Thinking Globally
From Media Imperialism to Media Capital
Michael Curtin
It is dificult to think globally about media industry
studies simply because most research focuses on
media industries in the United States. This bias is no
doubt due to our fascination with the power and
influence of these media, but it also stems from the
fact that American media produce a tremendous
amount of information about themselves. Critical
scholars in the US (who are well-funded compared
to their peers abroad) then mine this data and publish
their studies with presses that prefer subjects that
attractwealthy English-language audiences. Canada,
Australia, and the UK have received some attention
for similar reasons, but research on these media
industries is often motivated by concern about the
negative impact of Hollywood on their national cultures.
Outside of this Anglo orbit of scholars, the
pickings have been slim. It was not until 1999 that
the first major study of media industries in Latin
America was published. No comparable volume
exists for African or Eastern European media.
Arabic, Indian, and Chinese media began to generate
more attention during the 1990s, but it is only
recently that we are beginning to see systematic and
comprehensive studies of these industries.' As a
result, it is difficult to think globally about media
industries when so much ofwhat we know is derived
from American contexts.
It is also difficult to think globally because
research keeps circling back to national policy and
aesthetics. The conventional frame for studying
cinema around the world is the national cinemas
approach. Television islikewise examined as discrete
national systems and much of the debate revolves
around national policy issues. Media industries
themselves tend to function as self-consciously
national institutions as well. To the extent that they
operate internationally, the business of film and television
is conducted country-by-country under
regulation and licensing arrangements that conspicuously
observe national borders. Consequently,
national frameworks and biases prevail in media
industry studies and operations, and yet, as we know,
the world is changing. Media imagery today flows
across borders far more fluidly than ever before and
popular artists embrace opportunities that allow
them to reach broader and more diverse audiences.
Likewise, the most successful media enterprises
today attempt to extend their influence abroad. This
not only includes Time Warner and Sony but also
Globo, Media Asia, and Zee T V as well. So although
the residual influence of national frameworks
remains strong, the media industries are changing
and media studies must change with them.
What then would it mean to think globally about
media industries? Certainly it would mean that we
should extend our perspective beyond AngloAmerican
media and it would encourage us to consider
the world as a whole. But how can we do this
THINKING GLOBALLY
without seeing global media as the sum of their
parts, as simply a collection of discrete units? O r
conversely, how can we do this without seeing
media institutions around the world as pale reflections
of the dominant American media system?That
is, how can we shift our perspective so that we take
into account both the general and the particular,
both the forest and the trees? How can we escape an
Anglo-American bias? Which principles shape the
development and interactions of media enterprises
worldwide? Which tendencies present themselves
regardless of the many contexts in which media
operate? And how do the production, circulation,
and consumption of media help to engender spatial
relations and patterns that shape our lives?
These are not entirely new questions. Indeed,
they can be traced back to the pioneering work of
Harold Innis (1950; 1951). Yet it was not until the
late 1960s that lively debates began to emerge about
international media relations, and it was not until
the 1990s that we began to discuss media industries
with respect to globalization. In the first section of
this chapter, I provide a brief overview of international
media industries research. I then follow with
a discussion of the recent literature on globalization,
which provides a context for explaining key principles
that help us to think globally about media
industries today.
From Imperialism to Globalization
....................................
In the late 1960s, Thomas Guback (1969) and
Herbert Schiller (1969) published pioneering studies
of American media influence around the world.
Both describe self-conscious collaboration between
industry executives and government off~cialsseeking
cultural, commercial, and strategic influence
abroad. Kaarle Nordenstreng and Tapio Varis (1974)
soon followed with potent empirical evidence of US
domination in the international TV market, showing
that exports from America comprised a substantial
portion of television imports in many countries
around the world. Throughout the 1970s and 1980s
the media imperialis~~rthesis flourished, asserting that
the US and its European allies controlled the international
flow of images and information, imposing
media texts and industrial practices on unwilling
nations and susceptible audiences around the world.
According to this view, western media hegemony
diminishes indigenous production capacity and
undermines the expressive potential of national cultures,
imposing foreign values and contributing to
cultural homogenization worldwide.
The basic unit of analysis for media imperialism
researchers was the modern nation-state, which
meant that domination was usually figured as a relationship
between countries, with powerful states
imposing their will on subordinate ones, especially
in news reporting. cinematic entertainment, and
television programming. Based initially on data
gathered in the 1960s and 1970s, when American
media had few international competitors, media
imperialism's founding scholars anticipated enduring
relations of domination, presuming that the US
would be able to perpetuate its structural advantages.
So influential was this critique that it helped
to inspire an energetic reform movement among less
developed nations that called for a New World
Informationand Communication Order (NWICO).
Thrs campaign crested in the 1980s with a set of
United Nations reform proposals that would have
sailed through the General Assembly if not for the
fierce opposition of the Reagan and Thatcher governments,
both champions of "free flow" of information
over the reformers' demands for "fair and
balanced flow" (MacBride 1980). This AngloAmerican
alliance thoroughly undermined the
momentum behind NWICO; furthermore it led to
a counteroffensive aimed at promoting the commercialization
of media institutions around the world.
While these political struggles were raging,
researchers began to critically reexamine some of
the essential tenets of the media imperialism thesis.
One of the first and most telling critiques was posed
by Chin-Chuan Lee (1979), a young scholar from
Taiwan who interrogated the theoretical consistency
and empirical validity of the media imperialism
hypothesis by considering case studies of media
in Canada, Taiwan, and the People's Republic of
China. Lee argued that foundational assumptions,
such as a correspondence between economic domination
and media domination, did not hold up under
close scrutiny. Canada, a wealthy developed nation,
MICHAEL CURTIN
was thoroughly saturated by Hollywood media,
while Taiwan, an economically dependent and less
developed nation, had established a relatively independent
media system that nevertheless failed to
nurture "authentic" local culture, preferring instead
commercial, hybrid forms of mass culture. The
PRC, although the least developed of the three, was
even more removed from Hollywood domination
but thoroughly authoritarian, making it the most
elitist and least popular media system at the time.
Supporting neither the free flow doctrine nor the
media imperialism critique, Lee argued for middlerange
theory and regulatory policies that would be
sensitive to the complexities of specific local cir-
cumstances.
Scholars in cultural studies and postcolonial studies
also began to question media imperialism, especially
the presumption that commercial media have
clear and uniform effects on audiences. Might audiences
read Hollywood's dominant texts "against the
grain," they wondered?Might they be more strongly
influenced by family, education, and peer groups
than by foreign media? Critics also challenged the
presumption that all foreign values have deleterious
effects, noting that the emphasis on aspiration and
agency found in many Hollywood narratives might
actually have positive effects amongaudiences living
in social systems burdened by oppressive forms of
hierarchy and/or patriarchy (Fejes 1981; Liebes &
Katz 1990; Ang 1991; Lull 1991). Moreover, critics
pointed to the media imperialism school's troubling
assumption that national values were generally positive
and relatively uncontested, arguing for example
that during the twentieth century Indian national
media tended to cater to Hindu elites at the expense
of populations from diverse cultural and linguistic
backgrounds, suchasTamil andTelegu (Chakravarty
1993; Mitra 1993). Finally, they pointed out that
cultures are rarely pure, autonomous entities, since
most societies throughout history have interacted
with other societies, creating hybrid cultural forms
that often reenergize a society by encouraging
dynamic adaptations (Appadurai 1996; Clifford
1997). According to these critics, media imperialism's
notion of a singular, enduring, and authentic
national culture simply overlooks the many divisions
within modern nation-states, especially in
countries whose borders were imposed by colonial
masters, such as Indonesia and Nigeria. Overall,
cultural studies scholars pointed out that media
imperialism's privileging of "indigenous culture,"
tends to obscure the complex dynamics of cultural
interaction and exchange.
Empirical research data also began to suggest that
western media dominance might be diminishing.
As television industries around the world matured,
audiences increasingly showed a preference for
national and regional productions, especially in
news, talk, and variety formats but also in drama
and comedy. In Latin America, for example,
Peruvian T V audiences tend to prefer Mexican or
Venezuelan telenovelas as opposed to Hollywood
soap operas (Tracey 1988; Straubhaar 1991; Reeves
1993;Sinclair et al. 1996;Sinclair 1999).New media
technologies further complicated consumption patterns,
as VCRs and satellites began to expand the
range and quantity of available films and television
programming in the 1980s, a trend that was amplified
by digital media in the 1990s. As the range of
viewer choice expanded, researchers found that US
media comprised a relatively small part of overall
media consumption in many parts of the world.
Researchers also suggested that the revolution in
communication technologies seemed to be facilitating
a wave of cultural and political transformations,
such as the fall of the Berlin Wall and demonstrations
at Tiananmen (Lull 1991; O'Neill 1993; Wark
1994). Coupling these communication trends with
dramatic changes in shipping and transportation, as
well as the continuing march of neoliberal free-trade
policies, popular and scholarly critics began to contemplate
a seismic shift from the existing state-based
international system to a nascent global order, one
that was more open, more hybrid, and more thoroughly
interconnected than its predecessor.
Within this context, media industries have undergone
significant changes since the 1980s. as the
number of media producers, distributors, and consumers
has grown dramatically, first in Europe and
then in Asia, with China and India adding almost
two billion new viewersduringthis period. Although
powerful global media conglomerates were active
contributors to these trends, local, national, and
regional media firms expanded rapidly as well. For
THINKING GLOBALLY
example, Rupert Murdoch's News Corporation
entered Asia with hopes of transmitting satellite T V
programs to audiences across the continent on its
Star T V platform. Using films and television programs
from his Fox studios, Murdoch programmed
Star for a pan-Asian, English-speaking, elite audience
and used the technology of satellite delivery to
gain entry to markets that previously had been protected
by national broadcasting regulations. At first
Star succeeded, drawing the attention of middleclass
viewers and forcing governments to liberalize
their media regulations. Yet liberalization cut both
ways. Star gained access to new markets, but so too
did dozens of new services organized by Asian companies,
most of them telecasting in local languages.
Star helped to pry open national media markets, but
it soon found that it had to adapt its services to conditions
within those markets. Instead of transmitting
four channels across the continent, Star now delivers
more than 60 television services, each of them targeted
at specific geographical regions of Asia and
each fashioned for the distinctive cultures, languages,
and markets in which they operate (Curtin 1999;
Kumar 2005; Curtin 2007; McMillin 2007).
Such developments challenged media imperialism's
structural notions of center and periphery, as it
became clear that even the world's most powerfit1
media corporations were having a difficult time
imposing their agendas in many parts of the world.
Instead, companies like Star T V were avidly localizing
their programming and institutional practices, so
as to adapt to competitive forces in places like India,
Indonesia, and Taiwan. Though Star's original intention
was to penetrate and dominate Asian markets
with western technology and Hollywood programming,
it soon found itself pulled into lively competition
with new creative enterprises in diverse locales.
Conversely, as Star localized its operations, Asian
media institutions became more globalized in their
perspectives and practices, adapting many of the creative
and marketing strategies of their foreign competitors.
Rather than exhibiting concrete patterns of
domination and subordination, Asian media institutions
at a variety of levels seemed to be responding to
the push-pull of globalization, as increasing connectivity
inspired significant changes in textual and
institutional practices at a variety of levels.
Globalization of media therefore should not be
understood reductively as cultural homogenization
or western hegemony. Instead it is part of a larger set
of processes that operate translocally, interactively,
and dynamically at a variety of levels: economic,
institutional, technological, and ideological. AsJohn
Tomlinson (1991) observes, globalization "happens
as the result of economic and cultural practices
which do not, of themselves, aim at global integration,
but which nonetheless produce it. More irnportantly,
the effects of globalization are to weaken the
cultural coherence of all nation-states, including the
economically powerful ones - the 'imperialist
powers' of a previous era" (75). In other words,
unlike theories of media imperialism that emphasize
the self-conscious extension of centralized power,
globalization theories suggest that the world's
increasingly interconnected media environment is
the outcome of messy and complicated interactions
across space. The challenge for media industry
studies is to come up with theories and approaches
that identify the most significant forces driving these
interactions and to explain why some places become
centers of cultural production and therefore tend to
be more influential in shaping the emerging global
system.
Although US media are no longer perceived as a
singular cultural force worldwide, issues of power
and influence are nevertheless matters of ongoing
concern, only now the emphasis has shifted from
nations to cities. Increasingly we find that cities such
as Beirut, Mumbai, and Miami function less as centers
of national media than as central nodes in the
transnational flow of culture, talent, and resources.
Rather than asking about relations among and
between nations, we should explore the ways in
which media industries based in particular cities are
participating in the restructuring of spatial and cultural
relations worldwide. In an effort to clarify the
spatial dynamics of media industries in the global
era, this essay examines three principles of media
capital that have shaped film and broadcasting
throughout their histories. It shows that despite the
many changes that have taken place over the past
few decades, media industries are fundamentally
driven by 1)a logic of accumulation, 2) trajectories
of creative migration, and 3) forces of soc~ocultural
MICHAE
variation. The character and balance among these
principles has undergone a dramatic transition since
the 1980s, but the principles themselves remain the
same and therefore provide a firm foundation for
thinking about practices and performance of media
industries. For example, they encourage us to think
about capitalism as a social process that shapes the
spatial contours of media, bearing only contingent
or "not necessary" relation to the nation-state. These
principles also direct our attention to the fundamental
role that creative labor plays in the spatial deployment
of media resources. And they invite us to
reflect on the particularities of culture and politics
both as boundary markers and as creative resources.
In all, the principles of media capital encourage us to
develop spatially complex and historically specific
accounts of media globalization.
The Logic ofAccumulation
....................................
The logic of accumulation is not unique to media
industries, since all capitalist enterprises exhibit
innately dynamic and expansionist tendencies. As
David Harvey (2001) points out, most firms seek
efficienciesthrough the concentration of productive
resources and through the extension of markets in
hopes of realizing the greatest possible return on
investment in the shortest amount of time. For
example, companies reorganize the spatial layout of
their factories to increase productive efficiency or
they use new modes of transportation to expand
their market reach. These centripetal tendencies in the
sphere of production and centrfugal tendencies in
distribution were observed by Karl Marx (1973)more
than a century ago when he trenchantly explained
that capital must "annihilate space with time" if it is
to overcome barriers to accumulation (539).
As applied to contemporary media, this insight
suggests that even though a film or TV company
may be founded with the aim of serving a particular
national culture or a local market, over time it must
redeploy its creative resources and reshape its terrain
of operations if it is to survive competition and
enhance profitability. Implicit in this logic of
accu~nulationis the contributing influence of the
"managerial revolution" that acconlpanied the rise
of industrial capitalism (Chandler 1977). For over a
century, modern managers have sought to apply scientific
techniques and technologies of surveillance
to the refinement of corporate operations. During
the twentieth century capitalism became more than
a mode ofaccumulation, it also became a disposition
toward surveillance and adaptation, as it continually
reorganized and integrated manufacturing and marketing
processes.
The history of the American cinema -the world's
most commercial and most intensively studied media
industry - provides an instructive example of these
core tendencies. During the first decade of the
twentieth century, US movie exhibitors depended
on small, collaborative filmmaking crews to service
demand for filmed entertainment. Yet as theater
chains emerged, as distribution grew more sophisticated,
and as competition intensified,movie companies
began to centralize creative labor in large
factory-like studios with an eye toward ~mproving
quality, reducing costs, and increasing output. By
refiguring the spatial relations of production, managers
concentrated the creative labor forcein a single
location where it could be deployed among a diverse
menu ofprojects under the guidance of each studio's
central production office. The major film companies
furthermore separated the domains of planning
and execution, creating a blueprint (or script) for
each film that guided the work of specialized craftspeople
in lighting, makeup, and dozens of other
departments deployed across the studio lot. As
American cinema entered this factory phase during
the 1910s, the intensification of production accelerated
output and yielded cost efficiencies, providing
theater operators around the country with a dependable
flow of quality products (Bordwell et al. 1985;
Bowser 1990; Scott 2005).
Similar patterns emerged in the Indian commercial
film industry with major studios emerging in
Bombay and Calcutta by the 1930s. Although the
studio system would fall by the wayside for a number
of reasons, the concentration of productive resources
would intensify, allowing Bombay to emerge as the
center of a South Asian film industry that would distribute
movies across the subcontinent (Prasad 1998;
Pendakur 2003; Rajadhyaksha 2003). In Chinese
cinema, transnational theater circuits were firmly in
THINKING GLOBALLY
place by the 1930s. but the mode of production was
initially more dispersed for a variety of reasons.
During the post-World War I1 era as prosperity
returned to the industry, both Cathay and Shaw
Brothers established integratedproduction operations
in Hong Kong that rivaled the scopeand productivity
of their American counterparts (Bordwell 2000;
Fu 2003;Curtin 2007;Fu 2007).The capital-intensive
factory model prevailed with major movie companies
around the world. Nevertheless it is important to
note that unlike the auto or steel industries, fdmmaking
employeeswere creatingdistinctiveprototypes
rather than redundant batches ofproducts with interchangeable
parts. Each commodity was relatively
unique, even if production routines grew increasingly
standardizedand even ifthe films wereintended
for mass audiences (Bordwellet al. 1985).
Not only was film production distinctive from
other forms of industrialized manufacturing but so
too was film distribution, since movies are what
economists refer to as public goods (Kepley 1990;
Hesmondhalgh 2002). That is, each feature film is a
commodity that can be consumed without diminishing
its availability to other customers. And given the
relatively low cost of reproducing and circulating a
film print when compared to the cost of creating the
prototype, it behooves the manufacturer to circulate
each artifact as widely as possible. Unlike other cultural
institutions that needed to be close to live audiences
or patrons (e.g., vaudeville and opera), and
unlike industrial manufacturers that incurred substantialshippingcostsfor
their finishedproducts (e.g.,
automobiles and washing machines), movie studios
could dispatch their feature films expansively and
economically. The key aim of the distribution apparatus
was therefore to stimulateaudience demand and
ensure access to theaters in far-flung locales. They
achieved the latter by establishing theater chains or
by collaboration with major exhibitors, both nationally
and internationally (Thompson 1985; Gomery
1986;Balio 1993,Pendakur 2003; Curtin 2007).
Trajectories of Creative Migration
....................................
The second principle of media capital emphasizes
trajectories of creative migration, since audiovisual
industries are especially reliant on creativity as a
core resource. Recurring demand for new prototypes
requires a workforce that is self-consciously
motivated by aesthetic innovation as well as market
considerations. Indeed, attracting and managing
talent is one of the most difficult challenges that
screen producers confront. At the level of the firm
this involves offering attractive compensation and
favorable working conditions, but at a broader level
it also requires maintaining access to reservoirs of
specialized labor that replenish themselves on a regular
basis. Thisis one of the main reasons why media
companies tend to cluster in particular cities."
Nevertheless as a longer historical perspective
would seem to indicate, it is rare for such centers of
creativity to emerge strictly as a response to market
forces. During the pre-modern era, for example,
artists and craftspeople congregated at sites where
sovereignsand clergy erected grand edifices or regularly
commissioned devotional works of art.
Patronage drew artists to specific locales and often
kept them in place for much of their working lives,
and they in turn passed their skills along to succeeding
generations and to newly arrived migrants.
Rather than market forces, one might imagine that
spiritual insp~rationand feudal relations of patronage
significantly influenced trajectories of creative
migration during this period, but it is also important
to acknowledge the tendency of artists to seek out
others of their kind. Artists are drawn to co-locate
with their peers due to the mutual learning effects
engenderedbysuchproximity.Thatis,artistsimproved
their skills and enhanced their vision through their
ongoing association with other artists.
As the bourgeoisie rose to prominence in the early
modern era, commercial cities became new centers
of artistic production and exhibition, even though
pre-existing centers retained residual prestige among
the cognoscenti (DiMaggio 1986). Industrialists
built performance venues, established galleries, and
subsidized educational institutions, all of which
attracted fresh talent to cities such as Berlin, New
York, and Shanghai. Popular culture was layered
over this topography of creative labor flows in the
fine arts. Outside the major cultural institutions,
popular artlsts and performers found it difficult to
subsist in any one locale since they lacked access to
MICHAEiL CURTIN
the wealth of powerful patrons. Instead, they established
circuits of recurring migration, playing to
crowds in diverse towns and villages. These circuits
were formalized in the nineteenth century by booking
agents who rationalized the scheduling of talent
across regional chains of performance venues. By
concentrating creative laborers into performance
troupes and then circulating them around a circuit,
vaudeville made it possible for performers to earn a
living and to learn new techniques from their fellow
artists (Gilbert 1940; McLean 1965; Allen 1980). As
vaudeville flourished, it attracted fresh talent from
among enthusiastic audiences in diverse locales,
bringing them into the circuit of production. Film
industries would draw from the talent reservoirs of
popular theater and they would cultivate new talent
of their own. However, they would also anchor creative
talent to particular locations where the capitalintensive
studios were located. Despite their success,
reversals in the American (1950s), Indian (1940s).
and Chinese (1970s) film industries brought an end
to the studio system of production. Artists and laborers
consequently found themselves shifting from
the security of long-term employment to the uncertainties
of casual labor at a growing number of
independent production houses.
Why then did Hollywood, Bombay, and Hong
Kong continue to act as magnets for cultural labor?
One might suggest that like prior transitions, the
residual aura of these cities helped to sustain their
status as centers of creative endeavor, but geographers
Michael Storper and Susan Christopherson
(1987) contend that more importantly, a disintegrated
(or flexible or post-Fordist) mode of production
in the movie industry actually encourages and
sustains the agglomeration of creative labor due to
the fact that constant changes in product output
require frequent transactions between contractors,
subcontractors, and creative talent. Their study of
Hollywood shows that the number of inter-firm
transactions in the movie business has grown dramatically
over the past 50 years. At the same time,
the scale of transactions has diminished, indicating
that many small subcontractors now provide the
studios with crucial services, such as wardrobe, set
construction, and lighting, as well as key talent.
Storper and Chr~stophersonargue that although the
production system went through a period of disintegration,
the spatial concentration of labor persisted.
That is, film producers today subcontract hundreds
of tasks, but most contracts go to local companies
because it is easier to oversee their work and suggest
changes as the project progresses. As for the workers,
they cluster around Hollywood where studios
and subcontracting firms are based, since it helps
them "offset the instability of short-term contractual
work by remaining close to the largest pool of
employment opportunities."'
Geographer Allen J. Scott extends this principle
of talent agglomeration to industries as diverse as
jewelry. furniture, and fashion apparel, arguing that
manufacturers of cultural goods tend to locate where
subcontractors and skilled laborers form dense transactional
networks. Besides apparent managerial and
cost eff~ciencies,Scott points to the mutual learning
effects that stem from a clustering of interrelated
producers. Whether through informal learning such
as sharing ideas and techniques while collaborating
on a particular project - or via more formal
transfers of knowledge -craft schools, trade associations,
and awards ceremonies - clustering enhances
product quality and fuels innovation. "Place-based
communities such as these are not just foci of cultural
labor in the narrow sense," observes Scott
(2000), "but also are active hubs of social reproduction
in which crucial cultural competencies are
maintained and circulated" (33).
The centripetal agglomeration of labor encourages
path-dependent evolution such that small chance
events or innovations may spark the appearance of a
culture industry in a particular location, but clustering
engenders a growth spiral, as creative labor
migrates to the region in search of work, further
enhancing its attraction to other talent. Locales that
fail to make an early start in such industries are sub- .
ject to "lock-out," since it is difficult to lure talent
away from an existing media capital, even with massive
government subsidies. Scott suggests that the
only way a new cluster might arise is if its producers
offer an appreciably distinctive product line.
In general, we can conclude that cultural production
is especially reliant upon mutual learning effects
and trajectories of creative migration, and that
particular locations inevitably emerge as centers of
THINKING GLOBALLY
creativity. These principles have operated throughout
history under various regimes of accumulation, but
the modern era is distinctive because the centripetal
logic of capitalist production has been married to
the centripetal trajectories of creative migration,
engendering the rise of powerful transnational
media production centers. One might imagine that
in today's world of increasing commercial flows and
diminishing trade barriers we might be approaching
a time when one city would become a dominant
global center attracting talent from around the world
and producing a majority of the world's popular
screen narratives. Yet the complexities of distribution
undermine such pretensions to singular dominance,
especially when media products rub up
against counterparts in distant cultural domains
often served, even ifminimally, by competingmedia
capitals that are centers of creative migration in their
own right. Such complexities therefore direct our
attention to the third principle of media capital.
Forces of SocioculturalVariation
....................................
Cities such as Hollywood, Mumbai, and Hong Kong
lie across significant cultural divides from each
other, which helps to explain why producers in these
cities have been able to sustain distinctive product
lines and survive the onslaught of distant competitors.
These media capitals are furthermore supported
by intervening factors that modify and complicate
the spatial tendencies outlined above. Consequently,
the forces ofsociocultural variation direct our attention
to the fact that national and local institutions
have been and remain significant actors despite the
centripetal biases of production and creativity, and
the centrifugal bias of distribution. Indeed, the early
years of cinema were exceptional in large part
because the logic ofmedia capital unfolded relatively
unimpeded by national regulation, but as the popularity
of Hollywood narratives increased, many
countries established cultural policies to address the
growing influence of this new commodity form.
Motion pictures presented governments with a
unique policy challenge since they were distributed
even more widely than newspapers, magazines, or
books, the circulation ofwhich was limited to literate
consumers within shared linguistic spheres. By
comparison, silent era cinema overcame these barriers
and challenged class, gender, and racial boundaries
as well. Hollywood movies circulated widely, swelling
the slze of audiences dramatically and fueling
the growth of large-scale enterprises. According to
Thompson (1985), US movie companies became
dominant exporters by the mid-19lOs, a trend that
contributed to a further concentration of resources
and talent in the Los Angeles area. By the 1920s,
however, opinion leaders and politicians abroad
grew wary and cultural critics began to clamor for
regulation. Many countries imposed import quotas
and content regulations on Hollywood films and
some set up national film boards to subsidize cinema
productions with national themes and talent (Higson
1989;Jarvie 1992; Crofts 1993; O'Regan 2002).
Most importantly, however, national governments
embraced the new technology of radio broadcasting,
which in almost every country outside the western
hemisphere was established as a public service system
intended as a bulwark against cultural invasion from
Hollywood. Britain, which would serve as a model
to others, explicitly charged the British Broadcasting
Corporation with responsibility to clear a space for
the circulation of British values, culture, and information
(Scannell & Cardiff 1991; Hilmes 2003).
Radio seemed an especially appropriate medium for
intervention, since many of its characteristics helped
to insulate national systems from foreign competition.
Technologically, radio signals traveled only 30
to 60miles from any given transmitter. As in Britain,
one could interconnect a chain of transmitters that
would blanket the countryside, but the only way for
foreign competitors to reach one's domestic audiences
was via shortwave radio, a temperamental
technology that was comparatively inaccessible to
the masses.Such insulation was furthermore ensured
by an international regulatory regime that allocated
radio frequencies on a national basis, minimizing
technical as well as cultural interference between
countries. Language provided another bulwark,
since radio relied on aural competence in the state's
official language, helping to distinguish national
radio productions that played in one's parlor from
Hollywood "talkies" that played at the cinema.
Finally, public service radio systems were bolstered
MICHAEL CURTIN
by indigenous cultural resources, since literary and
theatrical works were commonly appropriated to
the new medium, as were folk tales and music. State
ceremonies and eventually sporting events also filled
the airwaves, as the medium participated in
self-conscious efforts to foster a common national
culture.
Radio also promoted a shared temporality among
audiences. Its predecessor, the nineteenth-century
newspaper, pioneered this transformation by directing
readers to stories that the editors considered significant
and by encouraging them to absorb these
stories at a synchronous daily pace (Anderson 1983).
Radio extended the daily ritual of newspaper consumption
to nonliterate groups, which expanded
the horizon of synchronization, such that program
schedules began to shape daily household routines
and create a national calendar of social and cultural
events. Radio insinuated itself into the household,
interlacing public and private spheres, and situating
national culture in the everyday world ofits listeners
- ( ? $ ~ ~ r m e l l~ r r f i K ~ ~ m F 1 ~ ; T V l o T e y
2000). Even though radio systems were founded
under the guiding hand of politicians, educators,
and cultural bureaucrats, radio would over time
open itself up to audience participation, employing
yet another distinctive cultural resource as part of its
programming repertoire: the voice of the people. In
each of these ways public service radio accentuated
national contours of difference in opposition to
media capital's desire to operate on a smooth plane
of market relations worldwide.
Although the BBC served as a template for public
service radio, national radio systems were diverse
and their success varied. All India Radio was exceptionally
elitist and therefore relatively unpopular.
It was not until the incursions of foreign satellite
competitors that Indian radio and television were
forced to compete for the favor of audiences ('Jeffrey
2006). India was not the only country to experience
the negative effects of state monopoly. Nigerian
broadcasting was rife with political favoritism and
censorship until it found itself competing in the
1990swith popular Nigerian video films (Haynes &
Okome 1998;Adesanya 2000; Haynes 2000; Larkin
2004;M c C d 2004).Despite such problems,regulation
----------
of the airwaves provided an effective way for governments
to refigure the centripetal and centrifugal
tendencies of media capital. It allowed them to
staunch the flow of culture from abroad and to cultivate
domestic talent and resources. Regulation
provided a defensive response to the spatially expansive
tendencies of commercial media industries.
Regulation also has acted as an influential enabler
of commercial media industries. Intellectual property
laws are especially compelling examples in this
regard, as are media licensing regime^.^ The commercial
development of broadcasting in the US was
facilitated by regulations that in effect made it possible
to "sell the airwaves" to corporate operators. In
so doing, the government created a market-driven
system out of an intangible public resource, enabling
a national program distribution system that stimulated
the growth of national advertising and concentrated
creative resources in a handful of urban
centers (Streeter 1996). Just as the British system
became a model for public service systems around- - - - - - - X
e world, the commercial licensing regime of
American broadcasting became the standard for satellite
regulation, which in turn pressured governments
around the world to adapt to commercial
models during the 1990s.
As we can see, the boundaries and contours of
markets are subject to political interventions that
enable, shape, and attenuate the dynamics of media
industries. Concepts such as "free flow" and "market
forces" are in factmeaningless without self-conscious
state interventions to fashion a terrain for commercial
operations. Markets are made, not given. And the
logic of accumulation must therefore be interrogated
in relation to specific and complex mixtures
of sociocultural forces.
Finally, it should also be pointed out that selfconscious
state policies are not the only actors that
organize and exploit the forces of sociocultural variation.
Media industries in Mumbai, Cairo, and
Hong Kong have themselves taken advantage of
social and cultural differences in their production
and distribution practices. Operating across cult~~ral
divides from Hollywood and from other powerful
exporters, they have employed creative talent and
cultural forms that resonate distinctively with their
- - - - - - - - - -
THINKING GLOBALLY
audiences. These industries have furthermore made
use of social networks and insider information to
secure market advantages, and they invoke cultural
and national pride in their promotional campaigns.
Forces of sociocultural variation can therefore provide
resources for carving out market niches that are
beyond the reach of foreign competitors.
Conclusion
....................................
Media capital is a concept that at once acknowledges
the spatial logics of capital, creativity, culture, and
polity without privileging one among them. Just as
the logic of capital provides a fundamental structuring
influence, so too do trajectories of creative
migration and forces of sociocultural variation shape
the diverse contexts in which media are made and
consumed. The concept of media capital encourages
us to provide dynamic and historicized accounts
that delineate the operations of capital and the
migrations of talent, while at the same time directing
our attention to forces and contingencies that
give shape to spheres of cultural exchange. Media
capital invites us to think in terms of global Chinese
media, not simply PRC, Taiwanese, or Singaporean
media. It encourages us to consider the dramatic
growth of Indian film audiences and satellite
subscribers in Europe and North America. And it
prompts us to wonder at the complex and expansive
channels of Nigerian video film distribution in
sub-Saharan Africa and even worldwide.
The principles of media capital help us clarify our
understanding of culture industries duringthe global
era. They also encourage us to acknowledge the
continuing importance of media policy. Market
dynamics and talent migrations increasingly privilege
a small number of global media capitals.
Therefore policymakers must be willing to intervene
where the market comes up short. In many
cases, governments will need to prioritize and even
subsidize media institutions because they provide
vital resources for local, national, and alternative
cultures. Like public parks and libraries, media play
a vital role in making particular places worth living
in. They foster identity, enhance social cohesion,
serve local businesses, enhance property values, and
provide spaces for public discourse. Some of these
functions will be supported by the market, but
others will not. The principles of media capital suggest
that the only way to attenuate or redirect the
spatial tendencies of media industries is through
exertions of public will. As we have seen, media
policies can establish barriers but just as importantly
they can act as enablers, helping to nurture and
sustain spaces for local voices in a global era.
Notes
..........................................................................
1 An exception isJarvie's (1977)exemplarystudy of the
Chinese movie industry.
2 Although itdoes not addressmedia industriesspecifically,
an extensiveliteraturediscusses the impact of human capital
on the clustering of busmess finns in particular locatlons
(Jacobs 1984;Porter 1998;Florida 2005).
3 Despite the development of new communication
technologies that allow creative collaborations across
vast expanses, creative labor still needs to congregate
so as to build relationshipsoftrust and la~niliaritythat
can enable and sustain long-distance collaborations.
Giddens' (1990)discussionof faceworkand Bourdieu's
(1986)notion ofsocialcapital both point to the importdnce
ofphysical proximity.
4 In the US, court rulings during the 1910s provided
movie studios with intellectual property rights so that
they - rather than their employees-might claim protection
for the films they "authored." Although copyright
laws originally aimed to foster creative endeavor
by individuals, the courts allowed movie factories to
claim artistic inspiration as well. Interestingly, they
furthermore ruled that waged and salaried laborers at
the major studios were neither creators nor authors
but were rather "work for hire." In this way, the
American legal system profoundly transformed copyright
law,facilitating the industrializationofcinematic
production and providing expansive legal protection
for movie distributors(Bordwellet 11. 1985).
MICHAEL CURTIN
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