Radio and Advertising in Colombia

Over the last few decades radio has becomeone of the primary means of mass communication in Latin America, able to reach euen the remotest rural populations because of the transistor. Colombia, where ninety‐one percent of the homes in the seven largest cities have at least one radio, has also been heavily impacted by this modern technological phenomenon, Elssy Bonilla de Ramos focuses on radio advertising as a means of characterizing the relationship between radio and the Colombian economic sector. She argues that private companies who own most of the country's stations and networks influence programming and advertising in order to widely promote products which they produce. She believes that in many cases these products are not necessary to the consumers'well‐being but are advertised in a way to make them more desirable. The authorgives a brief history of commercial radio in Colombia during the last fifty years, stating that early in its development programming underwent significant changes in order to capture an expanded audience. Comedy, sports, news, soap operas, classical and popular music, and quiz shows soon dominated the airways to the exclusion of programming that could play a role in the political, social and economic development of the country. She contends that industries that owned radio were intent on training for consumption and she uses a week's sample of programming and advertising to illustrate her point.