Defending Cultural Diversity: Variety or Dialogue?

Special Report: Cultural Industries and the Internet: The New Instruments of Popularity
By Michel Gensollen
English

"The production of cultural goods became more and more industrialized and disproportionately concentrated in the United States during the twentieth century (especially the movie industry).Today, we hope that the digitization and networking of information can counteract this trend by reducing promotion and distribution costs (long tail theory). The diversity of cultural expression, however, remains a key objective of cultural policy for at least three reasons: (1) exchange of cultural goods must be regulated due to many market failures (experience and merit goods, consumption externalities, production with large economies of scale, etc.); (2) culture should not be confused with individual entertainment. It is a collective consumption that conveys identities, values and meanings, and must therefore not be treated as having commercial value only; and (3) beyond diversity, the aesthetic quality of cultural goods allows for dialogue among cultures, which is one of the main objectives set by the UNESCO Convention of 2005 on the Protection and Promotion of the Diversity of Cultural Expressions."

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