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2014 76: 211 originally published online 27 January International Communication Gazette
Juan Pin
Latin America
A multilayered transnational broadcasting television industry: The case of
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Article
A multilayered
transnational
broadcasting television
industry: The case of
Latin America
Juan Pin o n
New York University, USA
Abstract
The transformation of the U.S. Hispanic and Latin American television industrial land-
scape is slowly reshaping the composition of interregional programming flows, with an
increasing presence of transnational corporations competing in different modalities in
national markets. While long-standing dominant Latin American media corporations still
hold a disproportionately hegemonic position in their domestic markets, the production
of culturally proximate products is no longer the prerogative of national networks. The
transnational invites us to reflect on the new sets of collaborations and transnational
industrial structures of production, distribution, exhibition, and consumption resulting
from the interrelated institutional relationships among television corporations across
the region.
Keywords
Hispanic, latina/o, latin American, media, media ownership, Spanish-language TV,
television, TV distribution, TV production
The intensication of dierent processes of media globalization and their specic
articulations within the U.S. Hispanic and Latin American region have foreground
an emerging transnationalism, which oers a way to understand both the visibility
and manufacture of hybrid socio-economic-cultural formations within an increas-
ingly complex broadcasting television landscape. The notion of the transnational
Corresponding author:
Juan Pino n, Department of Media, Culture, and Communication, Steinhardt School of Education, Culture
and Social Development, New York University, 239 Greene St. 8th floor, New York, NY 10003, USA.
Email: jpinon@nyu.edu
at UNIV DE GUADALAJARA on August 21, 2014 gaz.sagepub.com Downloaded from
dees the assumed binary opposition between the national and the foreign, show-
ing the porous nature of national borders that have long served as geopolitical
spatial containers of the material and the symbolic from which sociocultural
national identities have been built. Georgiou (2006) points out that transnational
is not equivalent to global, because while the transnational recognizes the devel-
opment and sustaining of connection and networks across geographical and cul-
tural borders, it also underlines the key signicance of national borders in partly
framing and restricting social actions and their meanings (2006, 10). Chalaby
(2005) argues transnationalization is a new order that is shaping the international
communication fabric and restructuring the relationship between the local, the
national, the regional, and the global through a new complex relationship between
media corporations, their products and their audiences (2005: 31).
Despite the overwhelming amount of programming ows from Western coun-
tries, particularly from the United States to the rest of the world (Miller et al.,
2005), the case of the Latin American television industry has drawn the attention of
scholars because of the growing vitality of some national broadcasting corpor-
ations, the intensity of interregional television ows, and the increasing expansion
of ctional programming, specically telenovelas, within the worlds television
market place (Havens, 2006). The resilience and vitality of the Latin American
television industry and markets against the expansion of U.S. programming in
the region has been explained by Straubhaar (1991), who uses the concept of cul-
tural proximity, which predicts that audiences will prefer localnational programs
if available. Following a cultural argument, Sinclair (2004) argues that the Latin
American region is a geocultural linguistic market with cultural proximity operat-
ing not only in national markets but also at regional levels, driven by sociohistoric
and culturallinguistics ties. However, there are signs of industrial transformation
within the region that Lotz has described as a multichannel transition (Lotz, 2007),
one that is characterized by a trend of shrinking massive audience reach by national
broadcasters in a segmented media landscape, which has resulted in part due to the
rising options oered by new television producers and content distributors through
cable, satellite, and the Internet. Hesmondhalgh (2006) argues that a trend of
consolidation and conglomeration among global media rms with large bureau-
cracies has made them turn to the innovation and creative exibility of small
independent producers. However, Miller et al. (2005) underscore the imprints of
global capitalism in this industrial logic, in which this corporate interdependence is
shaped by the New International Division of Labor, where media global conglom-
erates exploit labor overseas while retaining the key positions, for the decision-
making process, copyrights, and nancial returns. This is the asymmetrical
industrial landscape, resulting from two decades of media deregulation, privatiza-
tion, and liberalization in which global and national networks hold dominant
power through processes of media consolidation while also facing competition
from emerging players both domestically and abroad. In this context, I sought
to analyze the regional face of the transnational in television interregional ows,
in which the United States competes not only with Argentina, Brazil, Colombia,
212 the International Communication Gazette 76(3)
Mexico, and Venezuela within the regional domestic markets, but also has estab-
lished an array of dierent industrial relationships, including partial co-ownership,
coproduction agreements, joint ventures, and programming alliances.
The focus of analysis in this article is the seven main television Latin American
industries: those in Argentina, Brazil, Colombia, Chile, Mexico, Venezuela, and
the U.S. Hispanic market, which dominate production and programming ows at
hemispheric levels. The concept of the transnational explains the specic articu-
lations of the national, regional, or global across these seven television industries
within their specic industrial television layers. The study shows that the line
between the national and the foreign in U.S. and Latin American television
has blurred because of the presence of transnational capital, productions, and
formats that have passed as national given dierent arrangements with local
players. The purpose of this article is to map the ways in which dierent trans-
national dynamics are deployed quite distinctly across dierent industrial televi-
sion layers: those of ownership, modes of production, distribution, exhibition,
and consumption.
Some of the questions prompted by this analysis include the following:
1. In what specic ways can the transnational be traced across the dierent indus-
trial spaces of the U.S. Hispanic and Latin American television landscape?
2. Where are the industrial spaces in which the resilience of the national seems to
appear as crucial for the growth or success of these countries television
industries?
3. What is the main characteristic of the transnational within the regional industry?
Programming flows and the Latin American television
industrial landscape
Vertovec (1999) characterized transnationalism as a condition in which, des-
pite great distances and notwithstanding the presence of international borders
[. . .], certain kinds of relationships have been globally intensied and now take
place paradoxically in a planet-spanning yet common however virtual arena
of activity (447). But this intensication does not necessarily mean homogeniza-
tion, as Georgiou (2006) argues the concept of the transnational has been re-
appropriated to recognize heterogeneity and diversity, transformation and
dierence.
When it comes to processes of media globalization, in particular television,
Straubhaar (1991, 2007) underscores the emergence of a media landscape that is
more interdependent while remaining asymmetrically organized, with the rising
presence of Latin American corporations in regional and global settings, while
other scholars have long argued about the continued overwhelming presence of
U.S. programming ows both regionally and globally (Miller et al., 2005; Sa nchez
Ruiz, 2000a; Schiller, 1991). Thussu (2007) has characterized the limited presence
Pinon 213
of Latin American programming ows conceived as alternative ows versus
global ows, while Biltereyst and Meers (2000) questioned the real impact of
telenovelas in the world television marketplace. For instance, Sa nchez Ruiz argues
that in the case of Mexico, a media television powerhouse and a key exporter
within the region, Mexican programming exports are still lower than imports,
with an unbalanced ow that favors U.S. media products (Sa nchez Ruiz, 2000a).
However, Straubhaar (2007) recognizes the presence of Hollywood television
around the world, but also argues that in the case of national markets, scheduling
and patterns of consumption are key. While there may be a lack of balance that
favors U.S. programming, primetime television is primarily national or regional,
if available, while Hollywood lms may occupy less prominent spaces within
network lineups. In this essay the division among the national or transnational
and U.S. or Latin American is questioned because of the increasing cooperation
and even integration among these industries. Within this corporate world,
Chalaby argues, the media conglomerates are adopting new organizational
structures and management mentalities, evolving from the global to the trans-
national, in which headquarters give aliates growing autonomy, specialize
them according to their strengths and resources, and then link them up into an
interdependent corporate network (2005: 31). Indeed, Miller (2010) underscores
the increasingly transnational character of corporations with increasing trans-
national corporate ownership and global cultural strategies in telenovela
production.
The largest Latin American domestic markets developed strong domestic broad-
casting television industries that themselves constructed the national as part of a
sweeping regional modernization project (Mart n-Barbero, 1995). This construc-
tion resulted in distinctive national televisual production styles, narratives, and
local casting using a national star system that produced a powerful imaginary
anchored in the idea of the nation (Mazziotti, 2010). This has resulted in the rise
of some countries as media powerhouses while others have lagged behind. This
industrial imbalance was described by Roncagliolo (1995) with his taxonomy of net
exporters (Mexico and Brazil), new exporters (Venezuela), and net importers (U.S.
Hispanic). Sa nchez Ruiz (2000b) points out how in the 1990s, the Ibero-American
televisual space was overwhelmingly dominated by only ve corporations from
Brazil, Mexico, Spain, and Venezuela (Globo TV, Televisa, TVE, Venevision,
and RCTV), which comprised 90% of total regional exports. However, in the
last decade some national industries have surged as new exporters, such as
Colombia and the U.S. Hispanic television industry, oering a more complex
and multilayered industrial television landscape.
A crucial goal is to recognize the particular transnational dynamics expressed
in the tensions between localnational television versus foreign across dierent
industrial television layers, shaped by the following economic, social, and cultural
relations forged in cross-border, subregional, regional, and hemispheric levels: (1)
media ownership, (2) modes of production, (3) distribution ows, (4) circuits of
exhibition, and (5) patterns of consumption.
Media ownership and investment
The dual eect of the rise of new telecommunication technologies along with
processes of media deregulation in foreign ownership has allowed the penetration
of global and regional corporations in national media industries around the world
through cable, satellite, mobile telephony, and the Internet. However, the case of
the broadcast media is dierent because it is still one in which the idea of the nation
comes to the legal forefront under notions of the public interest and national
security. Some of the ways in which the law has shown the assumed national
character of broadcasting television have been that TV stations licenses are
granted only to national citizens, with limits on foreign ownership and investment
in broadcasting stations (Belmas and Overbeck, 2011: 346). In many countries
throughout the region, such as Mexico and Venezuela, regulation bans any for-
eigner from holding a television broadcasting license and forbids ownership in
broadcasting television stations. In other countries, the law simply puts foreign
ownership limits on television stations, and such is the case with Argentina, with a
40% limitation, Brazil with 30%, Colombia with 40% (ADI, nd), and the United
States with 25% (Carter, 2000: 431). Chile is the only country out of the largest
Latin American markets that has no limits on foreign ownership.
While early limitation in foreign ownership in the broadcasting industry sets
barriers against any takeover from transnational corporations, the rise and increas-
ingly dominant position of national broadcasting corporations, particularly within
the largest television markets, have also become de facto barriers to entry for
transnational corporations. Arguably as a consequence of these provisions, the
Latin American broadcasting television industry remains legally a national endea-
vor, while at the same time it enjoys the benets of an increasing inux of foreign
investments. By 2011, the Observatory of Television Fiction in Ibero America
reported the existence of 47 national television networks within the seven main
Latin American markets: Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Mexico, U.S.
Hispanic, and Venezuela (Obitel.net). Table 1 shows their ownership status in
terms of national and foreign ownership or investment.
Only 14 of the 48 national networks have some kind of transnational presence
through direct ownership or investment from the stock exchange markets. But, if
we take into account only privately owned networks, that number represents 41%
of the universe, or 14 out of only 34 networks. In order to understand todays
schema of foreign media ownership within broadcasting television, it is important
to underscore the dierent legal, corporate, and industrial schemes in which own-
ership needs to be situated.
In addition to that variety in ownership, media regulation largely shapes the way
in which dierent modalities and relevance of foreign investment are deployed and
felt in every nation. Takeovers by foreign media corporations and investors can be
seen in Chile, where the law allows it. Chilevisio n was bought by Turner
Broadcasting System, part of the huge Time Warner conglomerate. Telecanal
and La Red were sold to Mexican entrepreneurs, the former to Guillermo
Pinon 215
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Can edo, an ex Televisa executive, and the latter to Angel Remigio, the owner of
Albavisio n. In contrast to Mexico, where there is an explicit legal clause regarding
the exclusion of foreign participation in broadcasting companies, foreign capital is
poured into the broadcasting industry through the stock exchange, and this is not
considered ownership but rather a neutral investment. This legal provision is
possible because of the status given to these foreign investors, with no voting
presence within the corporate boardroom and limited shareholder rights (Robles,
1999: 38). So the stock exchange markets seem to play an important role within this
scheme. TV Azteca has participation through the Mexican Stock Market (BMV)
and the Latin American Stock Exchange Market (LATIBEX), while Televisa is
listed in the BMV and the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) market. Then the
presence of foreign stakeholders is felt mainly through an atomization of investors
with no ownership rights. TV Azteca is largely controlled by Ricardo Salinas, with
8% ownership, but also with controlling power of Azteca Holdings, with 54% of
the ownership of TV Azteca. Investment Trusts account for 2% of TV Aztecas
ownership, and the market represents 34% through the BMV and LATIBEX and
others 9% (Vidal, 2012a). For the Televisa Group, the Azca rraga Trust has 14.7%,
Bill Gates 7.4%, Dodge & Cox 8.7%, Oppenheimer Funds 6.2%, First Eagle
Investment Management 3.7%, Lazard Asset Management 4.9%, and the
exchange stock markets 34.4% through BMV and the NYSE. Other institutions
and foreign pension funds make up 17.9% (Vidal, 2012b).
In the case of countries that allow partial foreign ownership with percentage
limits on investment, such as Argentina, Brazil, Colombia, and the United States,
the landscape also shows dierent paths. In spite of the open path for foreigners to
participate, albeit with limited ownership, in Brazil, the networks are largely con-
trolled by Brazilian media holdings: Rede Globo is owned by Globo Organizations,
Bandeirantes is owned by Grupo Bandeirantes Communications, SBT by Grupo
Silvio Santos, and Record by Record Central of Communications. But in sharp
contrast with Mexican TV Azteca and Televisa Group, these Brazilian groups are
not listed in the stock exchange markets, limiting foreign nancial ows. In a
similar fashion, the two private Colombian networks, RCN and Caracol TV, are
owned by Colombian corporate groups, the Grupo Ardilla and the Santo Domingo
Group, respectively. In the case of the Santo Domingo family, owners of Caracol,
it sold 60% of its shares of Caracol Radio to Prisa in 2002; however, the family
retained full ownership of Caracol TV (Arango-Forero et al., 2010). In the case of
Argentina, there is a dierent ownership landscape. El Trece is owned by the Clar n
Group, with a presence in the Argentinean and London stock exchange (BCBA/
LSE) markets. Grupo Clarin has made 20% of its shares available to stockholders.
Booth American Company owns 9% and the private shareholders 71% (El
Cronista, 2012). Argentinean Daniel Haddad owns 20% of Canal 9, but the
remaining 80% was bought by Mexican Angel Remigio, owner of Albavisio n
(La Voz del Interior, 2007). Canal 11 Telefe is 100% owned by Telefo nica, a
Spanish telecom corporation with assets around the hemisphere and listed in the
Spanish Stock Exchange market in Madrid (BME).
Pinon 217
The U.S. Hispanic market also presents a very dynamic landscape in terms of
foreign presence. When it comes to television broadcasting entities in the United
States, legal barriers to foreigners are largely focused on broadcasting licensee
applicants and on media ownership over broadcasting infrastructure. But there is
no legal provision banning foreign investment in network corporations, conceived
as content producers. This is the legal loophole that allows the Azteca America
network to be entirely owned by Mexican TV Azteca, while the TV station aliates
are owned exclusively by U.S. citizens (Pin o n, 2011). By the same token, Spanish
Prisa started with 12% ownership of public-oriented V-Me (Edgeclie-Johnson,
2009), but by 2012 the Spanish corporation declared it owned 42% of the network
(Prisa TV.com). Televisa re-entered as a shareholder in Univision in 2010 by
acquiring 5% of the rm, with the option of expanding its participation to 40%
(Fontevecchia, 2010). In August 2012, MundoFox was launched as a network
owned 50% by Fox NewsCorp. and 50% RCN (Business Wire, 2012). As is the
case with Azteca America, Colombian RCN has 50% ownership of MundoFox
network with zero ownership in aliated TV stations.
Business entities specializing in media content, such as television producers, are
not subject to legal provisions in foreign media ownership as broadcasters are. The
increasing relevance of independent production houses throughout the region
makes the lack of prohibition on foreign capital a new crucial element in under-
standing new ways through which foreign corporations have an impact on national
broadcasting through strategies of production and agreements about distribution.
While I do not mean the Table 2 to be exhaustive, it does show the most visible and
inuential house productions specializing in ctional programming within the
region and their relationships with transnational corporations.
The presence of U.S. media corporations is highly felt in Colombia through the
ownership of FoxTelecolombia by NewsCorporations, Teleset by Sony
Corporations, RTI by NBC/Comcast, and the exclusive production agreement
between Vista Producciones and ABC/Disney. With the exception of RTI, these
production houses have gained great visibility through the Colombian network
RCN, which has dominated the countrys ratings through the years and has
achieved hemispheric visibility through a set of programming agreements with
the main U.S. and Latin American television networks. This is the very condition
that prompted the alliance between Fox and RCN to launch MundoFox as a
national Spanish-language television network in the United States. At the same
time, RTI has been a central player for Telemundos production strategy of produ-
cing low-cost programming for Latin American tastes. In Caracol TV, RTI-
Telemundo found a window for the Colombian market, where the U.S.-owned
production company tested their productions with hemispheric and global
ambitions.
The presence of Spanish and Latin American corporations in the United States
is also deeply felt. The Spanish corporations Prisa and Globomedia are expanding
their presence throughout the region. Prisa owns the production house Plural
Entertainment in Miami. The Spanish corporation also has ownership of V-Me
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Pinon 219
and Colombian Radio Caracol. Globomedia owns Imagina in the United States
and Promolm in Argentina. Venevision Studios in Miami is a subsidiary of
Venevision and Grupo Cisneros. While Televisa has a stake in Univision, the
Mexican company in 2012 launched Televisa USA in Los Angeles to produce
English-language ctional programming. Mexican TV Azteca and independent
production house Argos are paramount sites of production for Azteca America
and Telemundo. While independent producer FoxTelecolombia made its presence
felt through MundoFox, a property of RCN and Fox.
In Argentina, the Spanish conglomerate Telefo nica owns Telefe and its produc-
tion facilities. Endemol, a company owned by Italian Mediaset, which is well
known for producing reality shows, has a production house in Argentina that
started a successful path of ctional programming exemplied by Endemols copro-
duction with Telefe of Los Exitosos Pells and the Mexican version with Televisa,
Los Exitosos Perez (TodoTVNews, 2012). This strategic move was cemented with
the acquisition of the independent production house Underground with a long-
standing production alliance with Telefe. In Argentina, the presence of Dori Media
Group, owned by Argentinean-Israeli Yair Dore, has introduced Latin American
melodrama to the Israeli market, linking the television market in both countries
with a new set of programming ows and production on both sides of the globe
(Ginossar, 2011).
Notions of ownership within the Latin American media landscape are still
shaped by the power of larger economic groups holding a strong presence in
media-oriented business, particularly television (Trejo, 2010). However, since
the 1990s, within an increasingly globalized economy, media players saw the
need for access to foreign investment to be competitive within their domestic
markets but also at regional levels (Rey, 2002). While still protected by limits
on broadcasting foreign ownership, main media groups have sought dierent
modalities of transnational cooperation, alliances, or investments. Since the
mid-1990s, stock exchange markets are increasingly playing a crucial role, but
in the cases that regulation allows, global and regional media players have
aggressively sought to tap in new market and new audiences. However, global
media conglomerates can face a market response by Latin American economic
groups that perceive the advance of these transnational companies within their
television domestic markets as threatening to their interests. In 2006, the prema-
ture announcement for a new national network auction in Mexico triggered a
strong interest by US NBC-Telemundo that was received with an angry response
by Mexican Televisa and TV Azteca (Trejo, 2007). The same scenario was
repeated in 2009 in Colombia, when RCN and TV Caracol opposed the auction
of a third national network, a fraught process in which Spanish groups Planeta
and Prisa and Venezuelan Venevision competed and that was nally canceled
(EFE News Service, 2012). The bitter corporate ght between Televisa and
Univision has deep roots in the Mexican corporations aspirations of taking
over the Hispanic network (Wilkinson and Saragoza, 2012). At the same time,
these same corporations are highly embedded in various dierent partnerships,
agreements, and joint ventures crucial for their operation and economic survival
in domestic markets and their visibility in the region.
Distinctive narrative models and modes of production
Within the Latin American television industry, the production of telenovelas, series,
miniseries, telelms, and unitary programs is still largely crafted for the domestic
market. However, rising trends in ctional production express the increasing trans-
national nature of this industry, with cross-border, regional, or global production
strategies. This study found four prevalent dierent modalities for appealing to
audiences beyond national borders: (a) the formats, (b) the neutral strategy, (c)
coproductions and joint ventures and, (d) localization.
Formats. Today, the industry relies heavily on formats that have proven to be suc-
cessful in other markets. While Mexico and Brazil took the lead in production capa-
cities in the 1970s, in the 1990s other national industries became a source of ideas with
the rise of Argentina, Colombia, and Venezuela as format providers (Mato, 1999).
Today, Argentina and Colombia have taken the lead in original ideas, accompanied
by a surge of Chilean, Brazilian, and U.S. Hispanic formats. Argentinean telenovelas
such as Lalola, Floricienta, Los Famosos Pellps, among many others, have triggered
several adaptations in dierent regional countries, with a large degree of success.
Colombia has produced the most successful and widely adapted telenovela in the
world with Yo Soy Betty, la Fea, and in the region with Cafe con Aroma de Mujer,
Juan el Escamoso, Hasta Que la Plata Nos Separe, along with many others. Chile has
also produced telenovelas that have been adapted, with Donde Esta Elisa?, Alguien te
Mira, and Hijos del Monte serving as the most important examples. While the new
adaptations are lled with local and national cultural cues, the widespread nature of
remakes of successful formats has produced a transnational culture of certain nar-
ratives that have been produced across the region.
Neutral strategy. When it comes to programming ows, the telenovela industry has
also incorporated a neutral Spanish in order to make their national products
attractive to audiences overseas (Mazziotti, 1996). The early entry of Televisas
productions throughout the Latin American and Hispanic markets established
the Mexican accent as predominant on the screen within the region. For many
scholars the so-called neutral Spanish is actually a middle-class Mexico City accent
(Waisbord, 2004; Wilkinson, 2003). More recently, the neutral approach in tele-
novela production has evolved to refer to narrative and casting strategies, used to
manufacture programming with regional or global appeal (Mazziotti, 2010;
Rinco n, 2007). Originally intended to target multinational U.S. Latino audiences,
the neutral approach was adopted along with the construction of a PanLatino
identity. Univision and Telemundo have pushed this appeal to the PanLatino in
their news production since the 1980s (Rodriguez, 1999), but they have also trans-
ferred it to ctional production, with Miami at the forefront (Acosta-Alzuru, 2009;
Pinon 221
Mato, 2005). This approach has evolved into what I have termed reglocalization
(Pin o n, 2014), which is the trend of producing ction with multinational casts,
from multiple locations dispersed in dierent countries, and with narratives devel-
oped in a local fashion but traveling across the hemisphere exemplied by La Reina
del Sur in 2010. This telenovela incorporated multinational castings, multiple loca-
tions (shot in Colombia, the United States, Mexico, Spain, and Morocco), and
includes an immigration journey made by an empowered female hero and is the
most-watched telenovela in Telemundos history (Villarreal, 2011).
Coproductions and joint ventures. These have also become a new preferred strategy of
transnationalization for dominant networks. Globo TV has pursued an institu-
tional transnational strategy of coproduction, with the network engaging in the
production of telenovelas for regional markets and maintaining a full commitment
to a process of cultural adaptation for dierent countries while at the same time
renouncing the broadcast of these coproduction versions for Brazilian audiences.
This Brazilian production machine for telenovelas that will not enter the Brazilian
market is solely committed to transnational purposes. Some of the most salient
examples of this strategy are El Clon (Telemundo/Globo), Entre el Amor y el Deseo
(TV Azteca/Globo), Lazos de Sangre (SIC/Globo), and Pasiones Prohibidas (RTP/
Globo) (Globo Bets, 2012). Meanwhile, Televisa has been aggressively pursuing
coproduction arrangements in which the Mexican company obtains the rights to
produce Argentinean, Chilean, and Colombian formats. The Mexican company
also coproduced Bela a Feia with Rede, a new version of the Colombian format Yo
soy Betty la fea, as well as Rebellious, based on the Argentinean format Rebelde
from Cris Morena for the Brazilian market (Gazeta Mercantil, 2008). The com-
pany has signed several coproduction agreements with RCN, RTI, Sony, Endemol,
Fonovideo, Lionsgate, and Cris Morena.
Localization. This approach in ctional production is on the rise given the new
opportunities for global media corporations to reach massive audiences with cul-
turally proximate products. Sony Pictures Television (SPT), ABC/Disney
Networks, MTV Latin American Networks/Viacom, Nickelodeon/Viacom, Fox
Latin American Networks/NewsCorp, and HBO/Time Warner have all aggres-
sively pursued a strategy of penetration through the production of original content
for their cable networks, through ownership in local production houses, and
through coproduction agreements with key players in the television broadcasting
industry. This strategy is designed to cloak foreignness with culturally proximate
elements, ranging from the use of language, professionals, talent, places, and nar-
rative styles in order to be able to compete with local networks in primetime tele-
vision. Telenovela production and Spanish-language series are no longer a
prerogative of Latin American corporations, as Nickelodeon and MTV Latin
America networks have produced teen-oriented telenovelas with a great degree of
success. Fox Latin America has been successful in series production, and Disney
Latin America has coproduced with Argentinean Polka Producciones Amas de
Casa Desesperadas (Desperate Housewives) for the Argentinean, Mexican, and
Colombian markets. It also coproduces the most-watched telenovela, A Corazon
Partido (Greys Anatomy) in Colombia with Vista Producciones. SPT has shown a
dynamic production strategy by striking production deals with almost every hege-
monic network throughout the region (Vinaja, 2012).
While described as separate modes of production, these strategies often overlap
under a single production project with transnational goals. The regulation that
forbids and/or limits the participation of foreign entities in television broadcasting
has decisively pushed large conglomerates to seek participation through increasing
transnational modalities of production. The combined strategies of investment,
joint ventures, and coproduction with independent production houses have
become one of the most visible signs of an increasingly transnational industry.
This media scenario reveals a complex industrial reality. Miller and Leger (2001)
describe runaway productions as Hollywoods corporate strategies of outsourcing
as the most visible example of new transnational corporate ties resulting from
developing markets for labor and sales [. . .] pushed business beyond treating
Third World countries as suppliers of raw materials, to look on them as
shadow-setters of the price of work (2001: 102). The scholars incursion of
media conglomerates through these dierent modalities of production reinforces
the hegemonic cultural and economic position of USA and Western media indus-
tries. However, Straubhaar (2007) argues that the entry of nancial and techno-
logical infrastructure from global players into markets overseas has triggered the
development and growth of local and national television industries, as well as
creating new hybrid products and global cultural heterogeneity.
Flows of programming distribution
During the last 5 years, Table 3 reects the ows of newly released ctional pro-
gramming within the region. Brazil has been the main producer in the region with
more than 8,101 h from 2007 to 2011. Mexico takes second place with more than
7,716 h; Argentina is third with more than 6,098 h; while Colombia is fourth, the
United States is fth, Chile is sixth, and Venezuela is seventh (Obitel, 2008, 2009,
2010, 2011, 2012).
In spite of that, though, production capacities do not always reect program-
ming distribution within the region. In terms of programming ows, the over-
whelming force has been Mexico, with more than 300 new titles released within
the other six major markets, followed by Colombia with 144 new titles (solely from
the three years 2007, 2010, and 2010), and 101 titles from U.S. Hispanic companies.
There were only 81 Brazilian titles and 2011 released within these markets, distantly
followed by Argentina with 23, and Chile with six (Obitel, 20082012).
Media literature has been focused on the relevance and characteristics of pro-
gramming ows at global levels (Thussu, 2007); however, to understand program-
ming ows at regional levels it may require a more nuanced approach.
Iwabuchi (2002), studying programming ows in the East Asian media markets,
Pinon 223
has oered an interesting template on which to approach the complex historical,
cultural, industrial, and linguistic dynamics shaping media ows at regional levels.
If we look at Latin America, economic power, production capacities, stylistic
sophistication, and quality do not fully explain the dynamics of programming
within the region. Linguistic accents, subregional geographical proximity, migra-
tion, and diasporic populations, as well as a long history of how national popular
culture has traveled from literature, music, radio and lm to television, also have
set up specic paths of media ows. To understand programming distribution the
following sections on exhibition and consumption oer some insight on the struc-
tural nature of the industrialculturallinguistic dynamics that support regional
programming ows.
Table 4. New titles released in the main Latin American markets from 2007 to 2012 by
number of titles.
Exports
Imports Argentina Brazil Chile Colombia
a
Mexico U.S. Hispanic Venezuela
a
Argentina 33 0 22 44 14 0
Brazil 8 2 1 7 0 4
Chile 6 34 13 66 42 1
Colombia 4 2 4 29 12 4
Mexico 1 1 0 5 16 1
U.S. Hispanic 1 6 0 27 122 14
Venezuela 3 5 0 46 32 17
Total 23 81 6 114
a
300 101 24
a
In the case of Colombia, data from 2008 and 2009 are unavailable, although the country still is the second
largest exporter in the region. In the case of Venezuela there is data missing for 2007 and 2008.
Source: Obitel (20082012).
Table 3. Number of production hours of the main markets in the region from 2007 to 2011.
Prod. Hours Argentina Brazil Chile Colombia Mexico U.S. Hispanic Venezuela
2007 1,144 1,720 1,071 986 1,195 1,187
2008 1,597 2,026 667 1,612 1,248
2009 1,228 1,605 644 1,582 833 1,218
2010 1,035 1,288 671 1,671 1,194 911 380
2011 1,094 1,462 717 1,065 2,133 837 641
Total 6,098 8,101 3,770 3,722* 7,716 5,016 2,239*
*Total only from three years of information available.
Transnational circuits of programming exhibition
The increasing number of television networks across this newly fragmented regio-
nal landscape has triggered the need for more content. Then the amount of ows
within the region, from one country to another, may conceal the dynamics behind
who is selling what to whom and why. The intensity of regional programming ows
is the result of new networks seeking cheap accessible content to meet competition
at home, while through exclusive agreements the hegemonic networks look to
secure sources of successful programming from overseas. This competitive envir-
onment of exportimport programming has produced particular institutional
industrial routes drawn by strategic agreements and alliances among competing
networks that often mirror allied networks in other countries, an industrialinsti-
tutional television landscape that I call circuits of exhibition.
A key circuit of exhibition is tied to the increasingly relevant television program-
ming ows coming from the U.S. Hispanic industry to the region. A Program
License Agreement (PLA) signed between Univision, Televisa, and Venevision in
1992 has had long-lasting eects on the U.S. Spanish television industry. With the
PLA, Univision got exclusive rights to Televisas and Venevisions programming
for 15 years (Clemens, 2006, October 16). With a U.S. demographic of two-thirds
of U.S. Hispanics of Mexican descent, Univision was able to gain prots with an
audience loyal to Televisas telenovelas. Early on, executives from Telemundo
recognized the need to successfully appeal to the large U.S. Mexican constituency.
Since the early 1990s, the Hispanic network sought to cultivate a relationship with
TV Azteca in order to have access to programming with Mexican appeal (Financial
News, 1999). Then during the 1990s, in Telemundo TV Azteca found a window for
its programs, competing directly with Televisas programming from Univision.
Argos, an independent producer for TV Aztecas telenovelas, became an important
source of ctional programming across borders. In 2001, the launch of the Azteca
America network as the window for TV Azteca programming distribution in the
United States severed the programming relationship with Telemundo. However,
the production style of Mexican Argos remained present with the coproduction
relationship established between the independent house and Telemundo in 2000
(Sutter, 2000). During the decade of the 2000s, the media war across borders was
fought in Mexico and the United States through three circuits of exhibition:
TelevisaUnivision, ArgosTelemundo, and TV AztecaAzteca America.
The U.S. Hispanic industrys new strategies to co-opt audiences at regional and
global levels extended this cross-border circuit of exhibition with the integration of
the Colombian industry and audience as a new link within the chain of transnational
distribution. Since the early 2000s, Telemundo has sought a strategy of coproduc-
tion with the Colombian independent production houses Radio y Televisio n
Interamericana (RTI) and Caracol TV (PR Newswire, 2001). The success of the
telenovela coproduction Pasion de Gavilanes, in 2003, paved the way for
Telemundos long-standing relationship with RTI, triggering the purchase of 40%
of the Colombian producer by its Hispanic partner in 2006. While Caracol TV
Pinon 225
abandoned the coproduction relationship early on, the network strengthened its
position as a distributor of RTI and Telemundo productions by providing a crucial
window for exhibition. A countermove was made by Univision, which reached
programming agreements with the competing Colombian network RCN by schedul-
ing its Colombian telenovelas on Univisions sister network, UniMa s (formerly
Telefutura) (Business Wire, 2001). Such new circuits of exhibition reenacted the
Colombian rivalry between RCN and Caracol TV through the television windows
of Univision/UniMa s versus Telemundo. Aregional circuit of exhibition was cemen-
ted by the programming agreement reached between Televisa and RCN (EFE News
Service, 2010), while Mexican Cadena Tres/Argos and Caracol TV have reached
several coproduction agreements (D az, 2012). These corporate agreements created
two axes of programming ows, as circuits of exhibition, namely Univision
TelevisaRCNversus TelemundoArgos/Cadena TresCaracol TV, which all reect
the increasing dynamism of the Miami, Mexico, and Bogota media nodes.
In Brazil, Globo TV is the hegemonic television power (Rego, 2011); from 2007
to 2011 the network had no single foreign ctional program in its own lineup
(Obitel.net). Globo TV is a leading force in telenovela production and distribution
in the world television marketplace (Rego and La Patina, 2007), and its telenovelas
have been recognized for their high production values with several international
Emmy Awards and nominations. However, the linguistic and cultural properties of
Globos telenovelas have made their penetration unevenly felt throughout the
region. Globo TVs telenovelas are very successful in the Southern Cone, a sub-
region with commercial, cultural, and historic ties, where Brazilian ction is highly
visible in Argentinas, Chiles, and Uruguays broadcasting networks (Obitel; Rego
and La Patina, 2007: 90). But the titles exported by Globo TV to the rest of the
region are relatively lower than the ones achieved by its U.S. Hispanic, Mexican,
and Colombian competitor networks. However, the ubiquity of Globo TV is
apparent by reaching coproduction deals and programming agreements with
domestic competing networks across the whole region.
In Argentina, the dominant position of Telefe and Canal Trece (Artear) as
producers of successful original content and formats for the hemisphere is chal-
lenged by a more modest Channel 9 with Televisas and Telemundos program-
ming. While Telefe and Canal Trece have also included imported programming in
their lineups to a much lesser degree, what distinguishes both networks is their
relationships with independent producers, in particular Telefe with Cris Morena/
RGB and Underground and El Trece with Polka and Ideas del Sur. In Chile, while
the public network TVN has largely relied on the success of its original program-
ming, it has become an exporter, in contrast to the importer La Red, which trad-
itionally relies on Televisas programming to survive. While both Chilevisio n and
Megavisio n have produced original programming, they also have a mixed import
export model with Chilevisio n relying on Telemundos programming and
Megavisio n on Televisas decisions that also reinforce the distinctiveness of each
television channel and underscore the complex transnational hemispheric
landscape.
The television industry in Venezuela has been aected by the complex political
scenario in the country, which has had two eects: the recent decrease of national
production and the cementing of the strategic place of Venezuelan assets in the
United States. The closing of RCTV as a broadcasting network is mirrored by the
increasing production of Venevision in Miami. Venevision has a mixed import
export model with the increasing inclusion of Televisas programming, followed by
that of RCNs and Caracols. While Televen, a traditional net importer, has mostly
relied on Telemundos programming, it has also incorporated programming from
Televisa, TV Azteca, Caracol TV, RCN, Globo TV, Telefe, and Rede Record.
Circuits of exhibitions show, on one hand, the surge of corporate chains based
on alliances, as well as in rivalries of television networks across the region; while on
the other hand, they set up distinctive dynamics of programming dierentiation
that allow a particular television brand to be identied with certain production
styles. While the main television networks try to rely mainly on the production
output from their own studios or their allied independent production houses, for
second tier television networks access to cheap programming from the region, with
certain degree of the audiences acceptance, has become a secure investment for
sustainability based on the logic of a distribution business model.
Patterns of consumption: The national versus the regional
The most important consumption pattern within the largest regional television
markets is that as long as national programming is available, it has much greater
viewership than foreign programming. Audiences preferences for local program-
ming are illustrated by a programming strategy that consistently schedules national
productions in primetime and programming imports in afternoons or late nights.
Table 5. Origins of the most-watched fictional programs in the main markets for the most
recent five years (20072011).
Most watched
20072011 Argentinean Brazilian Chilean Colombian Mexican
U.S.
Hispanic Venezuelan
Argentina 46 1 2 1
Brazil 50
Chile 50
Colombia 50
Mexico 48 2
U.S. Hisp 44 6
Venezuela
a
11 2 2 15
a
Only from 2009, 2010, 2011.
Pinon 227
With the exception of the U.S. Hispanic market, in Argentina, Brazil, Chile,
Colombia, Mexico, and Venezuela the most-watched programs are overwhelmingly
made nationally. Table 5 oers data about the national origin of the 10 most-
watched ctional programs per year within these markets, focusing on the 50
most-watched titles from 2007 to 2011.
From 2007 to 2011, in Argentina, out of the 50 most-watched programs, only
four non-Argentinean productions made it to the top 10 yearly most-watched lists.
Among the 46 Argentinean titles, only one was coproduced with a foreign partner,
Suena Conmigo, produced by Televisa, Nickelodeon, and the Argentinean Illusion
Studios in 2010. For Brazil, the numbers are even more telling, as 100% of the top
50 titles were made in Brazil. Chile reveals similar results, as 100% of the 50 most-
watched titles were Chilean. Only one coproduction with foreign partners attracted
mass audiences, Don Amor, a 2008 Puerto Rican coproduction of Canal 13 and
Canal 6. In Colombia, all the 50 most-watched titles were homemade. However,
there were some successful coproductions with Argentinean producers, RCN
VistaPolka (Amas de Casa Desesperadas), Caracol TVTelfe (Montecristo) in
2007, RCN (Mujeres Asesinas, a Polka format) in 2008, and TelemundoRTI
Antena 3 (La Reina del Sur) in 2011. It is also important to note that among the
most-watched programs is ABC/Disneys Greys Anatomy, localized as A Corazon
Abierto, by Vista Producciones for RCN, considered the most successful produc-
tion in Colombian history (Henao, 2010). In Mexico, 48 out of the 50 most-
watched programs were Mexican productions. The two foreign programs were
Telemundo productions with well-known Mexican actors. Among the 48
Mexican productions, only one was a coproduction with a foreign partner, Los
Exitosos Perez by Televisa and Endemol-Argentina in 2009. In Venezuela, the
falling number of national production last year has changed some consumption
patterns. Out of the 30 most-watched titles for which we have information, from
the years 2009 to 2011, only half were national (15 titles), with Venevision showing
an overwhelmingly dominant position with 12 titles. Other Venezuelan producers
include Tigritos Media, Grupo Latina, and Turiamo Producciones PNI. In con-
trast, the United States reverses all the regional Latin American trends. Of the 50
most-watched titles over the last 5 years, 44 were non-US productions, all from
Televisa. The Mexican network provided at least 90% of the most-watched pro-
gramming in that market through Univision.
If we leave aside the U.S. Hispanic market, out of the 280 titles coming from the
most-watched list in Argentina (50), Brazil (50), Chile (50), Colombia (50), Mexico
(50), and Venezuela (30), 259 titles were national productions. There were only
21 nonnational titles, and 16 of them were shown in Venezuela in the last 2 years.
For the last 5 years in the Argentinean, Brazilian, Chilean, Colombian, and
Mexican markets, only six nonnational productions emerged as most-watched pro-
grams. All of this conrms the notion that for mass consumption, national pro-
duction, when available, overwhelmingly drives the television industry.
Another important trend emerging from the most-watched programs is the con-
centration of power in certain television networks. Out of the 57 television
networks from the region, only 12 of themCanal 13, Caracol TV, Chilevisio n, El
Trece, Globo TV, RCN, Telefe, Televisa, TVN, RCN, Univision, and
Venevisionrepresent 98% of the most-watched programs within the seven mar-
kets (Obitel 20082012). These networks are in turn led by the overwhelm-
ingly hegemonic position of Globo TV, Televisa, and Venevision within their
respective domestic markets, a position that has been crucial for their long-
standing position as the main worldwide Latin American exporters of television
programming.
These numbers show, on one hand, how audiences in the main Latin American
television markets overwhelmingly prefer national production if available; but on
the other, as Georgiou (2006) suggests, the transnational character of ethnic/immi-
grant media industries through the consumption patterns in the U.S. television
market. The notion of cultural proximity transcends exclusive cultural links to
the host country, by keeping dynamic and quite alive translocal cultural consump-
tion practices in which television is just one visible example. The fact that two-
thirds of the Hispanic population is of Mexican descent set up a condition in which
Mexican Televisa has produced 44 of the 50 most-watched ctional programs in the
U.S. Spanish-language television market. Sinclair and Cunningham (2000) under-
score that despite the complex process of cultural negotiation, resistance, and
adaptation in host countries, diasporic populations are actively sought by trans-
national media corporations conceived as potentially protable audiences: that is
whatever collective audience preferences and desires they might be, they are still
shaped commercially and ideologically by markets for certain form of genre by
media corporations (2000: 17).
Changes in the landscape
In the last years there have been some dramatic changes and possible re-accom-
modations of these forged corporate relationships. Access to Telemundos produc-
tions for Mexican audiences has dramatically increased the visibility of the
Hispanic network, while also augmenting the overall share of Canal 9 by 15%
since Televisa began including a 4-h block of Telemundos programming (De La
Fuente, 2009). This trend should have cross-border impact in the near future. At
the same time, the recent launch of MundoFox is changing the balance of power.
RCN will drop its alliance with Univision because of its corporate relation with
Fox, and RTI and Caracol TV have signed important agreements with Univision
and Televisa. The results of these realignments are yet to be seen, but they certainly
will have ripple eects throughout the whole region.
Conclusions
Sweeping neoliberal policies of deregulation, privatization, and liberalization
brought horizontal and vertical integration, resulting in the strengthening of dom-
inant corporations but also creating spaces for the emergence of new competitors,
Pinon 229
such as television networks, independent content producers, and the penetration of
foreign media corporations. While proximate cultural properties of programs lar-
gely drive the strategies of commercial networks, through audiences preferences
for the national or regional, the construction of the desired proximate cultural
ctional program to be sold is increasingly built on top of a transnational infra-
structure of capital, production houses, ideas, stories, talent, and professionals.
The penetration of global media corporations, foreign capital and investments
within television networks or local content producers as part of national broad-
casting players are growing under the public radar, and the embrace of corporate
identities and programming production is tied to local and national cultures. While
ownership and capital needs to accommodate each national broadcasting legal
framework, strategies of production reveal some of the most interesting cases of
how transnationalism works to secure programming rights at corporate levels while
also ensuring cultural appeal to local and regional audiences.
While remaking stories has been an old strategy in ctional production, the inten-
sity with which successful formats are produced, along with the increasing omni-
presence of Argentinean and Colombia ideas, followed by Venezuela, Chile, and
Brazil, does not have industrial precedence. The routes of innovation seem to be tied
to particular industrial environments in which independent producers and compe-
tition among television networks have ourished. This trend has been accompanied
with coproduction agreements that allow the owners of original ideas a stake in
programs while accessing foreign markets with proximate cultural proclivities.
The production of culturally proximate products is no longer the prerogative of
local or national producers, but rather transnational owners, investors, idea cre-
ators, and innovators, as coproducing partners are entering transnational corpor-
ations in domestic markets as rightful content competitors for local audiences. The
increasingly interdependent relationship among capital, copyrights, ideas, and pro-
fessionals is producing a hybrid industrial schema where the foreign not only col-
laborates with but is also already part of the national. While cultural proximity is a
paramount factor for a programs appeal, this is a televisual cultural proximity that
includes in many cases certain formulas of success, familiar narratives, and well-
known talent, and such cultural proximity is industrially manufactured. The idea of
the local or the national has long been manufactured in television through long-
standing social and cultural hierarchies that include some and exclude others based
on their assumed commercial advantages. National television corporations crafted
production styles and narratives that became proximate to audiences, and these are
increasingly embraced by transnational players: televisual cultural proximity is no
longer the privilege of national players.
Furthermore, the increasing presence of ctional programming tailored for
regional and global success is also making inroads in audience preferences across
the hemisphere. One way in which theses dierent industrial schemes are interwo-
ven has been in the production strategy of manufacturing ction with possible
global appeal that includes multinational casts and assumed neutral linguis-
tic accents. As exemplied by the Miami mode of production (Acosta-Alzuru,
2009; Mato, 2005) with multinational casts and neutral accents and narratives
aiming to reach the nationally heterogeneous U.S. Latino population, this mode
has increased in Latin American markets over the years. However, this transnational
strategy with a culturally regional face is also crafted by considering the purchasing
power of certain domestic markets. As with the manufacturing of national televisual
culturally proximate programs, the creation of regionally manufactured culturally
proximate programs has followed the power of certain industries and certain markets
in which the U.S. Hispanic, Mexican, and Colombian have come to the forefront.
Havens (2006) argues that when it comes to preferences in television program-
ming, cultural proximity is not divined from viewers, but articulated by program-
ming executives worldwide (4). An important argument in this article is that
regional programming counterows within the Latin American space are charac-
terized by a chain of transnational circuits of manufactured televisual proximities.
The power of these proximities is felt within the circuit of programming exhibition
in which certain television networks establish programming agreements with other
television networks across the whole hemisphere, not only mirroring domestic
rivalries at transnational levels, but more importantly ensuring the visibility of
their production styles and narrative strategies overseas. Programming ows
have long revealed the specic weight of certain countries and their industries
across the region with Brazil, Mexico, Venezuela, Colombia, and Argentina leading
as programming producers and exporters. I would also add that the very profes-
sionals in production teams with very specic formulaic cultural cues and narrative
strategies cemented a specic familiar cultural product for mass consumption. The
availability of ctional programming from their national corporations has secured
the primetime slots and the familiarity of certain televisual formulas in these dom-
inant media markets. While programming ows among countries oer a snapshot
of distribution patterns, it is through understanding the circuits of exhibitions that
we can temporarily set aside the idea of the nation and instead think about the
relationships among certain corporations within the region. The prominence of
certain corporations over others makes possible the visibility of certain programs
within a transnational chain. These alliances have also ensured that some narra-
tives from certain countries become familiar and eventually a second-best choice in
programming consumption.
While consumption patterns seem to underscore the power of the local or the
resilience of the national in ctional programming preferences, they also reveal the
manufactured character of the local or national. Audiences preferences across
the dierent markets are highly concentrated in a handful of dominant corporate
players: Globo TV, Televisa, Univision, RCN, Caracol, Telefe, El Trece, TVN, and
Venevision. The overwhelming dominance of corporations such as Univision,
Televisa, Venevision, and Globo TV in their domestic markets over local/national
players underscores, among other factors, the industrial character of the televisu-
ally proximate ctional cultural product. Arguably, the position of TV Azteca,
Bandeirantes, Televen, Chilevisio n, or Canal 9 as networks lagging in audience
preferences can be explained by the industrial-structural failure in capturing the
Pinon 231
televisual formulas, talent, professionals, and narratives that have made their com-
petitors so successful.
At the same time, circuits of exhibitions have enabled familiarity with the pro-
gramming of certain content producers and networks, becoming in many cases a
second-best option in subregional or regional contexts. At some geographic-
cultural levels and obeying the combined conditions of cross-border/subregional
markets, certain corporations have became the second and sometimes rst-best
option after national productions, as exemplied by Globo TVs programming
in Argentina, Uruguay, and Chile; RCNs and Caracol TVs production in
Venezuela; and Televisa in the United States. In the construction of regionally
cultural proximate products, programming from Televisa, Globo TV, or
Venevision became the most visible face of a familiar televisual grammar through-
out the region; the production strategies of the Telemundo network with Mexican
and Colombian content producers and networks are positioning the U.S. Hispanic
network as a new familiar face at hemispheric levels.
Furthermore, a particular trend within the last decade has been the incursion of
U.S. global conglomerates within the telenovela industry, long considered a Latin
American genre, where Sony, Viacom/MTV and Nickelodeon, Disney/ABC,
Comcast/NBC, and NewsCorp/Fox are producing series and telenovelas with
local talent and local narratives in Latin American countries. They have wrapped
their ctional programming in national or regional cultural avor with great suc-
cess and visibility. The traditional analysis of programming ows from the West to
the Rest is complicated by the emergence of transnational players operating in the
Global South. While culture is the leading factor in making content relevant for
audiences within the region, Latin American television production strategies and
programming is increasingly the product of an economic, corporate, and industrial
infrastructure integrated by national producers, transnational investors, and global
media corporations.
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