Pierre Juneau has held virtually every important position in the Canadian broadcasting hierarchy. His long career has been characterized by a sustained commitment to the principles of public broadcasting and ownership.

     In 1949 Juneau joined the National Film Board of Canada (NFBC) as the Montreal district representative. In the 1950s, he became the Quebec assistant regional supervisor, then the chief of international distribution, the assistant head of the European office, and the NFBC secretary. In 1964 he took on the position of director of French-language production. He also pursued film interests only secondarily related to his official position. In 1959 Juneau co-founded the Montreal International Film Festival and served as its president until 1968.

     In I966 Juneau left the NFBC to become vice chair of the Board of Broadcast Governors (BBG), the federal broadcast regulatory agency. In 1968 Parliament enacted a new Broadcasting Act, which replaced the BBG with the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) and Juneau was named its first chair, a position he held until 1975. As CRTC chair, Juneau is best remembered for promoting Canadian-content regulations in both radio and television, as well as in the growing medium of cable. The  regulations, soon called "Cancon," helped create a permanent domestic market for Canadian music and television. They stipulate percentages of overall air time! and specific time slots that must be devoted to material produced or performed by Canadians. These regulations met with widespread public support, and their principle remains essentially unchanged to the present day. Indeed, in 1971 the Canadian Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences (CARAS) named its annual ceremony the "Juno Awards" as a gesture toward both the CRTC chair and the Roman goddess.

     In 1975 Liberal Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau ai;­ pointed Juneau minister of communication, but he was defeated in the by-election of that year and resigned from the post. In 1978, still under Trudeau, Juneau became undersecretary of state and in 1980 deputy minister of communication. Trudeau appointed Juneau to a seven-year term as president of the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC) in 1982. These proved to be turbulent times, however, as the Trudeau government was defeated by the Conservative Party of Prime Minister Brian Mulroney. Although the CBC president enjoys an "arm's length" relationship with the government, relations between Juneau, who was closely identified with the Trudeau Liberals, and the new government became strained as increasingly severe budget cuts were imposed upon the CBC. In 1988 the Mulroney government also revised the Broadcasting Act. It foresaw that Juneau's position would be split between a part-time president and a full-time chair, a move Juneau opposed. Simultaneously, throughout the 1980s, new television services were launched, and the CBC's audience share declined. Juneau defended both the ideal and the practical reality of public broadcasting and stated his intention to raise to 95 percent the amount of Canadian content on the CBC. Furthermore, in 1988 and 1989, he oversaw the launch of the CBC's all-news cable channel, Newsworld, on which he appeared as the first speaker on the last day of his man­ date.

     Like CBC presidents before him, Juneau campaigned for operating budgets, controlled by Parliament, covering five-year rather than one-year periods and refused to relinquish advertising revenue so long as Parliament declined to cover all expenses. Under Juneau, the CBC consolidated its reputation for news and public affairs on both its French- and English­ language networks, increased its Canadian content, brought in a new head of English-language program­ ming, Ivan Fecan, and shifted toward independently produced dramatic content. In the 1980s, the CBC also scored some of its highest ratings successes ever. However, its dependence upon advertising revenue became more acute and its audience share fell. In 1995 Juneau was appointed to head the Mandate Review Committee of the CBC, NFB, and Telefilm Canada. Since that time, he has also become president of the World Radio and Television Council and of the Canadian Centre for International Studies and Cooperation, both based in Montreal.