Media: New kids on the box

In 1979 the BBC aired a programme which is crucial to understanding the new generation of people who have taken over British television. It was an episode of Arena, edited by a 32-year-old called Alan Yentob, which took a look at the song "My Way". The programme was originally inspired by Sid Vicious's punk interpretation of the song and paid affectionate homage to a tune that was an icon of popular culture.

Jane Root, who was appointed controller of BBC 2 last week, says it is not only one of her favourite programmes, but that it was influential in the direction of her career, and that of Michael Jackson, the chief executive of Channel 4.

Root and Jackson are now in control of the higher-brow end of television and they started their career together. They made a programme about television called Open the Box which led on to a series, The Media Show, for Channel 4.

"That episode of Arena took a popular cultural artefact and played around with it," says Root. "To people like me and Michael, it is the Daddy of all the television we later did." The reason that particular Arena is so popular with the new generation controlling television is that they, too, are the products of television, itself a popular artefact. "I was telly-obsessed," says Root. "From keeping the entire family silent during Star Trek as a kid, to starting my own film society when I was at sixth- form college, I have always been a fan. We all have."

While Michael Jackson did Media Studies at the Polytechnic of Central London, Root studied International Relations at Sussex University: "But alongside my degree I spent all my time doing film studies and any option I could on any of the media."

Jane Root's appointment marks the way that people who grew up with television have now taken it over. They have replaced the generations whose roots were either Oxbridge and journalism or the world of variety theatre.

The Polytechnic of Central London's media studies course was one of the first in the country, when the discipline was still heavily influenced by the Sixties explosion in structuralism: television is being run now by people who learned first how to take it apart. That is why Root doesn't find it quite so surprising as the rest of us that two people who worked on the same television show 12 years ago have ended up running a television channel each. "Media studies hadn't quite taken off. People didn't think television was something you made programmes about There had been the odd programme, but no serious look at it."

Mal Young, who became head of drama series at the BBC this year, has been a friend of Root's for 10 years and is part of the new generation at the top: "It's those of us from normal families who watched a lot of television in the Sixties and Seventies taking over."

If there is a new generation in charge of television there is a key factor in their success: the creation of Channel 4. Jackson and Root made The Media Show for Channel 4 before Jackson used the experience to join the BBC and Root formed her own produc- tion company, Wall to Wall, with her business partner Alex Graham.

Wall to Wall became one of Channel 4's biggest suppliers, but its importance, believes Root, lies in the way independent production companies gave access to television to outsiders for the first time: "What's interesting is that people in television now can have diverse careers."

They don't have to climb slowly through an organisation they only got into in the first place because of their background, she believes. Instead there are creative people in charge who have run their own businesses, as well as making programmes. There is also a class dimension to the change wrought by Channel 4 and the independents: Jane Root's father ran a gift shop, Michael Jackson's dad was a baker, Mal Young's father was a milkman, while the father of the controller of BBC 1 and one-time head of factual at Channel 4, Peter Salmon, was a window cleaner. It is all a long way from the time when who you met from your public school reading history at Cambridge was the way into the corporation.

"The independents have encouraged a meritocracy," says Mal Young. "I got my break through Phil Redmond and Mersey Television. It was possible to learn the skills and meet the right people. It became possible for people who had had normal jobs to get into television."

Jane Root agrees: "The BBC is a much more egalitarian place now. There is a sense that we have a more varied view of the world."

The BBC also has to get some credit for bringing on a more representative generation of managers. The promotion of Root shows it has been particularly successful in bringing on women.

In 1990 the corporation looked at the number of women in senior positions and discovered that just 10 per cent of senior executives were women. The corporation set itself targets for all its levels of management and now has 29.1 per cent of senior executives who are women; the target it set itself is 30 per cent. It has already surpassed its target for senior managers.

"When I got my first job as an editor in radio I was the only woman at my level," says Jenny Abramsky, who was appointed director of radio last month. "I spent all my time in meetings full of men. For eight years as I took other jobs I remained the only woman. When I got pregnant I went to the personnel manager who dealt with my management grade and he had never had to deal with maternity leave before. It was because no one at that level had ever been pregnant before. There is still a long way to go, but there is a sense of momentum now."

Sue Farr, the BBC's head of communications and marketing, has been at the BBC five years and did not know there were targets for women in management: "You hear about a time when the only woman in a meeting was the one taking notes, but now broadcasting is so competitive that no organisations could possibly afford to promote on anything other than merit."

When Jane Root heard about her new job last week, one of the first calls of congratulation she took was from Mal Young: "He just said one thing to me: `The lunatics have taken over the asylum.'"

MICHAEL JACKSON, 40

Education: Polytechnic of Central London. Way into TV: Organiser of lobby group for creation of Channel 4; became controller of BBC 2 in 1993, BBC 1 in 1996. Now: Chief executive of Channel 4

PETER SALMON, 42

Education: University of Warwick. Way into TV: Newspaper reporter; head of factual at Channel 4. Now: Controller of BBC 1

Sue Farr, 42

Education: University of Reading. Way into TV: Marketing background; communications director for Thames TV. Now: Director of communications and marketing, BBC

Mal Young, 41

Education: Liverpool College of Art. Way into TV: Scriptwriter on `Brookside'; head of Channel 5 drama. Now: BBC head of drama series