‘¡Vive LALExpo!’: power mapping discourses of unity in the webcam studio industry in Colombia

This article examines the Latin American Livecam Expo (LALExpo) as a key site for understanding power in Colombia’s webcam studio industry. The article argues that industry executives mobilize discourses of ‘unity’ to present a cohesive and legitimate front to the state, while obscuring deeply stratified labour conditions. Drawing on feminist ethnography and discourse analysis, the study introduces the ‘webcam studio industry’ as a distinct formation that complicates dominant frameworks centred on independent cam models or traditional porn labour. In Colombia, webcam work is embedded in studio-based infrastructures and transnational economies, limiting workers’ control over their digital identities and earnings. At LALExpo, narratives of professionalization and survival reframe structural inequalities as individual responsibilities, muting critique and aligning workers with industry interests. The article ultimately shows how unity operates as both a strategy for legitimacy and a mechanism of labour discipline within global digital sexual economies.