This week Culture Secretary Michelle Donelan has announced that the government will “reexamine the business case” for selling off Channel 4, which had been previously announced to howls of outrage from the cultured class. That suggests they will put the issue off. With an election in a few years, it seems likely that Channel 4 will simply be allowed to carry on as before. But that’s bad for Britain and bad for British TV.

The move has been welcomed by defenders of Channel 4, who argue that as a publicly owned but commercially run channel, it costs the taxpayer nothing whilst reinvesting profits into innovative homegrown programming like It’s a Sin, We Are Lady Parts (me neither) and Gogglebox. They argue that a privatised Channel 4 would cut the amount of original programming commissioned, leading to independent production companies folding.

This isn’t convincing. Channel 4 may have been set up to be different, but over time all TV has become far more like Channel 4. It’s telling that Russell T. Davies can smoothly move from AIDS drama It’s a Sin to the first gay Doctor Who on BBC1. Or that a black radical like Darcus Howe, who had a show on Channel 4 in the 1980s, can now be safely memorialised by BBC1 in Small Axe. At the same time, Channel 4 is quite happy to pack the schedules with less invigorating fare. This Friday you can watch The Great British Bake-off (originally a BBC show) and a Jimmy Carr special. On Saturday you get Formula One followed by two back-to-back American films. 

Meanwhile the handful of supporters of a privatised Channel 4 tended to argue that, free of public ownership, it would become a British Netflix. This is delusional: even Netflix is feeling the heat of competition from other streamers and considering ads. Attempts to launch such ventures, like Brit Box, have so far produced a useful resource for expats but remain tiny in comparison. If the choice is between a faux-edgy channel producing more of the same or another failed streamer, then what should the government do?

K-dramas are quietly conquering the globe

The answer is to look east, both for inspiration and audiences. Although plenty of people pay lip service to the rise of the Far East, we still tend to ignore what they do. If people think about Korean culture at all, they probably remember the funny Gangnam Style video or a K-pop song their daughter listened to. But Korean TV has gone from being utterly obscure to conquering Netflix, with Squid Game knocking Bridgerton off the top spot. If you want to see how popular it is, try watching Twogether on Netflix, which depicts Korean TV star Lee Seung-gi and Taiwanese pop star Jasper Liu travelling across Asia to complete challenges in order to meet their fans. And meet their fans they do, in large numbers, being mobbed even when playing badminton in Indonesia. 

How did Korea do it? In the 1990s they poured money into entertainment, following much the same development model which brought them economic wealth: subsidies to build up industry, with competing producers to ensure they still have incentives to improve, and export discipline to see what sold well overseas. Korean business executives travelled to countries like Japan to observe their TV industry, then integrated the lessons into their own. Much like manufacturing, the results weren’t impressive at first. They involved a lot of copying, but with time comes improvement. Just compare 2009’s Boys Over Flowers, an adaptation of a Japanese school manga which made stars of its leads, and 2020’s The King: Eternal Monarch, a love story across two realities. Both starred Lee Min-ho but the first looks positively crude, whilst the latter is probably glossier than anything British TV can produce at the moment. 

That combination of efficiency, quality and wide audience appeal is why Netflix has come knocking, investing in making over 80 dramas or TV series since launching there in 2016. It’s also why K-dramas are quietly conquering the globe. With so much competition, quality is incredibly high and genres varied. In order to reach the widest possible audiences, they are largely family friendly, with little nudity or sexual content. Meanwhile Korea’s position as a nation which has ascended from being poorer than sub-Saharan Africa to a global economy means that its stories about confronting modernity, achieving by working hard, and the stress of work in the office means that storylines can appeal to those in both the developing and developed worlds.

The success of their culture has led not only to financial success but also to cultural soft power globally, despite the lack of much pre-existing interest, and all sorts of linked benefits such as improving the status of Korean men as romantic partners. Rather than stay still, Korea continues to innovate. Copying America, they’ve moved from one-off series to returning series which go on for several years, as well as directly remaking many American TV shows to fit Korea. 

We know exactly what foreign audiences want from Britain

How could this apply to Channel 4? Unlike Korean TV, it broadcasts in English and is therefore in greater competition with large American networks. A privatised Channel 4 would almost certainly be snapped up by a US company, which may be one reason why Channel 4 insiders have been remarkably placid about the whole thing. Their stock options would definitely benefit, even if the viewing public didn’t. The government could certainly do more to shelter British TV from cheap American cultural imports, perhaps by demanding streamers like Netflix produce a minimum amount of British programming. Success can only come with growth however.

The government should therefore take more control of Channel 4. Rather than turn it into a Netflix, seek to encourage it to become a major producer of programmes for export to big streamers like Netflix. Co-productions with Netflix are already becoming common but most British TV is still artisanal: short series with a limited appeal outside the country. That makes them more expensive than they could be, as the costs can’t be spread across multiple episodes. Even a hit like It’s A Sin can’t be broadcast in many places because of the subject matter. Thankfully we know exactly what foreign audiences want from Britain: the past.

When people think of Britain, they think largely of its traditions: wax jackets, pubs, Beatrix Potter and the Highlands. If you go to Seoul today, you can find cool young Koreans dressing up in Norfolk jackets (a tweed sports jacket of the sort not worn since Edwardian times) and riding Triumph motorbikes. All of which is anathema to the people running British TV. That’s why the government is needed to force them to overcome their social discomfort and commit to making long-running period dramas with global appeal. Britain has an almost inexhaustible supply of classic culture to draw on — it only needs to do so properly, by copying Korea’s example.