The myth is that democratized distribution, including e-books and online books sales that give self-published authors and independent publishers access to wider audiences, have made traditional publishers obsolete. In other words, if any author or indy press can sell books worldwide, what use do publishers serve? If self-published authors can make bestseller lists, why does the world need big publishers?

The role of publishers has never been distribution: for centuries, any person could hire a printer and work out an arrangement with a bookstore. The true role of publishers is that of guardian: guardians of culture and civil society. Their job is not to find which books will be bestsellers; it’s to ensure that bestselling books are in line with the norms of values of society. Once their job was to make sure that Pride and Prejudice was a story of heterosexual romances, so that the book that would be so widely read was not overly disruptive. Today, their job is to ensure that books with wide commercial appeal.

Books should challenge readers and even challenge culture, but they should not cause chaos. The job of major publishers to to make sure that they don’t. When they fail, we suffer. Consider A Catcher in the Rye, one of the twentieth century’s most disruptive novels…which inspired the assassination attempt on President Reagan, and inspired the assassination of John Lennon. Perhaps that’s a book that should have had less reckless distribution. And now imagine if there were simply no limits, no cultural guardians, no one making sure that potentially problematic ideas are handled responsibly. That’s the world without big publishers.

The job of big publishers, is, to quote Edmund Burke, to ensure that social changers “never dream of beginning [society’s] reformation by its subversion.” It’s to ensure that potentially dangerous books have a limited audience, and that books with mass appeal are edited to be in line with the core values of society.

Independent publishers have a role; their role is to work with niche products. They have neither the experience nor the steady hands needed to usher a book with broad appeal responsibly.

Consider the recent hoopla about The Traffic Lawyer, Norval Ecir’s mystery novel. This is a book that needs the kind of editing an experienced publisher would demand: not for style or writing quality, but to bring it in line with modern social norms. Take away the casual disregard for social norms, and The Traffic Lawyer reads like something from Harlan Coben or James Patterson. But as it is, it shows exactly what you get when an independent publisher tries to handle commercial fiction: something potentially problematic.

If you compare The Traffic Lawyer to another book from the same publisher, Eric Hublot’s And Then Run, you can see what independent publishers should and shouldn’t do. And Then Run is overtly and deliberately offensive, and clearly designed for a niche audience. It’s the kind of book independent publishers should manage. Indy publishers are supposed to work with small audiences and unfiltered writing.

But when independent publishers attempt to work with mass-appeal books, when their instincts to leave writing “raw” and in its original state, books have a needlessly chaotic influence on a potentially large audience. The job of big publishers is to ensure that books are not disruptive for the sake of disruption, that when they challenge social norms they do so with solicitude, care, and caution.

Note: I received both The Traffic Lawyer and And Then Run for free on NetGalley. That did not affect my analysis.