The government created new conditions for the expansion of broadcast services and established the regulatory agencies which were concerned with the technical and economic situation of the broadcast enterprises The new technocratic-military system got involved with television, principally in reference to issues such as ownership, control, and financial support. However, the government did not express concern about the influence and content of television programs until 1970.

Television Content and Official Influence

As discussed in Chapter 3, broadcast enterprises are under government control, which encompasses, besides concession of licenses and allocation of frequencies, a series of political considerations such as censorship and direct governmental recommendations on program content. Before President Médici took office, the government had worried only about technological aspects of television, but from Médici's government on, the state began to concern itself directly with the content of the mass media. (9) In January 1970, President Médici signed a decree, which banned all publications, and broadcast features found "offensive to morals or good customs," (10) and in September 1970, he sent a message to the participants in the VI Brazilian Broadcast Congress, which took place in Poços de Caldas, Minas Gerais. In his message, President Médici said that he believed in the evolution of Brazilian television because he felt "television to be indispensable" to the acceleration of services for social well being. He further stated that businessmen need to look for a noble objective for Brazilian commercial television because the "government cannot wait inactively and silently, while competition increases the size of audience, resulting in a loss for the populace which is deprived of educational TV programs" (11).

His words reverberated among businessmen involved in Brazilian television. From that date, the government began to concern itself officially with the quality level of programs in order to counteract the effects of programs which offered more and more suspense, action. Strong emotions, and violence, all of which contributed to growth in audience size and in profits for the television stations. According to research undertaken from March 18 to March 24, 1969, by the Jornal do Brasil, violence was among the appeals most utilized by television in Rio de Janeiro. Table 6 lists some of the themes of television programs in Rio de Janeiro.

TABLE 6

Program Themes March 18-24,1969	% of Total Number of Programs
Traditional values of childhood and family	47.73
Violence	43.77
Ostentation and upward social mobility	30.12
Fantasy	26.20
Eroticism	03.90
Youth movement	08.60
Humor	33.31
Politics	14.58
Culture and Technology	17.17
Grotesque topics	05.25
Source: Muniz Sodré, 1971, p. 68

At the end of 1971, the "lower quality of taste" of the programs broadcast by the commercial stations led to the naming of an interministerial commission to study television content (see the list of typical weekly programs in 1971 in Table 7). The members of that commission were representatives of different ministries: the Ministry of Communications, the Ministry of Education, the Ministry of Justice, and the Ministry of Labor. The conclusions of the commission were never divulged. According to Hygino Corsetti, who served as minister of communications during Médici's administration, the conclusions were presented to and discussed with the concessionaires. The Ministry of Communications recognized that television was a factor in development and an instrument of social and economic integration. Corsetti explained the interference of his Ministry in the content of television by saying that Brazilian television was not following the government' 5 efforts in the electronic sector to build a great Brazil, economically strong and "'culturally modern":

First of all, I want to say that my interference has President Médici's knowledge and recommendations. I confess that the quality of what is being presented by Brazilian TV is already as much of a concern to me as the extension of networks and the technical improvement on the quality of the images. (12)

The Médici administration was particularly important to the development of Brazilian television because it established the National Program for Educational Television (Prontel), it expanded the infrastructure of telecommunication services, it introduced color television, and it facilitated the emergence of new sources of television advertising revenues by means of the "Economic Miracle". (Economic influences on the development of television are further discussed in the next chapter). And it was in the name of the National Security Council and in order to maintain social peace and national development that during Médici’s term in office the mass media (principally radio and television) were subjected more and more to censorship.

TABLE 7

Television Content, 1971
Broadcast Content	Total Hours/Week
Film	1.080,5
Advertising	557.9
Soap Opera	416.7
Game Shows	307.6
Sports	262.5
News	241.2
Education	218.2
Humor	152.0
Popular Music	114.6
Arts,literature,and science	59.2
Religion	19.2
Theater and Poetry	15.3
Source: Anuário Estatístico do Brasil, 1972:869

From Médici's administration through Ernesto Geisel's, many ministers, teachers, and critics made speeches about the educational and cultural implications of television, about its program content, and about its negative effects. As a result, Brazilian television improved its techniques and "cultural standards" and nationalized its programming (see Chapter 1). In this manner, the ministers began to address policy issues more intensively. One preoccupation of the government was expressed in the message by Euclides Quandt de Oliveira (minister of communications during Geisel's administration) to the Sixth Brazilian Tele-Education Meeting, which took place in Belo Horizonte in October 1974. According to Quandt de Oliveira, 

Brazilian commercial TV is based on a philosophy of private enterprise but, because of its strength of penetration and persuasion, it cannot be treated as other mass media, i.e., the press. Because of its specific nature it must be entrusted with a great deal of responsibility in respect to culture, education, and national efforts for development. This can only become true if the right message reaches the right audience. Commercial experience and research data might provide useful cues for such an enterprise. (13)

The Geisel administration, through its minister of communications, Quandt de Oliveira, addressed many recommendations to broadcast enterprises. These recommendations exerted a strong influence on television networks, which were continually reminded of their responsibilities to national development and national culture. On November 19,1974,during a lecture at the Anhembi Faculty of Social Communication, Quandt de Oliveira talked about the canned material broadcast by Brazilian television:

57% of a TV program is imported and Brazilian technicians produce 43%. From this 43%, 34% is foreign material, edited by Brazilian stations. That means, for 109 hours of a one week program, only 31 are genuinely Brazilian: the other 78 are imported. ... Commercial TV imposes upon children and youth a kind of culture that has nothing to do with Brazilian culture... Instead of acting as a factor of creation and diffusion of Brazilian culture, TV is playing the role of a privileged medium of cultural import, and is denaturing Brazilian creativity. (14)

Quandt de Oliveira made another speech October 1974, to the Fourth Southern States of Brazil Congress on Broadcasting:

The ministry ... expects that radio and television stations will fulfill their contractual and legal obligations, their code of ethics, so as to reach increased cooperation for the achievement of goals compatible with the efforts of a country to take off from underdevelopment to its deserved position in the world picture (15).

In 1977, Minister Quandt de Oliveira addressed another speech to broadcast managers, during the Fourth Centerwestern Congress of Broadcast (Belo Horizonte, May 18). In that speech the minister of communications criticized the excessive violence on Brazilian television and argued that violence is a problem that must be resolved by the concessionaires themselves. As support for his criticism, Quandt de Oliveira said that a group from his ministry had monitored violence on afternoon programs during a month, or 200 hours, on two television stations in Brasilia. The minister announced that the National Communications Council had been reorganized and that it would "dedicate a large part of its attention to the content transmitted by Brazilian radio and television, in order to establish norms and orientations related to the topic of violence. It does not intend to intervene in the freedom of choice of the programs by the men of television, but all these problems will be discussed by the Council itself." (16)

The growth of Brazilian television occurred during a time (1968-1979) when it had to operate under restrictions established by Institutional Act no.5 of December 13, 1968, when the president could make secret laws, and when Brazilian institutions were controlled by strong censorship. Between December 1968 and June 1978 (Press censorship in Brazil was officially ended on June 8, 1978), Brazilian mass media were controlled by strong censorship, which was exerted in accordance with the censor’s criteria. During that time, "it was difficult to broadcast about almost anything of importance."(17) This being the case, one can infer that Quandt de Oliveira recommendations exerted a strong influence on television content. As a result of the recommendations, admonitions, and criticism, television nationalized its programs, which today are typically Brazilian in treatment, theme, and style.

However, although the Médici and Geisel administrations made a solid contribution to the improvement of the "cultural standard" and technical quality of television programs, they were responsible for strong censorship, which mutilated and limited Brazilian television. According to Gerald Thomas, "in 1974, for instance, no less than 103 items were banned from TV and radio. The bans ranged from political issues to a beauty contest. In 1978, only seven items were banned, and this might appear a reassuring figure compared to 1974. But statistics are misleading, and recent prohibitions cover a much wider ground." (18) Further,

In São Paulo 36 newsmen from Radio Tupi were dismissed for refusing to alter a program to be shown jointly on TV and radio. Only 15 minutes before it was due to go on the air, the censor's phone call "advised" them to cut a whole speech from the program by the Archbishop of São Paulo, Cardinal Arns, one of the most outspoken personalities in Brazil's recent history. The producers demanded a written order. The impracticability of the demand was clear: the phone call came from Brasília and the station is in São Paulo, so the program was shown as scheduled. After two weeks of pressure from the government and Tupi's managers, the newsmen were dismissed. (19)

PREFACE / INTRODUCTION / 1. A BRIEF HISTORY OF BRAZILIAN TELEVISION / 2. THE IMPACT OF THE MILITARY REGIME ON TELEVISION / 3. THE INFLUENCE OF COMMUNICATION LAWS AND REGULATORY AGENCIES ON THE GROWTH OF TELEVISION / 4. POLITICAL INFLUENCES ON THE DEVELOPMENT OF TELEVISION / 5. SOCIOECONOMIC INFLUENCES ON THE DEVELOPMENT OF TELEVISION / 6.SUMMARY AND CONCLUSIONS / 7. NOTES / 8. BIBLIOGRAPHY / 9. ABOUT THE AUTHOR