Abstract
The format revolution (TV formula programmes adapted to local conditions) began to gather pace barely 15 years ago but is now an industry with an income of several billion dollars per annum. Around a third of primetime commercial TV in the United States and Germany (and probably in many other countries too) is a format. Game shows, talent shows and reality shows have now been joined by fiction formats. One of the consequences of the format revolution has been the globalization of television. The theoretical underpinning of Chalaby’s valuable book is provided by the global value chain theory and his book traces the development of a new global value chain emphasizing the observation of empirical reality in the manner of Braudel and the Annales School. The emphasis on the analysis of the concrete is a welcome corrective to much work on media globalization that is long on theory and short on fact. The book is divided into three sections: the first concerns trade, the second the format business and the third the content of TV formats. The globalization of television formats is made possible by the development of a regulatory regime of intellectual property rights that can be enforced around the world. The United Kingdom has emerged as the world’s leading format exporter although the business has evolved so that Intellectual Property (IP) holders do not license their shows to local producers but now prefer to make the local version of the programmes themselves ushering in a new age of transnational production companies. Chalaby concludes by arguing that there is evidence to suggest that TV formats tend to benefit local cultures rather than destroy them, and so the globalization of TV formats and the development of transnational media firms specializing in format production do not necessarily result in a homogeneous global culture. Whether or not Chalaby adequately considers the cultural influence of the formats themselves should not detract from what is a very welcome, well-researched and theoretically sophisticated account that traces the inner logic of media globalization.