The creation of the television channel Sianel Pedwar Cymu (S4C) has an iconic status in Welsh folklore. After winning the 1979 general election, the new Conservative government went back on its commitment to create a Welsh-language television channel. This led Gwynfor Evans, then president of Plaid Cymru, to threaten a hunger strike unless the government relented. His threat, and the belief that he was willing to die over the issue, was instrumental in forcing a rethink. S4C began broadcasting in 1982 and Evans’ intervention came to be seen as a rare Welsh victory against Thatcherism and compensation for the failure of the 1979 referendum to create a Welsh Assembly.
Price's book is not an account of that story but rather an analysis of what happened next. In a monograph that was first published in Welsh, Price reviews the first four years of the channel's life, a period that was officially a trial, with S4C's fate to be decided by the government at its end. As things turned out, the review was something of a formality and the government proved both positive and generous in the support it offered the channel. This is a reminder of the importance of not following the common caricature of Thatcher's governments as anti-Welsh in everything they did.
Price uses organizational archives and oral history to explore the significant challenges involved in setting up the new television channel. Money was inevitably an issue but so too was the relatively small number of Welsh-speaking actors and production staff. Equity, the actors’ union, was opposed to the use of amateur non-union staff and there were concerns about the quality of acting broadcast and the same faces being seen in multiple productions.
Although the channel was perceived to be crucial to the future of Welsh, it needed to find an identity that transcended the question of language. Trying to appeal to all different segments of the Welsh-speaking community was never going to be easy. There were tensions over what kind of programs should be made and what kind of Welsh should be used. Some complained that the Welsh broadcast could be slovenly; others found it too formal and removed from their dialect. The channel's novelty factor initially won large audiences, but these tailed off with many viewers more interested in what programs were about rather than the language they were in. As Price argues, it was never going to be possible to please all of the audience, all of the time. Indeed, since the target audience was itself a minority community, the channel had “to come to terms with the fact that only a small number of viewers would actually watch” its content (p. 128).
Price emphasizes the importance of individual managers and administrators, and their ability to forge relationships, as being important to the channel's success. Friendships between senior members of S4C, the BBC, and Channel 4 all helped bring about cooperation that was fundamental to helping the channel find its feet. S4C was broadcast in Wales instead of the new Channel 4 and good relations with those who ran the English channel were especially important. At first, S4C was supposed to broadcast twenty-two hours a week in Welsh but fifty hours in English. S4C was allowed to broadcast Channel 4 programs at no cost to itself and this enabled it to invest its limited resources in Welsh-language programming instead. But the most popular Channel 4 programs were not broadcast in Wales at the primetime slots they had in England, a cause of some complaint to Welsh viewers. This was made worse by the protrusion of Channel 4 advertising into Wales, causing confusion among audiences about when programs would be on. S4C was particularly sensitive to such complaints because a major reason for its creation in the first place was to try to minimize the antagonism the language could attract when programs in it were shown on English-language channels, as had happened before 1982.
Scholarship about contemporary Wales can often suffer from the country's smallness; to criticize is to potentially alienate patrons and allies who might be known personally to an author. Welsh political discourse similarly suffers from a lack of critical engagement because of how integrated government, media, and academia all are. The emotional importance of S4C in Welsh culture meant there was a particular danger here that the book might not be as critical as it should be. Its focus on the organization rather than content of S4C does mean some of its poor programming escapes attention, but this is not in any way a book of hagiography or one that is uncritical. In particular, the lack of attention the channel paid to Welsh learners is criticized and Price concludes the channel “adopted a very narrow definition of Welsh speakers in its early years” (p. 137). Although the implications of this are beyond the scope of Price's book, the Welsh language community still suffers from how some speakers feel excluded from it.
The likely audience for this book is probably quite select, but it is an excellent example of how an organizational history can be clear, lively, and connected to wider issues. As Price shows, S4C's best programs, notably SuperTed, found an international audience and the channel changed the broadcasting landscape in Wales, not least through encouraging the development of a vibrant independent production industry. S4C has not always enjoyed a comfortable history, but it continues to adapt and evolve, and its longevity and popularity are an inspiration to other minority channels. Moreover, the channel remains a key part of Welsh culture and no history of media in the UK or Wales in general should ignore this fine book about its founding years.
