To be independent or not to be independent, that is the question

It may seem strange to outsiders that this question should be asked.After all, the BBC has long enjoyed an international reputation for its -especially its journalism's -independence from political influence.It was, for example, the model for German public service broadcasting, introduced by the Allied powers after World War II in the three Western occupation zones.Hugh Greene, who was responsible for the establishment of the central broadcasting corporation in Northwest Germany (and later became Director General of the BBC), resisted all attempts by politicians to take control of it.The influences likely to affect the answer are multi-faceted and complex.The outcome will eventually depend on the terms of the next Royal Charter of the BBC, due to run for 11 years from January 2017, the government's prospectus for which was published in a White Paper in May 2016 (Department for Culture, Media and Sport 2016a).This article examines associated BBC-government relations successively in historical, political and systemic (about the BBC's vulnerabilities and defenses) contexts, after which the White Paper's proposals for the future of the BBC will be successively outlined, explained and evaluated. Until recent timesHistorically, the political independence of the BBC was underpinned by strong structural and normative sources of support.Structurally, Kelly (1983) classified