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to fall outside the research support of na tional foundations and even of
most communi cati o ns departments in univers ities, although they have
been taken up by the Interna tional Broadcas t Institute and there is
already a su bstanti a l litera ture on the relation of communica tions
policies
to
development policies as a whole.
In one fin al respect Williams looks ahead further than Barnouw .
His last chapter, "alternative technology: alterna tive uses," deals not
onl y with new technol ogical options-some of which lead away from
the "mass communi ca tions" phase of communica tion history-but
wi th wha t he calls "a new universa l access ibility." He suggests rightly,
I beli eve, that the next fifty years will see as great changes in the
approach to communi ca ti ons technology as the last fifty years. I do not
think th a t Barnouw , who does not peer into the future, would disagree,
but the division of his boo k into " toddl er," "plastic years," " prime"
and "elder" is too Spenglerian. For all the mass ive interes ts involved
and the widely held belief in the United States tha t it is more difficult
to change television than to cha nge the Constitution, we are still in the
" plastic years."
ASA BRIGGS
