• 1 We have chosen to use quotation marks around the terms “independence” and “independent” to show tha (...)

1Claims of independence are increasingly common in the fields of symbolic production, and in particular in the publishing industry. Many publishing houses and bookshops describe themselves as “independent”1 in a context of economic rationalization that they see as a threat to their autonomy, such as it is defined by the sociology of culture. It is particularly interesting to contrast these two similar notions—one (independence) evoking “indigenous” categories used by actors in the field, the other (autonomy) referring to the intellectual sphere. According to Pierre Bourdieu (1996: 61), autonomy refers to a given field claiming the right to define the principles of its own legitimacy for itself, or to a social sphere affirming its independence from external (political and economic) powers. In the sociology of culture, the notion of autonomy is more often used to describe the production of intellectuals and artists than that of the intermediaries who publish or publicize their creations. However, the growing importance of these intermediaries in the field of cultural production (Jeanpierre & Roueff 2014) makes this a prime site for the observation and understanding of the reconfigurations of the different sectors of the economy of symbolic goods (Duval & Garcia 2012).

• 2 Independence is defined in minimal terms in the publishing sector and in the bookshop industry, as (...)
• 3 Publishers and booksellers are quite similar in their attitude towards independence. Although books (...)

2This article aims to contribute to reflections on the notion of autonomy by questioning the uses of the term independence, which has become omnipresent in cultural sectors (Hesmondhalgh 1999; Hibbett 2005), and analyzing the links between the two notions and the realities to which they refer. In so doing, the goal is to shed light on the issues surrounding the mobilization of the theme of independence by two central categories of actor in the publishing industry: publishers and booksellers. In order to achieve this, we will draw on a study (see the presentation of the methodology below) conducted with structures that are legally independent, i.e., those who control their capital,2 in the sector of generalist publishing and bookshops. These actors face similar problems while occupying different positions in the book chain.3

• 4 For a genealogy of the successive meanings and usages of the term “independence” and its associated (...)
• 5 Rhetoric is used here in the sense of the mobilization of an intentionally persuasive discourse.

4Yet independence is a vague term. Definitions often lack precision and do not allow us to clarify the positions of those who use the term in a given social space.4 The elasticity of the term, in historical, geographical, and sectorial terms, raises a certain number of problems while also presenting the benefit of being able to bring together actors with various characteristics and interests (Habrand 2017). Revisiting the origins of the rhetorical uses5 of the notion of independence in the publishing sector will allow us to begin by clarifying these ambiguities before trying to disentangle the main elements of this polysemic category. We will then see how independence is mobilized as an effective resource in different social spaces and contexts, and what issues and limitations it encounters.

• 6 This expression refers to the structure of the market, typical of culture industries, in which a sm (...)
• 7 Production practically tripled between 1970 and 2007. Source: BnF/Département du Dépôt légal.
• 8 Fabrice Piault (2018). “Les 200 premiers éditeurs français.” Livres Hebdo, 1179, 22 June.

6It is important to remember the general context in which claims of independence occur, in a sector that has gone through significant transformations over the past thirty years (Mollier 2015a). Since the 1980s, the movement towards the concentration of capital has increased rapidly and become more international, leading to a larger proportion of major players at all levels of the book production chain, the decline of family-run publishing houses, and an increase in the number of small entities on the fringes of the oligopoly.6 The rise in the volume of production (81,263 books were published in 2017 in France, all sectors combined7), the increasing importance of bestsellers, a drop in the average size of print runs, and the acceleration of turnover in bookshops have all led to the marginalization of more fragile actors to the benefit of structures that have a privileged access to the market because they control distribution. In France, the ten largest publishing businesses were responsible for 88.9% of publishing in 2016, while the number of independent publishing houses (in terms of capital) went from 144 to 110 in two years.8

• 9 Pierre Bourdieu (1992) defines the field of restricted production as being made up of cultural acto (...)
• 10 Established in 2003, this book fair brings together around fifty small, independent (in terms of ca (...)

7The key elements that make up the publisher’s role in the field of limited production9—the time spent discovering authors and balancing mainstream and more niche texts, which are elements associated with autonomy—have suffered from this convergence of evolutions. As Pierre Bourdieu argued (1996: 345) the division of the market into two, characteristic of the field of cultural production since the mid-nineteenth century, seems at risk of disappearing due to the increasing interconnectedness between the worlds of art and money. He pursued his observation in a later article dedicated to publishing, where he argued that “acquisition and integration generally result in a reduction of the number and literary autonomy of decision-making entities,” which encourages a “commercial universal” (2008: 145-146). In this context, there has been a growing number of calls for “resistance” within the book chain and a return to the (often mythical) sources of publishing, in other words the organizing values and principles linked to the history of an artistic and intellectual field in its most autonomous phase. These involve the affirmation of a creative logic, a diversity in production that is not subject to the siren calls of commercial success. This presentation made at the alternative book fair L’Autre livre10 is a typical illustration of this:

• 12 The film industry was confronted with competition from major American studios after the First World (...)

8This emphasis on independence can be seen across all markets for symbolic goods in numerous places around the world. Although publishing only became aware of this phenomenon somewhat late in the day—compared with other sectors such as cinema12 or music (where the term “indie” was used from the 1970s)—it was all the more brutal because of the symbolic weight associated with books as vectors of culture and knowledge. A look at the history of the situation will allow us to understand how in France the concept of independence has progressively come to dominate in a sector that was long controlled by family-run businesses.

• 13 The Presses Universitaires de France (PUF) were created in 1921 by a group of professors, as a coop (...)

9Whether in terms of the control of political and religious power through censorship, or economic and financial constraints, the world of the written word has always had to define itself in relation to the external interferences (Jouhaud 2000) that operate at all levels of the book chain between the author and the bookseller. It was in the second half of the nineteenth century, as the field of cultural production (Bourdieu 1996) became progressively more autonomous, that the specific nomos that would feed the complaints of “loss of independence” began to take form. The Dreyfus affair played an important role in this, with intellectuals affirming their independence in opposition to temporal authorities (Charle 1990). The term was later taken up during the inter-war period, as groups of intellectuals mobilized to maintain control over their writings through the Presses Universitaires de France¹³ project (Tesnière 2001). The problem of the economic independence of distributors as a guarantee of the independence of the content produced also applies to the funding of the major encyclopaedic projects of the nineteenth century, from the perspective of the freedom of knowledge, as well as attempts in the 1930s to go against major companies (Douyère 2008). The independence of intellectuals and artists was seen as inseparable from that of the structures that allow them to publish and publicize their works (publishers, art galleries).

• 14 Created secretly during the occupation of France, the Éditions de Minuit then published several boo (...)

10This issue took on new forms after the war. In a context in which the intellectual field was heavily politicized due to the Cold War, and then the war in Algeria and decolonization, the question of engagement became central, closely combining intellectual and political considerations. The “politically engaged” or protagoniste (instigator) publisher (Hage 2016), was the striking figure of the period, particularly around the Éditions de Minuit (Simonin 1994) and François Maspero’s publishing house,14 before a new cycle of economic centralism brought the notions of financial independence and pluralism to the fore in the 1980s. There was once again a slippage from a primarily political definition of independence—as a form of engagement—to a primarily economic definition. The two notions are clearly linked, however, as we can see in the expression “market censorship” (Schiffrin 1999).

• 15 In 2017, Hachette Livre accounted for 39% of the total publishing revenue in France, followed by Ed (...)

11The lasting inscription of independence as a theme can be traced back to the 1990s, however, with the rising awareness of the dominance of publishing groups such as Hachette and Vivendi in France (which would culminate in the partial absorption of the latter by the former in 2004).15 In 1993, Jean-Marie Bouvaist denounced the predatory approach of the major publishing groups in his article “Crise et mutations dans l’édition française.” In 1999, the US publisher André Schiffrin’s L’Édition sans éditeurs became the symbol of resistance against the excesses of capitalism in the publishing industry.

• 16 Retracing the emergence of independent booksellers would require a historical perspective that is t (...)
• 17 On the different terms used to describe bookshops (“traditional,” “genuine,” “independent,” etc.) s (...)
• 18 There are roughly 3,000 independent bookshops in France, covering all kinds of structures, regardle (...)
• 19 Clarisse Normand (2018). “Les 400 premières librairies françaises ?”. Livres Hebdo, 1175, 25 May.
• 20 Brick and mortar bookshops account for 18.5% of retail sales, online structures for 20%. Source: Ob (...)

13In the twentieth century,16 the category of independent booksellers gradually replaced that of traditional booksellers, which were more commercial than cultural (Ozanne 2008), although it still presented the same vagueness of vocabulary.17 The title of independent bookshop18 in fact brings together strongly heterogenous actors, ranging from very large structures—notably regional structures, such as Mollat in Bordeaux (the third biggest bookshop in France with a turnover of nearly €25 million in 201719)—to very small bookshops with limited profit. In spite of these disparities of situation, independent booksellers have come together around the feeling of a threatened identity. Since the 1990s they have protested against Fnac and other major retailers, and from the early 2000s they campaigned against Amazon’s online sales in a context of dwindling market share20. The French booksellers union (SLF), which represents nearly 600 bookshops, thus chose to promote the identity of the “independent bookshop” in 2017, without laying out specific criteria, so that its members (from the chain Gibert Joseph to the neighbourhood bookshop, including publishers’ bookshops) might come together around a certain number of major values (quality, advice, diversity, etc.) summarising “an independent way of practising this trade.”

• 21 Ninety-five per cent of the holding company Actes Sud Participations is owned by Françoise Nyssen a (...)
• 22 Fabrice Piault (2018). “Les 200 premiers éditeurs français.” Livres Hebdo, 1179, 22 June.
• 23 “In publishing houses, the term ‘group’ is banned; ‘ensemble’ is used instead. There are no ‘branch (...)

18The example of Actes Sud is instructive, given that it has been a paragon of independent publishing (its capital is controlled by its founding members21) since its creation in Arles in 1978. Today it is the ninth largest French publisher22 with an annual turnover of €80 million. It has also invested in several other publishing structures—Jacqueline Chambon, Gaïa, Le Rouergue, Textuel, Payot-Rivages…—creating what has to be called a group, although the founding members reject the use of that term. A whole range of euphemisms, whether evoking natural groups (“an ensemble”) or friendship and community (“associated publishers”) have been employed in the media, thus preserving the high-status image of the atypical provincial publisher.23 Should we consider that beyond a certain volume of activity a publishing house can no longer be described as independent? In which case, what criteria should determine the threshold? The vision of the publishing market polarized between increasingly large groups and a myriad of more or less professional small structures leaves little room for medium-sized organizations.

• 24 Quoted in Catherine Andreucci (2006). “Les indépendants veulent du concret.” Livres Hebdo, 666, 17  (...)

19Conversely, some go to great lengths to draw attention to the insecurity of independent actors. Philippe Picquier, for example, the head of the eponymous publishing house [specializing in Asian literature], says, “Fortunately, I have lost part of my independence, and that has allowed me to go further.24” Michel Valensi, who has published works in humanities and literature since 1985 within Éditions de l’éclat, recounts the recurring economic difficulties of structures that operate without any external support:

• 26 The sales representatives are responsible for the commercial representation of a publication in a b (...)
• 27 Established in 1965, the École des loisirs is a renowned publisher of children’s literature in Fran (...)
• 28 The Lang law on fixed book prices gives the publisher the right to set the price for the books they (...)

21Moreover, Christian Robin (2008) argues that independence is nearly always relative: the relationship of dependency that a publishing house has with its sales and distribution suppliers26 leads to a loss of control over its commercial policy (conditions of sale, discount rates, etc.). The children’s book publisher l’École des loisirs27 is, according to these criteria, one of the rare exceptions in being “genuinely” independent, because they have their own team of representatives in bookshops. Similarly, a bookshop, especially a small one, only has a small margin of manoeuvre, because they do not control the prices of the books nor the discounts that are applied by the sales team.28 They are often subject to unsolicited book deliveries, or a greater number of volumes than ordered, which must be returned to the publisher at the cost of the bookshop. One Parisian bookshop owner explains how she has to defend herself against the pressure of suppliers:

• 31 Interview, 5 April 2012.

23A publisher in an economically fragile position may want to retain control over their editorial line (choice of authors, themes, etc.), much as a bookseller may wish to control the range of books presented. In both cases they affirm the right to define the principles of their own legitimacy, according to the scholarly definition of autonomy. In the words of the manager of a press focusing on foreign literature: “Being independent means controlling the ideological and intellectual orientations of one’s publishing house.”31

• 33 This series includes classic literary texts. The publishing house Robert Laffont has a relatively c (...)

25And yet the independence of a press or a bookshop is not always associated with the quality or the originality of its production/stock, whereas these criteria for evaluation tend to dominate at the pole of the most autonomous productions. Many small structures have an ephemeral or extremely marginal existence (Legendre & Abensour 2007), and their production is by no means remarkable. If the actors’ usage of independence and the sociological concept of autonomy cannot be considered strictly equivalent, this is because large publishing houses (whether they belong to a group or have absorbed their competitors) also publish authors who are widely recognized by their peers, as we can see in Gallimard’s catalogue of foreign literature (Sapiro & Bokobza 2008). The coexistence of different series within a given publishing house, which creates spaces of autonomy alongside spaces dedicated to more commercial production—for example Robert Laffont’s series “Bouquins”33—further complicates things.

• 34 See, for example, the article of Benjamin Caraco (2017).

27The third dimension is political: independence can be understood in the sense of challenging the dominant order, the expression of subversive thought. It is therefore incarnated in forms of alternative, underground, or protest publishing. Since the 1990s, small publishing houses that focus on social critique (Noël 2012a) have revived the idea of political and intellectual engagement mentioned above. One of the best examples of this is the non-profit publishing body Raisons d’agir created in 1996 by Pierre Bourdieu, which aimed to give academics and researchers the means to better control the dissemination of their work, while also dealing with social issues and current affairs directed at a broader public. This publishing initiative aimed to reclaim a certain autonomy in the face of economic and media forces, by promoting analysis that runs counter to the dominant perspective while still benefiting from efficient distribution channels thanks to the commercial power of Éditions du Seuil. The political dimension of independence, having waned after the “golden age” of the 1960s-1970s, thus returned in full force in the early 1990s in several publishing sectors, such as graphic novels34 and children’s literature, although it remained complimentary to the two other dimensions discussed above.

• 35 A public body of the ministry of culture, the Centre national du livre was created to support all t (...)
• 36 In 1981, the Lang law introduced a fixed price for books. This price is set by the publisher, and t (...)

30Since the 1970s, public authorities in France have acted as a buffer against market forces (Dubois 1999), and this phenomenon has only accelerated in recent years. The state guarantees the maintenance of a certain diversity in production and actors, through subsidies and assistance to both publishing houses and booksellers (the Centre national du livre [CNL], as well as regional funding for cultural affairs and Association pour le développement des librairies de creation [ADELC]35). It also does so through an institutional and legal framework of exemptions that allows them to offset commercial approaches with the law on the fixed price and reduced VAT on books.36 The state’s role in the autonomization of the book trade is also reminiscent of the cinema industry, in which, since the 1950s, public funding has helped create an official definition of “quality” and contributed to the independence of “creation” in opposition to the market (Duval 2016: 262).

• 37 See in particular, Jérôme Vidal book’s (2006: 65).

31All of these programmes enable the production of projects perceived as financially unviable, due to the restricted nature of their “natural” market or their intellectual ambition. In the early 2000s, for example, a young press without resources such as Les Prairies ordinaires was thus able to pursue a policy of publishing high-quality social science books with the help of the regional government of Ile de France, translating a selection of major English-language authors into French (David Harvey, Mike Davis, and Fredric Jameson). However, this kind of small publisher is in direct competition with larger publishing houses, which emphasize the quality of their production. Indeed, it is the “dominant” generalist publishers, such as Gallimard, Le Seuil, or Flammarion who receive most of the funding from the CNL intended for “slow turnover works” (Cartellier 2008) (ie., those with low or moderate sales over several years). Indeed, government authorities prioritize the autonomy of publications associated with the field of restricted production, rather than actors’ independence (legal and financial). There are tensions that result from this: small independent publishers have challenged the criteria upon which CNL funds are distributed, and the lack of transparency in recruitment to its commissions.37

• 38 The label is awarded for three years and, as of 1 January 2016, concerns 526 bookshops. These estab (...)
• 39 Several managers of bookshop chains signed an opinion piece challenging the use of the label for on (...)

32This issue also affects bookshops, which are the subject of increasing attention by authorities. This can be seen in the creation of the official LIR label (Librairies indépendantes de référence) for independent bookshops in 2009, which provides access to tax exemptions for bookshops that respect strict specifications.38 The bookseller trade union, Syndicat de la librairie française (SLF) managed to negotiate the creation of a second, less restrictive label (Librairies de référence) that could include bookshops run by publishers or groups of bookshops. Although the latter are not independent in the legal sense, they are involved in maintaining diversified stock whilst controlling their selection, unlike chains such as Fnac. Beyond the financial advantages (tax exemptions), the goal of the SLF is to maintain a united front between members of different sizes and statuses. This twofold label thus illustrates the disconnection between independence and autonomy and what is at stake in defining strict boundaries between actors.39

• 40 [Online] [accessed on 5 April 2017].

33Independence is also a symbolic resource in the eyes of the public. Obtaining it means being able to set oneself apart in the eyes of buyers, in a market that is saturated and lacking differentiation. The adjective resonates with the expectations of more cultivated fractions of the public and with new “more human” forms of consumerism based on authenticity and local services. This can be seen in the renewal of independent and artisan shops in town centres (Leblanc 2017). The success of the “Indiebound” movement in the English-speaking world is another example of this, exalting the local nature of independent shops in gentrified areas, and bookshops in particular.40

• 41 Fabrice Piault (2018). “Les 200 premiers éditeurs français.” Livres Hebdo, 1179, 22 June.
• 42 [Online] [accessed on 5 April 2017].

34For a major generalist publisher such as Gallimard (the fifth largest publishing group in France with a consolidated turnover of 432 million euros41) which calls itself the “first independent French publisher,”42 it is essential to cultivate a belief in the image of the literary publisher par excellence. To do this they draw on a prestigious past, directly opposed to the disembodied financial logics of a group like Hachette—which is all the better as a foil because it is objectively close. Conversely, for small structures that are economically subjugated, valuing independence and the alternative nature of their activity is a way to gain symbolic capital and attract authors and readers. Because of its vague nature, independence thus brings together the various interests of actors situated at opposite positions of the editorial field, who come together in claiming intellectual autonomy, regardless of their economic status. However, this malleability raises certain problems, particularly in terms of recognition between peers, which is the third issue at stake here.

• 43 Slavoj Žižek was first translated by small publishers such as Navarin, Points hors ligne, Nautilus,(...)
• 44 For the past twenty years, Fred Vargas had been published by the independent publishing house Vivia (...)

35The virulence of the struggles for classification and the need to issue some calls to order in distinguishing “true” independents (who incarnate a form of purity and virtue) from “pseudo” independents (characterized by their compromising behaviour and search for profit) demonstrate the importance of this issue. Several texts published by actors in the publishing industry have reactivated this theme, attempting to reaffirm the legitimate forms of the practice according to the logic of the artistic avant-garde: artisanal ethos, vocational investment, and refusal of any form of economic opportunism. The former director of Agone publishing house, which focuses on political essays, calls for a distinction between “businesses that are governed by a logic of growth through acquisition” and “those who produce books that are not just like any other commodity” (Discepolo 2011: 17-18); although the distinction between the two is above all based on moral criteria. The opposition between “true” and “false” independents also reflects the traditional opposition between the actors in the field of restricted production, who evoke the nomos of art for art’s sake by referring to a previous, purer state of the field, and the actors of large-scale, mass production, who tend to identify with an entrepreneurial and depoliticized definition of independence. These classification role plays cannot be disconnected from economic issues to the extent that small structures traditionally play an exploratory role, developing authors or formats that will potentially be taken up and developed later by larger publishing houses. In this respect we can cite the philosopher Slavoj Žižek’s increasing shift from small marginal publishers to prestigious publishing houses from the 2000s,43 or more recently, Flammarion’s poaching of Fred Vargas and her successful crime novels.44