Seeking Fairer Practices and Distribution in the Cultural Industry

2024.06.24. The Fair Economy — People's Solidarity for Participatory Democracy recently announced that it will hold a "Public Hearing on Legislating the Fair Distribution Act for the Cultural Industry to Improve Unfair Practices" at 10 a.m. on the 27th in Seminar Room 2 of the National Assembly Members' Office Building.

The cultural industry is evaluated not only as a future-oriented sector that will lead the era of knowledge and information but also as a high-value-added industry playing a core role in national competitiveness. In the first half of 2022, domestic content industry sales grew steadily to about 66.9 trillion won (about $48.5 billion), up 7.0% from the same period last year.

However, as this quantitative growth has been accompanied by increasingly complex and diversified methods of production and distribution, as well as deepening polarization within the industry's structure, various unfair practices have been accumulating. In particular, the cultural industry is known to have a large "information imbalance" and "power imbalance," since small-scale operators make up a large share of the industry and finished content is distributed through a small number of platforms. As a result, damage to artists has been mounting, raising concerns that creators' motivation to create could decline and the foundation of the cultural industry could collapse.

In the previous 21st National Assembly, the Cultural Industry Fair Distribution Act, aimed at preventing various unfair practices arising from the industry's quantitative growth and creating a fair distribution environment, passed the plenary session of the Culture, Sports and Tourism Committee but ultimately failed to clear the hurdles of the National Assembly.

Accordingly, opinions have emerged that enacting the Cultural Industry Fair Distribution Act is urgent to ensure the sustainable growth of the cultural industry, as it would broadly regulate previously unregulated unfair practices and provide more robust protection for authors.

The organizers explained, "We arranged this event to comprehensively examine unfair practices across every sector of the cultural industry and to seek a strategy for legislating the Fair Distribution Act for the Cultural Industry."

First, in a session on victim cases chaired by attorney Kang Sin-ha, speakers will present cases of unfair practices in the cultural industry by sector: webtoons (writers Cho Eun and Kim Dong-hun), comics (writer Lee U-jin), illustration (artist Lee Yo-an-na), film (Lee Ha-yeong, operations committee member of the Korea Producers Association), broadcasting actors (Song Chang-gon, general secretary of the Korean Federation of Actors' Unions), voice actors (Choi Jae-ho, general secretary of the Korean Voice Actors Association), and music (Lee Jong-hyeon, representative of a music production company).

Next, attorney Kim Jong-hwi of Lawyers for a Democratic Society's Culture, Arts and Sports Committee will give a presentation titled "Diagnosing Types of Unfair Practices in the Cultural Industry and the Need to Legislate the Fair Distribution Act for the Cultural Industry."

A discussion is also scheduled with attorney Han Gyeong-su, an executive committee member of the People's Solidarity for Participatory Democracy's Livelihood Hope Headquarters, and Jin Jae-yeong, head of the Content Finance Support Division at the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism.

The event is co-hosted by lawmakers Kang Yu-jeong, Kim Yun-deok, Min Hyeong-bae, Park Su-hyeon, Yang Mun-seok, Lim O-gyeong, Lee Gi-heon, Jeon Jae-su, and Cho Gye-won of the National Assembly Culture, Sports and Tourism Committee; lawmaker Kim Nam-geun of the National Assembly Political Affairs Committee; the Minjoo Party of Korea's Culture, Sports and Tourism Policy Coordination Committee; Minbyun's Culture, Arts and Sports Committee; and the People's Solidarity for Participatory Democracy's Livelihood Hope Division.