The Publishing Industries in Ibero-America: Challenges and Diversity in the Digital World

Abstract

In the past fifteen years, the concept of cultural diversity has gained renewed relevance — even if it has had a late arrival — both in the field of cultural industries and in the public policies orientated towards safeguarding such diversity as a result of strong processes of concentration and trasnationalization in the cultural field. In fact, diversity is the correct word nowadays, and by extension, the compulsory concept of discussion in the cultural field, be it on the discursive side of cultural policy, the researching of cultural policies, or in cultural management (Puente, 2011). While the concept of diversity has an immediate antecedent in ‘cultural exception,’ its use nowadays refers to the importance of plurality of actors, particularly local and regional, in the production and circulation of cultural goods, such as books.