Actualidad del mercado del libro: el caso argentino

Over the last thirty years, a series of rapid changes have taken place and, as a result, the book market has experienced a reconfiguration process. The present study focuses on the case of the Argentinian market; however, we are not trying to imply it is an isolated and encapsulated market that possesses unique features but rather trying to understand how and under which conflicting terms global issues were resolved within a specific context. To that end, we analyze the following topics: an ever-growing market concentration revolving around a few companies which, combined, account for a transnational oligopoly known for its fluidity when it comes to exchanges with foreign countries and for the imposition of high profitability criteria; the development of new technologies and its impact and visible effects in book production; the emergence of small and middle-sized publishing houses (independent, alternative, or marginal according to their marketplace positioning) that have managed to find more or less profitable niches in terms of genres, themes, and authors that don not attract the interest of the big corporations; the consolidation of new types of publishers that do not come from high culture backgrounds; the new market openings that derive from superstores and online sales; the new methods for book trading through “colonization” of reference areas; and, in correlation, the explosion of new genres and formats.