Cultural Policy in the UK

ethnic form _or_ system of g everywherenment in the UKCULTURAL POLICY IN THE UK Mid-1960s to late mid-eighties ethnic polity in the UK Critical overview of the give out 30 years marching music 2010In the last three decades (approximately 1980 to 2010), pagan insurance in the UK has taken a publicly questionable direction. Overall, ethnic insurance and practices of the past 30 years brace been overwhelmed by vernal-made neo-liberal communications and ideologies, namely sparing freethinking, monetarism, neo-conservatism, commodification of shade, managerialism and performativity. Examining separately of these in turn, it be observes app atomic number 18nt that a grocery-driven, neo-liberal approach to UK heathenish indemnity has generally failed in each of its call forthd aims frugal growth, esthetical integrity, growthd get at to the liberal liberal arts, and affectionate justice.The mid-seventies were a real turning point in toll of heathen policy, wit h gigantic policy alternates occurring from this time on both at bottom and without the pagan heavens. In several(prenominal) ways, the earlier mid-seventies epitomised heathenish and semi semipolitical touchs with the general wellbeing of the public, and some support of the arts for their own rice beer rather than as an means of broader political and social change. The early 1970s aphorism, in some(prenominal) ways, a political climate of idealism. pagan policy of the time bounceed this atmo field of operations. However, there were drastic political, ethnic, and ideological changes made later in the 1970s which learn, to a degree, continued to shape the ethnical policy discourse of the next thirty years and up to the present day ( antiquated, 2007). In the heathenish sector as a whole, Gray describes the enlargement of what he calls instrumental policies (Gray, 2007, p.5) since the mid-1970s. By this verge Gray describes the switch over in ethnic polic y from an arms-length, distanced organizational approach to the arts and husbandry to a political interest in using the ethnical sector as an instrument, or instruments, of social, scotch, and political change. In the first decades of province patronage of the arts, the humanities Council saw itself non as a source of direction, not as a source of artistic policy, but as a kind of enable body (Stevens, 1998 10, quoted in Caust, 2003, p.52). By the late 1970s, just, this attitude on the per centum of the state had changed dramatically. Instead of standing back and simply allowing the arts to develop and flourish via generous state subsidy and support, some Western governments including that of the unify nation developed the political orientation that they could and should instead expect outcomes for their investments (Caust, 2003, p. 52). The overwhelming shift to a market-based, market-driven ideology in bounds of pagan policy has had many negative force-outs upon t he arts themselves, and several tangentially-related areas of the social and political landscape. In the last thirty years, it is sparing change which appears to deliver been the states prime concern in terms of heathenish policy, despite public assertions to the contrary. Gray states that the ideological and organisational changes toward instrumental policy-making feed had an effect upon what the state does, how it does it, and the justifications and reasons that keep been correct forward to explain them (Gray, 2007, p.5). The reforms that relieve oneself taken place in the body politic of heathenish policy in the unify Kingdom have been summarised by scholars as various(a)ly representing a mode of privatisation (Alexander and Rueschemeyer, 2005, pp. 71-4), or one of commodification (Gray, 2000). Privatisation concerns, variously, a heightened level of interventionism in the management and administration of public assets (Gray, 2007, p.5) by orphic entities or actors o r the sale of previously-nationalised state industries and assets to the tete-a-tete sphere. Commodification is a term riding habitd to describe wider changes in political exploits and ideology, concerning the replacement of ethnical honor derived from its usefulness, to entertain derived from its exchangeability (Gray, 2007, p.5). Commodification results from an ideological shift in spite of appearance the state, and this drive out be seen as a driving force in pagan policy tuitions within the last thirty years. Despite government assertions that artistic excellence and broadened public access to the arts are prime concerns of the state, sparingal concerns are also lots of perhaps overriding concern to the Thatcher, Major, Blair and embrown administrations which governed Britain betwixt 1980 and 2010. Tony Blairs opening statement in the government publication agriculture and creativity The Next Ten Years (____) makes the economic preoccupation of the government in relation to ethnical policy quite explicit. Blair acknowledges a connection among creativity and occupation and then makes an economic justification for his governments investment in supporting creativity in its broadest sense (Caust, 2007, p. 55). With reference to both culture and creativity, Blair states they also matter because original talent go forth be life-or-death to our undivided and national economic success in the economy of the coming(prenominal) (Smith, 2001 3 quoted in Caust, 2007, p.55). Economic RationalismEconomic rationalism is a term first coined in Australia with regards to economic policies and ideologies which favour privatisation of state industries, a free-market economy, economic deregulation, reduction of the wel fartheste state, change magnitude indirect taxation and rase direct taxation (Pusey, 1991). Such policies were special(prenominal)ly widespread in a global context during the 1980s and 1990s. The policies of Thatcherism leave an examp le of economic rationalism in action. The origins of the term economic rationalism were actually favourable, in describing market-oriented policies of various administrations in Australia, the UK and the US in the 1970s and 1980s (Pusey, 1991). In the 1990s, the term started to be use with an unfavourable tone, toward the Third Way policies of both the Australian Labour Party and the UK impudent Labour party of the 1990s. Both these parties initiated market-driven reforms within their political ideologies, which laid them closer to Thatcherite economic rationalism via increased strain upon the privy sector in economic, political, and cultural arenas (Pusey, 1991). These were parties which had not traditionally placed a comparatively great(p) wildness upon the free-market economy, and therefore the term economic rationalism has been used sanely disparagingly to indicate that these parties have, to a degree, stipulation up their historically leftist roots, when social justice and expansion of the welfare state took precedence over sheer capitalism. In terms of cultural policy, economic rationalism is evident throughout the 1980s and 1990s in the United Kingdom. Thatcherist policies in the 1980s placed scarce ideological and practical focus upon the free market, and in terms of cultural policy this translated to cuts in arts and education budgets, and the development of private-public partnership in cultural financing. The logical effect of such(prenominal) policies was that the arts, in particular, became increasingly monetised and reliant upon market and mass good luck charm in order to survive economically. The UK governments of the 1980s and 1990s placed great ideological and political emphasis upon the economic potential of the countrys cultural sector. Bennett (1995) views such economic potential as creation used as a prime justification for state action and interventions within the cultural sector (p. 205-7). However, as Gray (2007) point s out, this is not necessarily the same as see culture as a mechanism for economic regeneration (p. 16). The governments of the 1980s and 1990s appear to have sought to use various pretexts, including economic arguments, in order to justify their interventions in the sphere of cultural policy, however their true intentions most of the time were to stimulate broader economic growth through such cultural policies. As we shall see later, attempts at stimulating economic growth through cultural policy have, by and large, failed overall.Caust (2007) asserts that more recent government policy debates have been prevail by an economic figure (p.52). Arguments which focus upon the economic value of the arts have developed, and thus a political atmosphere is created in which the intrinsic value or charge that society may place upon the arts is trumped by the arts stringently economic value. Economic rationalism, through its emphasis on the free market and upon the private sector, speeds the development of such an atmosphere, which permeated the UK cultural policy sector throughout the 1980s and 1990s. Although Causts discussion (2007) focuses on cultural policy in the Australian context, there are many parallels with UK cultural policy during the same time period. Caust describes a changing climate in which less emphasis came to be placed on the definition of art itself and upon value judgments of a particular art piece or art form by hold experts. Instead, market theory is accent, and increased importance is placed upon those art forms which can achieve the greatest commercial success. In the realm of cultural policy, such a change in the mode of arts valuation by the state leads to the desire to support arts activity which was commercial, exportable and cost-effective (Caust, 2007, p.52). In the realm of cultural production, the natural result of such cultural policies is the emergence of mass cultural products which satisfy the market. Simon Cowell, and the m assive, global Pop god and X Factor talent-show franchises he created, epitomises the result of two decades of economic rationalism. These programs, in which amateur singers compete in a televised, viewer-voted series, are vastly commercially successful and have been licensed in the US and many European and Latin American countries. Cowell has made a fortune, and it is typically a given that the winner of Pop Idol or The X Factor leave behind have the Christmas number-one single in the UK (2009/2010 was an exception to this rule, when a social-media campaign by design pushed a reissued single by agit-rock group Rage Against The Machine to the masking of the UK charts in a display of protest against the blandness and ubiquity of Cowells cover-song artists). magic spell a huge success in economical terms Cowells franchises melt all the government-desired traits of exportability and mass-market appeal, while stimulating sales of music media in sum to generating significant reve nue via paid telephone voting and merchandise it could scarce be indicated that the format of these shows stimulates artistic originality, experimentation, or melodious development in any significant way. The example above demonstrates that to give the market what it wants often leads to a lowest-common-denominator approach to cultural production and a bland muffle of the development of new and exciting art forms. Such effects of economic rationalism on cultural policy and therefore upon culture itself reflect Causts discussion of economic concerns and their effects on culture. As Caust states, such market-oriented cultural policy creates a compromising role for artists since serving the state as aneconomic generator is very different from taking risks artistically, or being innovative and creative generally. It could be argued this objective is little different from the expectations of a totalitarian state, in which its artists serve the states political aims. (Caust, 2007, p. 54)ManagerialismPrior to the late 1970s and early 1980s, governments had on the whole aimed to effect an arms-length approach in terms of arts management. One of the founding principles of the Arts Council itself was that it should be relatively strong-minded of the government itself, and not directly under government control. Gray (2007) far-famed the general tendency of governments to adopt relatively indirect forms of involvement (p.11). Gray states that this role can be advantageous for governments, as they are not especially held accountable for the results of such policies implemented at arms-length they can have some effect on the sector by producing general policies but, at the same time, they can avoid being held directly responsible or accountable for the specific policy choices that are then made on their behalf. (Gray, 2007, p.11)However, with the political, ideological, social and economic changes which took place when Thatcher was elected, the governments of the 1980 s onwards adopted an increasingly managerialistic approach to the arts and cultural policy. Increasingly, the arts management implemented by successive administrations over the last three decades has been moved towards a new style of management that has been influenced by private sector models (in the form of bang statements and marketing, for example) (Gray, 2000, p. 112). It certainly follows logically that governments which prioritise capitalism and the free market would be attracted to the idea of imposing private-sector management models upon spheres they were hoping would become economically amentiferous. Hence, successive governments have attempted to run the arts and cultural spheres, to some degree, as if they were private commercial enterprises. In many cases, this is a misunderstanding or legerdemain of the inherent nature of many areas of the arts.Generally, the start of managerialism in UK cultural policy can be seen during the reforms taking place under the label th e New Public Management (NPM) (Gray, 2007, p.6). NPM emphasised several core concepts, which were put into action via UK state intervention in the cultural sphere. Under NPM, managers in the arts realm were em exponented to make more decisions relating to their sphere of management results were prioritised, and valued, over processes managerial control was more generally decentralised competition in terms of public service provision was actively encouraged new emphasis was placed upon cognitive process measurement and management appointments now tended to be made through contracts rather than through seniority or hierarchy within the sector (Osborne and McLaughlin, 2002, p. 9 Pollitt, 2003a, pp. 27-8 Gray, 2007, p.6). Following the 1988 Ibbs Report, new managerial bodies were created by the government for example, the Executive Agencies (or, more formally, nary(prenominal)-Departmental Public Bodies) (Gray, 2007, p. 8). This led to a general decentralisation of government arts m anagement, but also to issues regarding accountability, managerial righteousness and the relationship of elected politicians and appointed managers with the prime example being that of the contact between the then Home Secretary Michael Howard and the then head of the prison house Service, Derek Lewis. (Gray, 2007, p. 8)Local Strategic Partnerships and Regional Development Agencies were newly-instigated modes of arts management, which further emphasised both the decentralisation of government cultural policy during this period. Additionally, these agencies show conclusion of overall managerialism towards the arts in that they demonstrate a devolution of power to local and regional arts managers. (Gray, 2007, p. 9) In later years, a somewhat different (modernizing) model of public management (Gray, 2007, p.6) was implemented, although the more general emphasis upon the concept of managerialism with respect to cultural policy did endure. Commodification of CultureIn tutelage with governmental emphasis upon the economy and the free market within the last three decades, there has followed an increasing commodification of culture. An obvious example of such commodification is enclose within the phrases cultural industries and creative industries, which were hailed by New Labour in the 1990s and 2000s as a means of economic regeneration in the United Kingdom. Caust (2007) argues that the development of a view of cultural activity and production as an industry grew not only from the government, but also from the cultural producers themselves When it became increasingly difficult in the early eighties to successfully argue the arts to government purely on the basis of the community welfare model, bureaucrats, practitioners and academics began the shift towards using a language that described the arts as an industry and developed the economic/cultural industry model. This led to the use of the terms cultural industries in Australia or in the United Kingdom, creat ive industries to describe all activities connected with the arts, as well as sectors far removed (Caust, 2007, p. 54)These cultural industries had been growing throughout the latter part of the twentieth century, aided by technological advances and global economic factors. In the northern hemisphere, populations were enjoying increased economic prosperity leisure time was on the increase generally television allowed mass cultural consumption in unprecedented fashion and consumer electronics including audio and video equipment were becoming widely available and inexpensive (Hesmondhalgh Pratt, 2005, p. 3). By the early 1980s, the state was increasingly aware of these growing cultural industries both within the UKs own economy, and on a more global level.A path of increasing commodification of public policies was followed since the mid-1970s, with resultant changes in a broad range of cultural spaces. Ideologies prior to this mass commodification of culture had determine society as a whole as the primary mean beneficiary of government cultural policy. Increased commodification led to a shift, as the intended beneficiary of cultural activity and policy was now the individual consumer (Gray, 2007, p.14). Whereas cultural policy had previously been judged upon a broad range of criteria including social justice, access, and excellence increasing commodification led to a narrowing of the criteria for judging cultural policy (ibid). Increased emphasis on the market value of cultural products and industries leads to an sound judgement of cultural policy in primarily, if not exclusively, economic terms. Again, this demonstrates a political preoccupation with the outcomes and outputs of cultural policy rather than the processes and inputs related to such policies, and a clear link between managerialism in cultural policy and the concomitant overall commodification of the culture produced under such a system. Performativity unless as the language and aims of commer cial private industry were adopted for the cultural policy sphere via managerialism, economic realism, and the commodification of culture, so too the cultural sphere adopted measures and concerns regarding exertion during the last three decades. Again, policies were judged on their results, their output and their products, and the economic success of cultural endeavour. In the realm of education, standardised performance tests have been increasingly introduced into the state schools, with the frequency, scope and range of educational tests increasingly greatly throughout the past thirty years. Likewise, in the sphere of cultural policy, tests of performance have also been increasingly implemented. These include countywide mathematical process Assessments, and the Comprehensive Area Assessments replacing them in 2009, Best Value Indicators, Key Lines of examination for Service Inspection, Local Area, Funding and Public Service Agreements, all of which provide explicit criteria aga inst which service provision can be assessed (Gray, 2007, p. 8-9).The driving ideology behind such a raft of new tests to measure cultural and educational performance would appear to be a notion of accountability. The government wants to prove to an often sceptical public that its policies, whether in education or in culture, are working. Decentralisation of managerial power, and increased managerialism in cultural policy, provide a layer of accountability, or at the very least(prenominal) a scapegoat for failed or disappointing policies. Again, this move towards evidence-based policy-making and assessment reflects the belief of successive governments that the models that work for business can be apply to the cultural sphere. It is uncertain whether this is in fact correct.Culture does not ladder in the same way as manufacturing or other private business enterprises, and the outputs or achievements of the cultural industries and creative industries may be relatively intangible a nd ultimately difficult to measure with performance tests. Here, again, the inappropriateness of applying capitalist, market-driven ideals to the sphere of cultural policy is exposed. Also, the possibility is raised that such performativity in the cultural sphere serves two, largely unstated functions for the government firstly, regular testing encourages increased cultural production, which within the confines of cultural industry could be anticipate to increase economic production secondly, such emphasis on performance provides a form of justification for government policy in the cultural sphere. There has always been dissent regarding state arts spending in the United Kingdom how much public money is spent, what it is spent on, and what pay back the British taxpayers can expect on their investment in the arts. doing tests in the cultural sector allow the state to point to unquestionable success, progress, or productivity in the cultural sector, which can be interpreted as p roof of successful cultural policy implementation. InstrumentalismInstrumentalism the use of cultural institutions and cultural policy to achieve specific political aims is in many ways as old as cultural policy itself. For as long as there has been state arts patronage in the United Kingdom, the state has attempted to utilise the institutions, activities and sectors it sponsored to make political, social and economic changes to society. In the most recent three decades, the emphasis has been upon the latter, whereas earlier in the twentieth century, more importance was perhaps placed upon concepts of social change and nation-building. The roots of the Arts Council the organisation CEMA which was instituted during the Second World War were in morale-building, increased public access, softening of Britains class divisions, and fostering patriotism and a sense of the unified nation. As such, state intervention in the cultural sphere has more often than not been with at least some intention of using said intervention as a political or other tool.Gray states that the museums sector, in particular, is effectively being used as a tool for the attainment of the policy objectives of actors and concerns that have traditionally been seen to lie outside of the museums sector itself (Gray, 2007, p. 3). Museums are particularly susceptible to political manipulation, as they occupy a unique cultural space in terms of creating a nations sense of history and heritage, and fostering ideas of nationhood and the future of a country. What is included or excluded in a museum, and the manner in which it is displayed and framed, has a huge effect upon its reception and the ideas it can inspire.Vestheim (1994), talking of cultural policy, defines instrumental policy as being to use cultural ventures and cultural investments as a means or instrument to attain goals in other than cultural areas (p. 65). In broad terms, all cultural policy, and by telephone extension all public pol icy, can be viewed as instrumental policy. exclusively policy is intended to achieve something (Gray, 2007, p. 205). So, while instrumentalitsm has always been a trace of cultural policy in the United Kingdom, it is in recent decades that it has come to the forefront of the cultural discourse. Thatcher, Major and New Labour under Tony Blair and Gordon Brown have all emphasised cultural policy as an instrument of economic regeneration, and achievement within the market. As such, they have acknowledged that their cultural policies are more baldly instrumental in nature than those of former administrations which at least paid lip service to ideals of social justice, welfare, and development of the arts for their own sake. Neo-ConservatismAfter the industrial and economic woes of the 1970s in the United Kingdom, the tide was ready to turn to neo-conservatism, and this was a change reflect in many of the Western societies. Reagan, for example, was president of the United States durin g the Thatcher regime in the UK, and both pursued Conservative policies within a capitalist framework. In cultural policy and artistic thinking, neo-conservatism was perhaps the ideological opposite to the love story of the preceding century.In the nineteenth century, cultural discourse was dominated by the ideal of the lone, genius artist who would be successful only posthumously (a striking example of this would be many of the great Romantic musical composers). Romantic ideology lauded the isolated artist-genius who was inspired to work purely because of artistic passion, rather than economic concerns. In fact, to be a poor and sharp-set artist conveyed perhaps relatively more artistic credibility. It was believed that the true value of art is transcendent and can be determined by experts, usually accompanied by the idea that the monetary value of art is wild and the market cannot decide (Hesmondhalgh Pratt, 2005, p. 5). Concomitant with this was the Romantic belief that art was for all, and that culture has the power to act as a civilising force upon society as a whole.Neo-conservatism tuned these ideas on their head. The lauded artist of the 1980s through 2000s is economically successful, creating a cultural product or commodity that appeals to, and responds to, the demands of the mass capitalist market. Ideals of the civilising powers of noble culture upon society as a whole have been largely abandoned in practical terms, in favour of economic concerns (despite state assertions to the contrary, the prime goal in recent years appears to be financial rather than social).Limited positive effects of neo-conservative cultural policies and ideologies can be appreciated in some spheres. Caust argues that, in a society which is dominated by capitalist values (Caust, 2007, p.54), an economically successful artist will likely receive greater respect for their work, as well as more money. Furthermore, the market-driven, neo-conservative emphasis on the export ability of cultural product can have the positive effects of creating national pride and highlighting the value of cultural production to the wider human race (ibid, p. 54). MonetarismConclusionsIn recent times arts funding agencies have been restructured to reflect a market-driven agenda rather than an arts-driven agenda. (Caust, 2003, p. 51)Overall in the last thirty years, cultural policy in the UK has looked increasingly to capitalism, the free-market economy, and the so-called cultural and creative industries in terms of cultural policy direction. Models from the world of business and commerce have been applied over several decades to the cultural sector managerialism instrumentalism monetarism economic realism performativity and the overwhelming commodification of all kinds of culture. In implementing these policies, many of the more socially-just aims of prior generations of cultural policy-makers have been neglected or abandoned. In an era of increasing globalisation, succ essive UK governments of the past thirty years have pushed for cultural production, economic viability and profitability, and the creation of exportable cultural commodities for mass cultural consumption.Applying such concepts and organisational structures from private industry to the cultural sector has its drawbacks. Caust states that, when it comes down to dollars, thearts cannot in any way compete with many other components of the broad cultural industry spectrum such as the communications or IT areas. (Caust, 2007, p.55). Overall, the forces of neo-conservatism have not succeeded in making the UK cultural sector an economically productive and independently viable industry. In attempting to fit the arts and culture into a capitalist mould, UK cultural policy of the past thirty years has failed in many arenas cultural, social, economical, and political.BibliographyACGB, records 1928-1997. http//www.vam.ac.uk/vastatic/wid/ead/acgb/acgbb.html (capital of the United Kingdom Victori a Albert Museum)Alexander and Rueschemeyer, 2005 _________________________________Alexander, David (1978), A form _or_ system of government for the Arts comely Cut Taxes, (London Selsdon Group, 1978)Amis, Kingsley (1979). An Arts Policy? ( London Centre for Policy Studies, 1979).Barnes, T. 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