Power Without Responsibility (subtitled: The Press and Broadcasting in Britain or Press, Broadcasting and the Internet in Britain) is a book written by James Curran (Professor of Communications at Goldsmiths College

Goldsmiths College

Goldsmiths, University of London is a public research university located in London, United Kingdom which specialises in the arts, humanities and social sciences, and a constituent college of the federal University of London. It was founded in 1891 as Goldsmiths' Technical and Recreative Institute...

) and Jean Seaton

Jean Seaton

Jean Seaton is Professor of media history at the University of Westminster.She is the official historian of the BBC, who is continuing Asa Briggs multi-volume account of the Corporation's history with the next volume The BBC Under Siege in preparation. Her other books include Power Without...

 (Professor of Media History at the University of Westminster

University of Westminster

The University of Westminster is a public research university located in London, United Kingdom. Its origins go back to the foundation of the Royal Polytechnic Institution in 1838, and it was awarded university status in 1992.The university's headquarters and original campus are based on Regent...

). Originally published in 1981 by Fontana

Fontana

-Places:*Fontana, Chaco, a settlement in San Fernando Department in Chaco Province, Argentina*Fontana, Cape Verde, a settlement in the island of Sal, Cape Verde*Fontana, Gozo, on Gozo Island, Republic of Malta*Fontana , a neighborhood of Belgrade, Serbia...

, it has been translated into several languages and is now in its seventh edition. The title comes from a quote by former British Prime Minister Stanley Baldwin

Stanley Baldwin

Stanley Baldwin, 1st Earl Baldwin of Bewdley, KG, PC was a British Conservative politician, who dominated the government in his country between the two world wars...

. It details the history of the news media in the UK

United Kingdom

The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...

 from the eighteen century to the present. It has been cited by Noam Chomsky

Noam Chomsky

Avram Noam Chomsky is an American linguist, philosopher, cognitive scientist, and activist. He is an Institute Professor and Professor in the Department of Linguistics & Philosophy at MIT, where he has worked for over 50 years. Chomsky has been described as the "father of modern linguistics" and...

 in the introduction to Manufacturing Consent

Manufacturing Consent

Manufacturing Consent: The Political Economy of the Mass Media , by Edward S. Herman and Noam Chomsky, is an analysis of the news media as business...

and by him in a televised BBC

BBC

The British Broadcasting Corporation is a British public service broadcaster. Its headquarters is at Broadcasting House in the City of Westminster, London. It is the largest broadcaster in the world, with about 23,000 staff...

 interview with Andrew Marr

Andrew Marr

Andrew William Stevenson Marr is a Scottish journalist and political commentator. He edited The Independent for two years until May 1998, and was political editor of BBC News from 2000 until 2005....

. Nick Cohen

Nick Cohen

Nick Cohen is a British journalist, author and political commentator. He is currently a columnist for The Observer, a blogger for The Spectator and TV critic for Standpoint magazine. He formerly wrote for the London Evening Standard and the New Statesman...

 rated it "the best guide to the British media" in a review for the New Statesman

New Statesman

New Statesman is a British centre-left political and cultural magazine published weekly in London. Founded in 1913, and connected with leading members of the Fabian Society, the magazine reached a circulation peak in the late 1960s....

.

Contents (Seventh Edition)

Part I - Press history

• Whig press history as political mythology
• The struggle for a free press
• The ugly face of reform
• The industrialization of the press
• The era of the press barons
• The press under public regulation
• Fable of market democracy

Part II - Broadcasting history

• Reith
  John Reith
  John Reith may refer to:*John Reith, 1st Baron Reith , Scottish broadcasting executive*John Reith...
  
   and the denial of politics
• Broadcasting and the blitz
  The Blitz
  The Blitz was the sustained strategic bombing of Britain by Nazi Germany between 7 September 1940 and 10 May 1941, during the Second World War. The city of London was bombed by the Luftwaffe for 76 consecutive nights and many towns and cities across the country followed...
  
  
• Social revolution?
• The BBC under threat
• Class, taste & profit
• How the audience is made
• The first new media
• Broadcasting roller-coaster

Part III - Rise of new media

• New media in Britain
• History of the internet
• Sociology of the internet

Part IV - Theories of the media

• Metabolising Britishness
• Global understanding
• The liberal theory of press freedom
• Broadcasting and the theory of public service

Part V - Politics of the media

• Contradictions in media policy
• Media reform: democratic choices