Why do media companies behave the way they do, and how does Hesmondhalgh explain the strategies the cultural industries use to minimise risk and maximise audiences?
Media industries: cultural industries (David Hesmondhalgh). The high-risk, high-reward nature of cultural production, and the strategies firms use to minimise risk and maximise audiences: integration and conglomeration, formatting, stars, genres, franchises and the tension with creativity.
An Eduqas A-Level Media Studies guide to the cultural industries (David Hesmondhalgh). Covers the high-risk nature of cultural production, and how firms minimise risk and maximise audiences through integration, conglomeration and formatting with stars, genres and franchises, with the application skills the media industries questions reward.
Reviewed by: AI editorial process; not yet individually human-reviewed
Have a quick question? Jump to the Q&A page
Jump to a section
What this dot point is asking
Eduqas names David Hesmondhalgh as the theorist for the cultural industries. His argument explains why media companies behave as they do: cultural production is high-risk, so firms use a recognisable set of strategies to minimise risk and maximise audiences. You need those strategies, the ability to apply them to the products you have studied, and the judgement of whether risk-minimisation comes at the expense of creativity. Industries is examined in Component 1 Section B and studied in depth across the forms in Component 2.
The answer
Cultural production is high-risk
This single fact explains the rest of the theory. Because most products lose money, firms organise everything around reducing risk and maximising the chance of a hit, which is why the cultural industries look so different from a craft or a one-off art form.
Minimising risk and maximising audiences
Hesmondhalgh identifies recognisable strategies the cultural industries use to minimise risk and maximise audiences:
- Integration and conglomeration: owning many businesses and several stages of the chain (vertical and horizontal integration) to control the process and spread risk across a large portfolio of products.
- Formatting: relying on proven, repeatable elements, stars, genres, sequels, franchises and adaptations, that audiences already recognise and trust.
- Maximising audiences: aiming products at the widest possible market to spread costs and improve the odds that the hits will cover the failures.
The result is an industry that strongly favours the safe, familiar and repeatable.
The tension between risk and innovation
Crucially, the industries also depend on innovation and difference, because audiences want novelty too and a market saturated with identical products fails. So there is a constant tension between repetition (to manage risk) and difference (to attract audiences), which links directly to Neale on genre as repetition and difference. This tension is why even a franchise or a formatted title must feel somewhat new while staying recognisable.
Evaluating Hesmondhalgh
Hesmondhalgh explains the dominance of the safe and repeatable, but a balanced answer notes that independent and public service producers, and digital participation, allow more creative risk, and that innovation is still essential. This connects to Curran and Seaton on diverse ownership widening creativity, and is the kind of link Component 2 rewards.
Examples in context
A strong answer names the specific strategies Hesmondhalgh identifies and applies them to product detail, then judges the tension between risk-minimisation and creativity. Confirm the current Eduqas in-depth and set products with your centre, since the prescribed lists are updated periodically.
Try this
Q1. Explain why Hesmondhalgh describes cultural production as high-risk. [5 marks]
- What the marker wants. Uncertain demand, expensive to make but cheap to copy, most products fail while a few hits pay for the rest (AO1).
Q2. Explain how the producers of one product you have studied minimise risk, using Hesmondhalgh. [10 marks]
- Cue. Name the strategies (integration, conglomeration, formatting with stars, genres, franchises, maximising audiences) and apply them to the product, noting the need for some difference (AO2).
Exam-style practice questions
Practice questions written in the style of WJEC Eduqas exam questions on this dot point, with worked answer explainers. The year tag is the paper they imitate, not the source.
Eduqas C1 202210 marksExplain how the producers of one of the media products you have studied minimise risk, using Hesmondhalgh's theory. [10]Show worked answer →
An Explain question (AO1 and AO2). The marker rewards accurate use of Hesmondhalgh applied to the product, not a general account of the industry.
Method. Set out Hesmondhalgh: cultural production is high-risk, so the cultural industries minimise risk and maximise audiences through integration, conglomeration and formatting (stars, genres, franchises, sequels, adaptations).
Develop. Apply to the product: which strategies its producers use (a known franchise, a recognisable star, a proven genre, a cross-platform release). The top band names the strategy and ties it to specific product detail.
Eduqas C2 202315 marksDiscuss the extent to which the cultural industries minimise risk at the expense of creativity. Refer to the in-depth products you have studied. [15]Show worked answer →
An extended response (AO1 and AO2), shown at 15 marks (Eduqas Component 2 questions range higher; this site caps practice items at 20), marked by levels of response.
For. Hesmondhalgh argues firms minimise risk through franchises, sequels, stars, genres and integration, favouring the safe and repeatable over the new. Apply to named in-depth products (for example a franchise or formatted title).
Against. The industries still need innovation and difference (Neale) to attract audiences; independent and public service producers, and digital participation, allow creative risk. Link to Curran and Seaton, then judge.
Related dot points
- Media industries: production, distribution and circulation. Vertical and horizontal integration, conglomerates and synergy, convergence and technological change, and the difference between commercial and public service funding models.
An Eduqas A-Level Media Studies guide to production, distribution and circulation. Covers vertical and horizontal integration, conglomerates and synergy, convergence and technological change, and commercial versus public service funding models, with the application skills the media industries questions reward across Components 1 and 2.
- Media industries: power and media industries (Curran and Seaton). The concentration of ownership in a few conglomerates, the pursuit of profit and power, the resulting narrowing of variety, and the case that diversity and alternative ownership widen creativity and democracy.
An Eduqas A-Level Media Studies guide to power and media industries (Curran and Seaton). Covers the concentration of ownership in a few conglomerates, the pursuit of profit and power, the narrowing of variety, and the case for diversity and alternative ownership, with the application skills the media industries questions reward.
- Media industries: regulation (Livingstone and Lunt). The role of regulators (Ofcom, IPSO, the BBFC, the ASA), the tension between protecting citizens and serving consumer choice and freedom of expression, and the difficulty of regulating globalised, converged media.
An Eduqas A-Level Media Studies guide to media regulation (Livingstone and Lunt). Covers the role of regulators (Ofcom, IPSO, the BBFC, the ASA), the tension between protecting citizens and serving consumer choice and freedom of expression, and the difficulty of regulating globalised, converged media, with the application skills the questions reward.
- Media industries: applying the media industries theories. Choosing and applying Curran and Seaton, Hesmondhalgh and Livingstone and Lunt to the products you have studied, linking ownership, risk and regulation, and reaching the judgement the extended responses reward.
An Eduqas A-Level Media Studies guide to applying the media industries theories. Covers choosing and applying Curran and Seaton, Hesmondhalgh and Livingstone and Lunt to products, linking ownership, risk and regulation, and reaching the judgement, with the exam skills Components 1 and 2 reward.
- Media language: genre theory (Steve Neale). Genre as a repertoire of elements reworked through repetition and difference, how genres serve audience expectation and industry risk, and how genres hybridise and evolve.
An Eduqas A-Level Media Studies guide to genre theory. Covers Steve Neale's argument that genre is a process working through repetition and difference, the repertoire of elements, how genre serves audience expectation and industry risk, and how genres hybridise, with the analysis skills the media language questions reward.
Sources & how we know this
- Eduqas A Level Media Studies (A680QS) specification — Eduqas (WJEC) (2023)
- The Cultural Industries — David Hesmondhalgh (2018)