The Freedom to Read Is the Freedom to Innovate

About fifteen years ago, Macmillan Publishers began publishing children's picture books by the actor Taye Diggs. We have now published five books together. Taye’s books are about friendship, family, love, and being proud of one’s heritage. At least three of them have been banned in multiple places across the United States. At the PEN America Literary Gala in 2025, I said that I had no idea how anyone would want to ban those sentiments. I still don't. But, as I’ll explain, that isn't really the point of the bans.

Last year, ninety-two percent of attempts to remove books from American schools and libraries came from organized pressure groups and government officials — up from seventy-two percent the year before. Less than three percent of challenges originated from individual parents. The story most often told about book bans, that they reflect community concerns about what's appropriate for children, has very little to do with what's actually happening on the ground.

What's actually happening is a coordinated campaign of intimidation, and its real target isn't a handful of titles. It's the willingness of librarians, educators, authors, and publishers to keep doing their jobs at all. The message is clear and overt: do what we want, or else. Or else we'll boycott you, dox you, take your funding, threaten your livelihood, close your library, or initiate legal proceedings against you. These intimidation campaigns want to make people afraid to defend books.

So why am I talking about book banning in a series about innovation and transformation? The freedom to read is part of the bedrock of building an innovation infrastructure. Every breakthrough we celebrate in science, technology, art, and governance depends on a population capable of engaging with new ideas; exposure to perspectives outside your own;  comfort with discomfort; the discipline to sit with an idea you initially disagree with long enough to actually understand it; and the capacity for long-form, critical thinking that only focused reading can truly build. Restrict what people can read and you restrict what they can imagine. And, put simply, a society that can't imagine can't innovate.

At Macmillan, we've chosen to approach the fight against book bans as a core business priority. We publish broadly because a confident society encourages debate, and a confident publisher does too. It’s critical that we set an example because there are already worrying signs that the book banning playbook is being activated in other countries.

We are active plaintiffs in litigation against book-ban laws in Iowa, Idaho, and Florida, where a federal court recently affirmed that the First Amendment applies in school libraries and struck down key provisions of the state's book-removal statute. Our employees have voluntarily created more than 150 Book Résumés (detailed advocacy resources used by librarians and educators defending challenged titles). We've established an employee committee, Yours to Read, dedicated to this work. We support the librarians directly under the most pressure, through the ALA Merritt Fund and partnerships with rural and school library organizations. And we work in coalition with the Authors Guild, PEN America, the American Library Association, and Unite Against Book Bans, because no single publisher can do this alone.

In the United States, all of this comes at a time that should be so momentous and celebratory in our history – our 250th Anniversary. As we witness the celebrations around us, we must think about what values we’ll carry forward. My parents taught me the value of being a free and critical thinker. It's one of the most important things I've tried to pass on to my own daughter. I want her, and every other child and young adult in this country, to inherit the same freedom: to read whatever they want, think whatever they conclude, and become whatever the combination of those two things makes possible.

While these debates may take different forms around the world, the principle remains the same: societies thrive when people are free to encounter new ideas, challenge assumptions, and think for themselves. Toni Morrison once said that "access to knowledge is the superb, the supreme act of truly great civilizations." That is what's at stake. Our future will be shaped by the countries, organizations, and leaders that understand this and work to make it so. I’m proud that Macmillan Publishers and Holtzbrinck will be among them.

Jon Yaged is the CEO of Macmillan Publishers, a Holtzbrinck company. He serves on the Boards of the Association of American Publishers, National Book Foundation, and the National Coalition Against Censorship. His freedom to read advocacy has been featured in outlets such as NBC News, MSNow (formerly MSNBC), Bloomberg TV, and Forbes.