The protection and promotion of cultural diversity in a digital networked environment: mapping possible advances towards coherence

doi:10.1017/CBO9780511792496.011

9 - The protection and promotion of cultural diversity in a digital networked environment: mapping possible advances towards coherence

from PART III - ‘Trade and…’ linkages

Published online by Cambridge University Press: 26 April 2011

Mira Burri-Nenova ,

Christoph Beat Graber and

Thomas Steiner

Edited by

Thomas Cottier and

Panagiotis Delimatsis

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Mira Burri-Nenova: Affiliation:
University of Bern, Switzerland
Christoph Beat Graber: Affiliation:
University of Lucerne, Switzerland
Thomas Steiner: Affiliation:
University of Lucerne, Switzerland
Thomas Cottier: Affiliation:
World Trade Institute
Panagiotis Delimatsis: Affiliation:
Universiteit van Tilburg, The Netherlands

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Summary

KEY MESSAGES

∙ Neither the WTO nor UNESCO currently offers appropriate solutions to the trade and culture predicament that would allow for efficient protection and promotion of cultural diversity.

∙ The trade and culture discourse is over-politicised and owing to the related path dependencies, a number of feasible solutions presently appear blocked.

∙ The digital networked environment has profoundly changed the ways cultural content is created, distributed, accessed and consumed, and may thus offer good reasons to reassess and readjust the present models of governance.

∙ Access to information appears to be the most appropriate focus of the discussions with a view to protecting and promoting cultural diversity in the new digital media setting, both in local and global contexts.

∙ This new focal point also demands broadening and interconnecting the policy discussions, which should go beyond the narrow scope of audiovisual media services, but cautiously take account of the developments at the network and applications levels, as well as in other domains, most notably protection of intellectual property rights.

∙ There are various ways in which the WTO can be made more conducive to cultural policy considerations and these include improved and updated services classifications; enhanced legal certainty with regard to digitally transferred goods and services; and incorporation of rules on subsidies for services and on competition.

Introduction

Cultural diversity as a concept and as a distinct public policy objective has substantially gained in significance in the past decade and its role is likely to be augmented in the years to come.

Type: Chapter
Information: The Prospects of International Trade Regulation
From Fragmentation to Coherence
, pp. 359 - 393

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511792496.011 [Opens in a new window]

Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Print publication year: 2011

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