Paper by Silvio Waisbord

8/7/2019 Paper by Silvio Waisbord

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Paper by Silvio Waisbord http://www.jamco.or.jp/2002_symposium/en/paper/silvio_waisb

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Panelist Paper

Latin American Media in a Global ErabySilvio Waisbord

Latin American broadcasting historically developed along the lines of

the U. S. model of private ownership financed by advertising. Sincethe 1920s, domestic business (in alliance with U.S. mediacompanies) never confronted powerful actors committed to anyalternative to commercial broadcasting. The occasionalanti-commercial, nationalistic rhetoric from government officials,particularly between the 1950s and 1970s, did little to change thebasis upon which commercial media systems were built. Despite theresemblance with U.S. broadcasting, the Latin American modelevolved into a home-grown hybrid of unbound commercialismblended with authoritarianism and clientelism that resulted from theregion's topsy-turvy political development and economic conditions.

Continuous political instability coupled with a series of authoritarianregimes resulted in tight control of the media.

The anti-democratic mix of commercialism and authoritarianism rancounter to public service broadcasting. Because public broadcastinglacked support from powerful sectors (government and elites), itnever had any chances to become the backbone of media systems.Unlike former European colonies in Africa and Asia, Latin Americalacked a colonial legacy of public service upon which anon-commercial broadcasting could have been built. The idea ofpublic broadcasting was absurd in the mind of the authoritarian

governments that came to power in the region between the 1930sand the 1980s. Nor did it get full support from political parties. Whenin power, they were happy to correspond to the interests of mediabusiness as long they could keep, at least, some control such asrunning a few stations and keeping news coverage on a short leash.Only in countries where universities owned television stations (e.g.Bolivia, Chile), noncommercial aspirations had, in principle, betterchances. However, they never achieved their potential due to


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numerous problems, including political instability, and continuouspressure of powerful business to auction off their licenses. Problemsin securing the funding for alternatives to commercial media alsodoomed the prospects for media reform. Consequently, mediasystems were dominated by political authoritarianism andlaissez-faire economics.

Nationalism informed projects for media reform, especiallyregarding matters of ownership and content. Sporadically, over thecourse of the first sixty years of broadcasting, factions withingovernments and progressive social movements pushed for increasedstate control of domestic radio and television in order to insurenational content and the access of different groups to broadcastingoutlets. In 1929, the Uruguayan State set up a non-commercial publicbroadcasting service, SODRE (Servicio Oficial de Difusin RadioElctrica) with one state-financed short-wave and two medium wavefrequencies. The decision was part of a larger plan to finance media

and the arts as well as other public services for its small, urbanmiddle-class. The government did not limit the growth of privatecommercial media, however, and by the 1950s the Uruguayancommercial broadcasting sector was sufficiently powerful to block thefurther expansion of state-owned media. In Colombia, radio andlater television first began as public-private hybrids. The Colombiangovernment originally bid the time slots on state-owned radiostations to private companies who exploited them commercially byselling advertising time. Without limitations on commercial stations,private radio soon overpowered these public private hybrids. Thesetwo examples illustrate that government attempts at nationalist

broadcasting policies failed in their intentions to strengthen publicservice and to support the production of national content, basicallybecause they left untouched the commercial basis of the mediasystems. At times, state-directed national policies were couchedwithin broader political and economic reforms, ostensibly focusingon broadcasting's foreign "dependency" and lack of role in social andeconomic development. They accomplished little in effectivelychanging the existing order, however, as policies, above all, weredesigned to increase control of the media rather than democratizingaccess.

In the late 1950s and early 1960s, within the general thinking oneconomic and political development in the region, some of the earlierideas about national or public service broadcasting resurfaced.Development communication focused on the use broadcasting toprovide education, information, and modern values to the"traditional" masses." International development programs likeUNESCO, the Alliance for Progress and the Organization of AmericanStates made funds available for communication equipment and


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programs to use the mass media for health, education, ruraldevelopment, and family planning. Recipients of assistance includededucational radio and television system, communication satellites,and vast agricultural extension programs. Despite their limited andtemporary success, development media projects ultimately crumbledas the Colombian and Mexican experiences patently show. With the

assistance of foreign funding, Colombian President Carlos Lleras setup an educational television program in coordination with theMinistry of Education as a complement to regular classroomprograms. He also established a program of grassroots integrationand rural development using television to reach lower-income adults.In 1968 the Mexican government began an open-circuit educationaltelevision system for secondary school called Telesecundaria. Theseefforts at public service broadcasting flourished as long as foreignfinancing or domestic political support was forthcoming. When fundsand support dried up, public services languished in the backwaters ofofficial bureaucracies.

Accomodation and Confrontation

The endorsement of free market economies by the militarydictatorships that swept Latin America in the 1970s spurredbroadcasting's commercial growth, usually under ironclad politicalcontrol. The evolving nature of state and media relations influencedthe way the broadcasting industries developed. When the state wasable to forge a mutually beneficial relationship with nationalbroadcasting industries, strong media monopolies developed. Thiswas the case of Mexico and Brazil where monopolistic domesticbroadcasters grew strong under the protection of strong,authoritarian states. The mutual benefits of this relationship and theenormous size of domestic markets explain why Mexico and Braziltoday have the two largest, most monopolistic, and politicallypowerful broadcasting industries in the Western Hemisphere.Brazil's authoritarian rulers worked closely first with private radiostations, that they censored and in part directly controlled, and laterwith commercial television, notably TV Globo, that they helped createand had no need to control. In Brazil, the state's coming to terms withtelevision took place later than it did in Mexico. In Mexico thisaccommodation was the natural outgrowth of the radio broadcasters'

ongoing relationship with the country's political leaders, dating fromthe 1940s. In Brazil, a mutually beneficial working arrangementbetween television broadcasters and the government was reachedafter 1964 under a military dictatorship and well into thedevelopment of commercial broadcasting. U.S. investors were activein the establishment of commercial radio in Brazil as well as in therise of TV Globo. Although US influence strengthened commercialbroadcasting, the manner in which the Brazilian industry evolved


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broadcasting policies before the dictatorships were a basic part of thedemocratic give and take of the societies, with different interestscompeting for control of broadcasting and no single monopolisticmedia industry developing. In both Uruguay and Chile, thecompetition among different interests in broadcasting ended withthe gradual breakdown of democracy and, in 1973, with brutal

military takeovers of the government. For over a decade in Uruguayand for even longer in Chile, the military kept the media under strictcontrol and censorship, while, at the same time, allowing for theircommercial growth in commercially competitive domestic markets.Neither dictatorship, however, was able to forge a close politicalrelationship with a private domestic broadcaster, as was the case inBrazil and Mexico, leading to the formation of monopolistic domesticbroadcasting industries in these countries.

Globalization, democratization and media industries intransition

This was the situation in the early to mid-1980s when militarydictatorships started showing cracks and the transition to democracygained momentum. Back then, few could have imagined the LatinAmerica media would undergo phenomenal modifications in thefollowing years. As civilian administrations replaced militarydictatorships, the region's media have experienced, perhaps, thebiggest transformations in the past half-century. Transformationsranged from technological to legal, from political to policy, fromproduction to distribution of media content, and from economic tofinancial.

Globalization, a process that profoundly reshaped media structuresand dynamics worldwide in the 1990s, did not spare Latin America.Regional transformations need to be understood as part of the globalimplementation of market policies and free-trade economics inmedia industries. Privatization, liberalization, and deregulation havebeen the mantra of media policies. Because Latin American mediahad long been open to international capital and programming flowsand dominated by private and commercial principles, globalizationhas not been a completely novel development that radicallytransformed the foundations of media systems. What theglobalization push of the 1990s has done is to tip the balance furtherin the direction of the market but without downplaying, let aloneeliminating, the role of the state and domestic politics. Globalizationand market forces have not made the state and domestic politics lessrelevant but, actually, brought them once again to the forefront. TheLatin American cases suggest that it would be misleading to seeglobalization as the imposition of foreign processes onto domesticmedia systems. The historical evolution of the region's media already


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put in evidence that neither globalizing and domestic dynamics norstate and market forces are antithetical. Recent developmentsconfirm this historical pattern: these dynamics and forces are not instraight opposition but articulated in a process of perpetualnegotiation. National politics filter and mediate globalization,outlining its limits and possibilities. States and market forces

continue to be locked in constant battles in which accommodationand mutual benefits, rather than one-sided victories are the norm.

The widespread introduction and adoption of technologicalinnovations is a necessary starting point to analyze how globalizationrelates to sweeping changes in Latin American media. Whereas somemedia technologies (and industries) declined, others exploded. Atthe same time when the region experienced one of its worsteconomic and social crises in contemporary history, more peoplegained access to television and radio sets than ever before. Cabletelevision also underwent significant development. From a small and

marginal industry in the early 1980s, by the late 1990s cable hadbecome one of the most dynamic media industries. Recentestimations conclude that there are more than fifteen millionsubscribers in the region, a small number compared to the wealthyindustrialized countries, but 20 percent of a total of 81 milliontelevision households in the region. Cable television did not developevenly across the region. It reaches over 50 percent of televisionhouseholds in Argentina, 25 percent in Chile and Mexico, and lessthan ten percent in Brazil. Predictably, distribution patterns aresocially stratified. In a region with persistent and deepening socialinequalities, cable audiences are concentrated mainly among upper-

and middle-classes. There has been modest growth of cablesubscription in poorer districts but the growth mainly has beenobserved among well-to-do households. Coupled with the explosionin the number of radio and television households, the existence of 35million VCRs and two million satellite television subscribers suggesta media landscape substantially different than the one that existed inthe early 1980s.

Trends in the evolution of media technologies and industries can besummarized as follows: the explosive growth of radio and television,the rise of new forms of distribution of television programming

(cable and satellite), the decline in newspaper readership, and theconcomitant decrease in the number of movie theaters andaudiences and the consolidation of new channels for exhibition offilmed entertainment.

Trends in media industries

These developments underpin policy-making decisions that shaped


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fundamental transformations in the organization and operation ofmedia industries in the 1990s. The main trends in Latin Americanmedia have been the formation of multimedia corporations, thedecline of family-owned companies, the articulation between local,regional and international capital, the intensification ofcross-regional trade of money and content, and the increase in the

production and export of television programming.

The adoption of market policies put an end to the long-standingtug-of-war between state and market models of media organization.During the 1990s, media policies shrunk the participation of stateand public interests and helped consolidate market principles. Suchpolicies were part of a wider change in the region's political zeitgeist.The ascent of market policies in media industries happenedsimultaneously with the implementation of neo-liberal programs ofstabilization and state reform that deeply transformed LatinAmerican economies. As in other industrial sectors, privatization,

liberalization, and deregulation were responsible for dismantling theold media order and strengthening market forces.

It is important to note that neither NAFTA nor MERCOSUR, the twomajor trade agreements passed in the 1990s, had major impact onthese processes. Market policies of privatization and liberalizationwere already in motion before the agreements came into effect.Neither agreement introduced new laws that radically changedstructures and dynamics. NAFTA left untouched ownership andprogramming regulations that concerned Mexican interests.MERCOSUR virtually ignored cultural industries.

As in other media systems worldwide, privatization became thedominant policy in the television industry. In Argentina and Mexico,administrations decided to auction major state-owned televisionstations that had been nationalized in the early 1970s. In 1984, theBolivian government allowed private companies to own televisionlicenses. In Chile, private capital was authorized to bid for televisionlicenses that had been historically in the hands of universities.Private ownership was also permitted in Colombia where the statehad controlled television and private companies were limited toproducing a restricted amount of hours of programming. Privatecompanies also benefited from the transition from an era of scarcityto an era of abundance of electromagnetic spectrum. The vastmajority of the new radio and television frequencies were awardedto private bidders, and only a few to public organizations andgovernments.

These changes have not fundamentally changed old dynamics in theinteraction between states and markets in media policies, most


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notably the lack of wide participation of civil society in thedecision-making process and, ultimately, in having access to mediaorganizations. Political democratization has not brought a genuineprocess of democratization of media ownership, content and control.Nor has public accountability been an integral part of the process bywhich media licenses have changed hands. Public officials

approached the politics of privatization as a way to gain personaladvantages, both politically and economically, by accepting thedemands of powerful media interests. The old system in which thestate had an all-pervasive role in media matters, particularly in termsof ownership, has certainly been changed, but the pro quid quodynamics of personal favors and clientelism remain unchanged.

Together with privatization, the removal of cross-media ownershiprestrictions and the liberalization of new media industries were thecatalysts for a process of rapid concentration of information resourcesand the consolidation of media corporations. Certainly, the existence

of highly concentrated companies is not new in the region. Televisaand Globo were already horizontally and vertically integratedcompanies that held almost monopolistic positions in Mexico andBrazil respectively, the two largest media markets in the region.

In flagrant contradiction to constitutional rules in some countries thatban the formation of monopolies and oligopolies in media industries,recent policy decisions accelerated the process of concentration.Policies opened new media sectors and strengthened the position ofalready dominant local groups. Domestic corporations such asArgentina's Clarn group and Colombia's RCN and Caracol, forexample, received the plums of the privatization of televisionstations. This decision allowed them to control important resources inthe television industry and build a backbone for their mediabusiness. Privatization also made it possible for companies withdiverse industrial interests to move quickly and aggressively intotelevision, such as Mexico's Elektra Group that formed Azteca in itssuccessful bid for state-owned Channel 13. For media companieswith ambitious domestic and global goals, having a solid position inthe television industry is crucial: open television receives the lion'sshare of advertising investments and is the indispensable launchingpad for producing programs and conquering global markets.

Cable and satellite television also entered into the fold of dominantcompanies. Firms that already controlled open television branchedinto cable as it happened in Uruguay. In countries such as Argentinaand Brazil, where cable development was originally fragmented innumerous mom-and-pop companies, leading companies swallowedlocal companies and subscribers, leading an intense and rapidprocess of concentration. The result was the formation of duopolies in


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cable markets: the Clarin group and Telefnica have the largemajority of Argentine subscribers, and Globo and TVA control theBrazilian market.

Regional media powerhouses took the lead in the development ofsatellite television. Approximately thirty satellites currently coverLatin America, including BrasilSat, Mexico's Morelos, Intelsat,Panamsat, and Argentina's Nahuel. Optimistic prospects aboutgrowing numbers of subscribers stimulated the launching of tworegional satellite services in the mid-1990s. Galaxy Latin Americapartners Hughes, Venezuela's Cisneros group, Brazil's Abril andMexico's Multivision, and Clarin in Argentina. Sky Latin Americabrings together News Corporation, TCI, Televisa, and Globo. Bothfeature an alliance between global technology and media behemothswith the largest producers and owners of television hours in LatinAmerica. Each party brings indispensable resources: Western mediagroups provide satellite connections, large international operations

and extensive film and television archives; regional partners offerdomestic experience and popular local programming.

Privatization and liberalization in the telecommunication industryalso contributed to the formation of conglomerates. It is impossible toanalyze the evolution and structure of contemporary mediaindustries without addressing telecommunication developments.Technological and industrial convergence has blurred clear-cutdistinctions, making it necessary to analyze the linkages betweentraditional media and telecommunication industries. As inbroadcasting, market policies substantially changed oldtelecommunications structures and dynamics. Initially, the break-upof state monopolies meant the entrance of foreign companies, namelySpain's Telefnica, France's Telecom, and Bell South, into formerlyclosed markets. Subsequently, local media companies took advantageof liberalization to enter into different telecommunication sectors.Traditional newspaper firms such as O Estado de So Paulo, Jornaldo Brasil, and Folha de So Paulo in Brazil, for example, acquiredinterests in cellular telephony and cable television.

Meanwhile, established media companies rushed ahead in Internetdevelopments. According to the latest estimations, there are sevenmillion Internet users in Latin America, less than two percent of totalworld users. High cost of phone services is one factor that holds offfurther growth. These obstacles have not deterred media companiesfrom establishing a beachhead in Internet business. "Old media"companies such as Folha and Grupo Abril's Universo Online in Braziland Venezuela's Cisneros Group, control major portals andconnections services in the region.


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As a result of the formation of conglomerates, a handful of companiescontrols the majority of media interests in Latin American countries.Most markets are increasingly dominated by two media behemoths.

Concentration and private domination does not mean that, underneo-liberalism, governments have lost all means to influence media

operations. In small countries/markets such as in Central Americancountries, proximity between state and private interests remains astight as ever. Official advertising is a substantial portion of totalinvestments. Government decisions typically make a huge differencein the economy of media companies, particularly when the latter areinterested in expanding and fighting rivals, or need to gain access toforeign inputs, or to financial lifesavers during economic crises.These conditions present government officials with plenty ofopportunities to cajole media owners to attend their political needs.At times, confrontations along business/partisan lines have becomeheated, spilling into the headlines of major newspapers and fuelingpress exposes on official wrongdoing. In bigger countries/markets,such relations are a bit more complex. There are more mediacompanies, bigger advertising pies, and more developed regionaleconomies. Nonetheless, quid pro quo relations betweengovernments and media companies are typical. Officials and mogulsuse available means to put pressure, negotiate, and obtain benefitsfrom each other.

The current media landscape makes it difficult for media companieswithout extensive interests to survive. Family-owned media as wellas university- and church-owned outlets have experienced a hardtime staying afloat amid a prolonged economic crisis and mediaconcentration. They have difficulties in raising large amounts ofcapital to support technological innovation, finance expansions andmergers, launch massive marketing campaigns to attract audiences,or offer sweet deals to large advertisers. If profitable, they are ripefor takeovers; if not, they perish. Going bigger is the only way tojump into the globalization bandwagon. Even large companiesneeded the assistance of global investors to consolidate their power inopen markets.

The impact of globalization

Privatization and liberalization also accelerated theinternationalization of media industries. As happened elsewhere,Latin American media did not remain separate from globalizingdynamics that deeply changed media structures around the world.The recent wave of transnationalization has brought in a new phasein the history of the region's media. New developments include the


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expansion of regional companies beyond their home countries, newrelations between local, regional, and global companies, and strongcompetition among groups domestically and regionally.

First, Latin American companies expanded into neighboringtelevision markets. Whereas media internationalization historicallymeant the expansion of US companies southward, today's medialandscape shows a different pattern in which media companies fromlarger markets have made inroads in medium and small countries.Mexico's Televisa and TV Azteca, the Cisneros Group, and AngelGonzlez, a Mexican citizen with extensive media interests in CentralAmerica, purchased interests in television stations throughout theregion. They have expanded mainly to small or medium-size marketswith little indigenous production.

Liberalization and deregulation of cable television facilitated theexpansion of global interests. US cable powerhouses such as TCI andLiberty Media have been particularly interested in expanding intocountries with high, actual or potential, numbers of subscribers andtelevision households. Given its substantial number of cablesubscribers (comparable to some of the most-cabled countriesworldwide), Argentina became a regional launching pad forpay-television business. The 1994 Argentina-United States tradeagreement of reciprocal investments paved the way for the entranceof US investors into the media industry. Coupled with ongoingchanges, the agreement ushered in profound transformations in theownership structure of Argentine media. Also, the 1995 Cable Lawinitiated important changes in Brazilian pay television. By increasingforeign ownership to 49 percent, the law shook off Brazil's traditionof media protectionism and attracted the interest of globalcompanies. Despite its small number of subscribers, trade analystshave repeatedly forecast a bright future for Brazil's pay- television.The size of the population and amount of advertising investmentmake it the biggest and potentially most profitable market in theregion.

Global companies also expanded as programming distributors forcable and satellite services. US cable programmers such as Discovery,ESPN, FOX, HBO, MTV, and TNT. CNN and CBS created LatinAmerican divisions and offer 24-hour news services (NBC's Canal deNoticias was cancelled). A number of parternships were formed.Telenoticias teamed up the US Spanish-language networkTelemundo, Reuters, Spain's Antena 3, Argentina's Clarn Group andProductora y Comercializadora de Mexico. USA networkjoint-ventured with three regional operators to provide cableservices. Cine Canal, a regional movie channel, is the result of thealliance of Hollywood studios and cable companies with interests in


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Brazil, Chile, Mexico and Venezuela. Additionally, cableprogramming in most countries includes the international services ofRTVE, RAI, BBC, and Deutsche Welle from Europe. Programming isdistributed through INTELSAT, PanAmSat, and domestic satellitesfrom Argentina, Brazil, and Mexico. Two-thirds of PanAmSat's LatinAmerican revenues come from leasing transponders for

broadcasting.

Cable and satellite networks also allowed further expansion ofregional firms. Although the vast majority of cable and satellitesystems in each country offer foreign programming,Spanish-language networks are the majority. Services include theinternational signals of the largest regional producers such asArgentina's Telefe, Brazil's Manchete, Chile's Universidad Nacional,Mexico's Televisa's Eco, and a large number of small, low-budgetoperations that have local or national reach. Despite modestaudiences, the opening of cable outlets encouraged the mushrooming

of local programming.The formation of conglomerates coupled with media globalization hasaccelerated the transition from family to corporate ownership ofmedia companies. The transition is far from complete, but it hasbecome increasingly evident that ownership of traditionalfamily-owned companies is unlikely to continue. This ownershipstructure that remained relatively stable until the 1990s in allcountries is anachronistic. The removal of protectionist legislation,the easing of the circulation of global capital, higher barriers to entryin media markets, and the need for large amounts of capital tofinance conglomerates make it impossible for family ownership tosurvive.

Local production, regional exports, unequal markets

The multiplication of distribution windows created the need formore television content. This situation, in principle, should havefavored mainly Hollywood producers. No other audiovisual industryworldwide can successfully compete with Hollywood in terms ofoutput, well-established distribution networks, product familiarity,and extensive libraries. Actual results, however, suggest a morecomplex picture. Far from having reinforced Hollywood's historical

preeminent position as the lingua franca of Latin Americantelevision, more demand for television programming has resulted innew developments.

The number of domestic and regional television hours has increasedremarkably throughout the region. The increase resulted fromseveral factors. First, the decrease in costs of video technologies and


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Only rarely is programming produced directly with internationalaudiences in mind, such as Globo's high-production novelas, spinoffsof Argentine novelas that were hits in global markets, orco-productions among regional companies or with Hollywood andEuropean partners. In these cases, budgets may be higher thanaverages. La Extraa Dama, for example, an Argentine-Italian soapopera cost $160,000 per episode, a figure that exceeded the cost fortypical domestic productions. The prospects of international revenueshave become more important, however, particularly for programs(e.g. high cost telenovelas, dramas, and documentaries) whereproduction costs are unlikely to be recovered domestically.

Finally, protectionist policies account for the increase in localproductions in some countries. Governments rarely monitor andenforce quotas and other measures intended to nurture localproduction and protect domestic companies. But, in some countries,quotas and the prohibition to air foreign content in prime time havecontributed to strengthening local production.

Audience preference for local productions coupled with the need tomeet quotas often means that low-budget productions fill up largeportions of television schedules. Talk shows, game shows, varietyshows, and sports do not require extravagant production investmentsand offer many opportunities for in-program advertising that addsfurther revenue. Borrowing a page from Rupert Murdoch'sprogramming strategy, many Latin American media companies wenton a shopping spree for popular sports teams to guarantee a source ofprogramming that usually delivers huge audiences and revenues.

Networks' preference for low-budget genres is more evident duringeconomic crises when advertising investments shrink. Executives optfor shows that do not require large casts, stars, writers, outdoorscenes, large crews, and twenty-hour shooting days. Such genres haveno potential to cross boundaries and bring extra revenues but arepreferred solution to the problem of filling schedules with cheapprogramming. It is no coincidence that, urged to fill schedules intimes of economic recession, television executives have opted topurchase foreign formats. Filling schedules with domestic orimported game-shows and talk-shows is cheaper than drama and

telenovelas. The import of regional programming is anothercost-cutting alternative. After the mid-1990s financial crisis that hitthe region's economy, advertising and, consequently, televisionindustries, imports became a favorite option. Even in countries withstrong production such as Brazil, networks that regularly broadcastlocal content relied on Mexican telenovelas. The cost for localproduction was not lower than $30,000 per hour, whereas Mexican


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telenovelas were sold for $10,000.

As a consequence of the growth of local production, televisionschedules in most countries offer fewer hours of US programmingthan in past decades, particularly during prime time. Domesticshows monopolize or dominate prime time in Argentina, Brazil,Chile, Colombia, Mexico, Peru, and Venezuela. Daily schedules insmall markets (Bolivia, Ecuador, Central America, Paraguay, andUruguay), however, commonly feature regional and, to a lesserextent, local shows. Hollywood productions are commonly used asfillers in fringe slots, or broadcast during low-audience weekends. Insome cases, regional imports have replaced Hollywood content as aquick, low-cost alternative to local production. Angel Gonzalez'sstations in Chile, Costa Rica, Dominican Republic, Ecuador,Honduras, and Peru are filled with Mexican programming.

As a region, Latin America confirms the conclusion that markets witha substantial number of television households coupled with largeadvertising investments and GNPs offer better conditions for thedevelopment and consolidation of a domestic audiovisual industry.As some authors have concluded, these factors are the comparativeadvantages that account for dissimilar development of mediaindustries across markets. Brazil, for example, offers more propitiousconditions for the consolidation of an indigenous audiovisualindustry than Panama or Nicaragua. Considering 1998 numbers,Brazil's $3.8 billion television advertising market providesadvantages that Panama's $30 million and Nicaragua's $17.5 million,for example, cannot match. Moreover, Mexico's Televisa and Brazil'sGlobo are able to produce approximately 3,000 hours ofprogramming annually, largely because they have long maintained aquasi-monopolic position in the television industry that allowedthem to capture the largest share of television audience andadvertising in the biggest and richest Spanish and Portuguesemarkets, respectively.

Conclusions

In scaling back the role of the state in broadcasting and removingrestrictions that prevented or limited foreign participation,globalizing policies have deepened disparities among media markets

in the region. Globalization contributed to the consolidation of athree-tier structure formed by large producers and exporters ofaudiovisual content based in Brazil, Mexico and Venezuela; mediumproducers and exporters in Argentina, Chile, Colombia and Peru;and modest producers with virtually no exports in Bolivia, CentralAmerica, Ecuador, Paraguay, and Uruguay.


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What do the Latin American media industries say about largerdevelopments and debates about media globalization? Revisionistviews of traditional "one-way street" models rightly have drawnattention to the complexity of contemporary flows that resulted fromtechnological changes and the maturation of television industries indifferent countries and regions. The new revisionism has forced us torethink theoretical paradigms that dominated debates aboutinternational media in the 1960s and 1970s. It has done so bysketching the formation of geo-linguistic markets, and the existenceof major producers/exporters in each market (e.g. Brazil andMexico/Latin America, Hong Kong/Greater China, Egypt/MiddleEast).

When revisionist studies first appeared, Brazilian and Mexicanprogramming was flooding television screens in the region,Spanish-language networks in the United States, and newly openedmarkets in Europe. This phenomenon provided evidence toreexamine central tenets of the "media imperialism" theory. Thesituation of contemporary television in Latin America suggests evenmore complex patterns. Perhaps it is necessary to take thisrevisionism a step forward, and analyze television flows inside oneregion. If global patterns of television flows need to be understood asa "patchwork quilt," Latin American television suggests that flowsinside regional/ geolinguistic markets also need to discriminateamong complex inflows and outflows. There is not a single,dominating center that exports content to the rest of the region but aLatin "patchwork quilt," formed by multilayered flows of capital andprogramming. Intra-regional trade of television shows and formats,and ownership and production partnerships among regional andglobal companies suggest that globalization is not unified in terms ofprogramming or capital flows. Instead, it is a highly uneven processthat affects media markets differently.

These developments raise questions about the oft-made argumentthat media globalization in the post-Cold War era chiefly worked forthe benefit of Hollywood and at the expense of indigenous culturalindustries. Privatization, liberalization and deregulation of mediaindustries removed obstacles that halted Hollywood's ambitions andprimed its global engine. Certainly, both television and film areaudiovisual industries, and frontiers between them are hard to drawgiven technological convergence and industrial convergence. LatinAmerican television, however, suggests that globalization doesn'thave identical effects on both industries, and that the analysis needsto be attentive to particular issues and dynamics in each one.

Like their counterparts worldwide, regional film industries continue


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to experience tremendous difficulties to survive. State protectionismin the form of subsidies and credits, the ambitions oftelevision-based companies to expand into film, and co-productionand distribution arrangements with European companies, wereresponsible for keeping local productions afloat and, occasionally,increasing the number of releases. Generally, local films can barely

compete with mighty Hollywood productions. Some local productionshave topped audience preferences and done extremely well at thebox office, but they are few and far in between, lost amid a sea ofblockbusters sustained by Hollywood's deep advertising pockets,huge output, and global stars.

The situation in the television industry is somewhat different.Domestic television has a better chance to survive and expand thanfilm. As paradoxical as it may sound to gloom-and-doom views ofglobalization, some Latin American media companies actuallybenefit from structural reforms in television industries that have

opened systems to foreign programming and investors. Becausetelevision production is cheaper than film, output is larger. Becausetelevision companies do not compete head-to-head with Hollywoodtelevision divisions, they are in a stronger position than filmcompanies.

Globalization does not affect all television markets in the same way.The strength of local companies, the size of the audience andadvertising revenues, and the existence of protectionist policiesmitigate or favor the entry of regional and global interests. Globalcapital and programming moves easily into weaker and smallermarkets with low production, and aggressively in partnerships withlocal powerhouses into advertising-rich countries with large, actual orpotential, audiences. Nor are all regional media companies on equalfooting vis-a-vis globalization. To some, globalization has been a boostto their business; to others, globalization has facilitated the entry ofpowerful competitors and thereby introduced powerful challenges todomestic companies. The trajectories of Globo and Televisa show thatsecuring a dominant position at home through extensive horizontaland vertical integration and close contacts with political powers isfundamental for plans of regional and global expansion.

Globalization has exacerbated preexisting characteristics andaccentuated differences in the region. It has facilitated the expansionof already dominant media companies in domestic, regional andinternational markets. It has increased the differences among mediamarkets: while large countries produce a substantial amount oftelevisual content, smaller countries continue to experienceenormous difficulties. Due to rising demand for more televisionhours created by the explosion in the number of cable and satellite


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channels, globalization has augmented regional traffic ofprogramming. After decades of governments promoting state-ownedmedia, threatening private owners with nationalization, and toyingwith projects for media reform, globalization signals theconsolidation of commercial media systems and the end ofalternative models. But states and governments are hardly the losers

of globalization. They are still able to keep the media at a short leashby negotiating the terms of business practices and defining theworkings of media markets. They may no longer control broadcastingstations or overtly try to restrict media content, as in past decades ofauthoritarianism and state-owned media, but are still able to pulllevers that define the conditions under which businesses operate.Globalization has not shaken off old relations but, in a way, hasperfected them. In a region where markets historically dominatedmedia systems, it would be mistaken, and even trivial, to affirm thatglobalization has ushered in a new order in which business interestsrule. Markets and states, business and politics, local and international

forces have long been intertwined, locked in a more confrontationalor peaceful relation according to the specific politics of the times.Domestic politics are not accesory to global dynamics but, as it hasbeen since the early beginnings of Latin American broadcasting,continue to be fundamental in mediating and articulating theinteraction between national and supranational forces.

Documents

Paper by Silvio Waisbord