The Political Economy of Disney The Cultural Capitalism of Hollywood [Hardcover]

This book sheds new light on the socio-economic impact of multinational corporations. Combining Cultural Studies and International Political Economy, it provides a revealing analysis of the Walt Disney Company, and by extension the wider Hollywood studio system. It does so by examining the cultural and economic forces powering the industry's expansion, the 'civilisation' that Disney disseminates, and the various ways that societies beyond the USA have adopted facets of the Hollywood productions to which they are exposed. Identifying both the strengths and the weaknesses of these transnational firms, it demonstrates the significance of their contribution to American power and predominance.

Alexandre Bohas is a Lecturer at Universit? Paris 1 Panth?on-Sorbonne, France, and a specialist in International Political Economy. His research deals with cultural globalization, transnational companies and American power.

In this contrarian, critical, and wide-ranging work, Alexandre Bohas develops a rigorous, pluralistic and powerful cultural political economy approach to Hollywood. He shows how the Walt Disney Corporation organizes material and intellectual capital to shape socio-cultural imaginaries, manage tensions in a creative economy, compete globally, and contribute to US hegemony. (Bob Jessop, Distinguished Professor of Sociology, Lancaster University, UK)

Alexandre Bohas has given us an empirically rich account of the political economy of Hollywood in general and Disney in particular. It also makes a very considerable contribution to the conceptual development of cultural approaches in International Political Economy, showing admirably the intertwining of commercial strategies, symbolic constructions and audiencels½