Designing cultural policy in a postcolonial colony: the case of Puerto Rico

Puerto Rico became a territory of the United States in 1898 with the end of the Spanish-American War. In 1952, the island became a ‘Commonwealth’ through the development and approval of a local constitution. While this political status allows Puerto Rico some degree of autonomy, it nevertheless continues to subject the island to United States federal authority. For the last 60 years, discussions on whether Puerto Rico’s Commonwealth status is a permanent or transitional status has fuelled much of the political debate and public policy of the region, and has been highly influenced by political status ideologies: to become a state of the United States, to maintain the current status, or to become independendent. Budgetary, legal, and commercial dependence on the United States causes constant conflicts in the design and implementation of Puerto Rican public policy in areas such as education, law, and economic development. Likewise, culture has not been exempt from these debates. In fact, cultural differences have caused conflict at all levels – from the theoretical conceptions of culture, to cultural policy and arts management. Moreover, the implementation of cultural policies has also been subject to political ideologies and the concept of culture has variably been seen as an obstacle or strength for specific political purposes. In the midst of a sustained economic crisis, the current Puerto Rican government has proposed the development of a comprehensive cultural policy through a participatory process. The objective of this paper is to present this process as a means of analyzing Puerto Rico’s experience through the challenges in designing and implementing cultural policy within a ‘postcolonial colony’ scenario. This paper will place emphasis on the government’s role, cultural public institutions, and cultural production.     

The nonprofit arts organization concept and its transformation in Korea

ABSTRACT

After the Korean War, both the autocratic and later democratic South Korean governments actively fostered the development of Korea’s arts sector, in part by emulating the organizational and legal structures of U.S. nonprofits. Yet, in this policy transfer, Korea has taken a different path, notably rearticulating the U.S.-style hands-off facilitation model to reflect and accommodate Korean political, institutional, and cultural exigencies. We analyze the effects of the resulting cultural policy on Korean public arts institutions, using documentary evidence and narratives from our case studies of two national arts organizations restructured by the government: The National Theater Company of Korea and the Seoul Arts Center. We employ the concept of cultural statism, conditioned by "culture as glorification," resource dependence, and path dependence, to understand the development of Korea’s public arts sector. Specifically, we consider: the government’s desire to use the arts to enhance its image on an international stage shaped by western liberal democratic values; arts leaders’ desire for reliable support (resource dependence); and the tendancy of Koreans to want to be associated with the stability and prestige of the government (path dependence).     

The new patron state in South Korea: cultural policy,democracy and the market economy

ABSTRACT

This article explores conceptual frameworks for understanding Korea’s contemporary cultural policy by looking into the historical transformation of the culture-state-market relations in the country. It argues that Korea has become ‘a new kind of patron state’, which emulates the existing patron states in the West firmly within the statist framework and ambitiously renders government-led growth of cultural industries (and the Korean Wave) as a new responsibility of the state. The formation of Korea’s new patron state has been driven by a ‘parallel movement’ consisting of democracy and the market economy, which has defined the political and socio-economic trajectory of Korean society itself since the 1990s. Democracy has been articulated in cultural policy as cultural freedom, cultural enjoyment and the arm’s length principle; meanwhile, the market economy of culture has been facilitated by a ‘dynamic push’ of the state. After discussing the parallel movement, the article points out the tension, ambiguity and contradiction entailed in cultural policy of the new patron state.     

A study of social‐market interventions in the shaping of the field of cultural production

A social analysis based on extensive evaluation of the Dance and Drama Awards programme reveals the social‐market political paradigm underpinning the formation of cultural policy in the UK underthe New Labour government. This specific intervention in the field of cultural production is placed in the context of broader government interventions in the cultural domain that seek to give respect to undervalued social and cultural groups. There is a political analysis of the characteristics of the social‐market political formation that underpin New Labour’s “affirmative” actions, and the political strategies informing the government’s “access” and “inclusion” agendas and their impact on the cultural and creative industries. The authors argue that the construction of a “social‐market” position in New Labour’s cultural policy represents an attempt to bridge or “hyphenate” the contradictory claims of social democracy, on the one hand, and economic fatalism, on the other. Despite the rhetoric of social and cultural “transformation”, the authors argue that a “faith” in the market prevents New Labour from transforming the political‐economic and cultural structures that generate economic and cultural injustices.     

Democratization and museum policy in South Korea

ABSTRACT

This article examines the two distinct historical policy paths taken by the South Korean government in the late twentieth century towards the democratization of museums. One was based on the creation of a museological public sphere as an extension of the political democratization movement of the 1980s. This demonstrated the potential to become a valuable component of the wider incipient national public sphere within which civic subjects could discuss their individual and collective historical memories. However, despite this potential, a museological public sphere failed to influence the general trajectory of national policy regarding the democratization of museums that had been in development since the early 1980s. This other policy path towards cultural democratization was triggered by the award of the Seoul Olympics in 1981. It was based on public participation and entitled the ‘cultural Olympics’. An important strategy of the cultural Olympics was the construction of a new institutional infrastructure to expand the public right to enjoy culture. This path facilitated an increasing entanglement with neoliberalism in 1990s. Finally, the 1997 IMF crisis furthered the association between a superficial idea of democratization through institutional expansion and the practices of neoliberalism, a trend which continues within South Korean museum policy today.     

Conceptualizing Greek cultural policy: the non‐democratization of public culture

This paper concentrates on several of the most significant moments of Greek cultural policy since World War II, together with its key concepts. It traces the cultural policy of the country, its main changes and its relationship with politics through a socio‐cultural analysis and a look at the political and cultural events which occurred. The concepts of national identity, hegemony, civilizing mission, democratization, and cultural democracy are applicable in this framework. Despite various attempts at reforms, the country's cultural policy could be characterized as ‘path dependent’; it connected unwaveringly to its two main objectives: heritage and the arts.     

The cultural industry policies of the Korean government and the Korean Wave

The paper examines how the Korean government promoted Korea’s cultural industries over the last 20?years. In the early 1990s, there was a radical departure in the government’s cultural industry policy, from that of political control over the cultural industries to viewing them as central to the government’s export-focused economic development strategies. The policy of developing the cultural industries was implemented in conjunction with government investment in other strategic industries, such as the information and communication technology industries. In the 2000s, the domestic market for cultural products expanded and diversified rapidly as the Korean society enjoyed improved living standards and a growing middle class demanded improved quality from Korea’s cultural products. The rapid development of other industries also facilitated the enhanced competitiveness of Korean cultural products in global markets. As a result, Korea’s cultural industries made substantial inroads into East-Asian markets in the late 1990s and into global markets in the 2000s.     

Interrogating the uses of culture in the politics of diversity: a case from South Korea

This article seeks to critically examine the ascendancy of culture in the arena of politics by analysing emergent multicultural discourses and policy development in South Korea as an illuminating case study. In exploring various discursive modalities of culture in the politics of diversity, it investigates how culture is identified as a source of social problems and concurrently employed as their solution. Combining discourse analytic and in-depth interviewing techniques, the article focuses on analysing how female marriage migrants and their children are constructed as cultural other, and how the language of culture is deployed to divert attention from issues of power and structural inequalities. In particular, it examines the discourse of ‘cultural deficiency’ and ‘cultural competence’ used in relation to migrants, and assesses the proposed conceptual shift in cultural policy development from multiculture to cultural diversity.     

Cultural development: a new policy paradigm in the cultural policies of the 1970s in Québec

The common expression of ‘cultural development’ appears in many cultural policy statements without it necessarily arousing questions about its precise meaning. Indeed, we usually spontaneously associate ‘cultural development’ to any governmental intervention that aims at stimulating cultural vitality. However, if we look more closely at the origin of this concept, we soon discover that its appearance on the eve of May 68, in France, corresponds to the rise of new concerns in cultural policy matters and to a radical redefinition of the state’s role in this domain. Still enjoying a strong influence, France’s political transformations were closely followed by some Quebecois politicians and socially engaged intellectuals who were participating, at that time, in the formulation of a new political vision in cultural matters in Québec in the 1960s and 1970s. The objective of this paper is thus to retrace the origin of the idea of cultural development and follow its evolution in Québec.     

Politics of the ‘creative industries’ discourse and its variants

The existing academic debate on creative industries can be summarised as ‘Trojan horse or Rorschach blot’: creative industries working as a neoliberal discourse or producing different effects depending on local context. Arguing that these are two sides of the same coin, this article looks closely at the discourse’s depoliticising and encompassing forces and their interplay on the discourse’s intersection to the broader new economy narrative. The article’s focus is South Korean variants of creative industries discourse. First, the country’s ‘content industries’ discourse served as a Trojan horse for the depoliticising narrative of knowledge economy while boosting the cultural sector discursively and financially. Second, ‘creative economy’ has very recently emerged as the current conservative government’s master economic narrative. This discourse allows the government’s neoliberal economic policies to be further justified while making cultural policy unable to persuasively claim that creativity belongs in the culture’s domain.     

Access to culture in Croatian cultural policy: moving towards explicit policies

In this paper through the analysis of the access to culture issue in the Croatian cultural policy agenda, we illustrate the current cultural policy developments in Croatia in the broader European context. Taking the differentiation between explicit and implicit policies at both macro and micro level we analyse discourses on access to culture in the Croatian cultural policy at the constitutional level, parliamentary political parties’ level, the governmental level and the level of cultural organisations. On the one hand the policies regarding access to culture remain mostly implicit and revolve around traditional models connected to instruments dating back to socialism; while on the other selected cultural organisations develop instruments for fostering it where European projects have an influence. The orientation more towards cultural production issues and less to access to culture and cultural participation issues draws similarities of cultural policy developments in Croatia with the general European cultural policy framework.     

Assessing the local embeddedness dynamics of the Baumwollspinnerei cultural quarter in Leipzig: introducing the POSES Star Framework

This paper argues that it is important for urban scholars and practitioners to comparatively appraise the differential forms of local embeddedness of cultural quarters. Such appraisals can help to realize more sustainable practices of cultural quarter anchoring within neighbourhoods. The case study of Leipzig, Germany – a city that deploys both ‘creative city’ and ‘cultural industries’ models of urban development within a context of post-industrial, post-socialist transformation – is used to examine the adaptive re-use of a former cotton-spinning mill, the Baumwollspinnerei, into an internationally renowned cultural quarter. The POSES Star Framework is developed as an analytical tool to systematically outline multiple local embeddedness dynamics (political, organizational, social, ephemeral, and spatial) of a cultural quarter within a neighbourhood and within a specific urban planning and policy context. The application of the POSES Star Framework to the Baumwollspinnerei reveals that internal organizational concerns for site development and marketing are prioritized over external engagements with Leipzig's urban planning and cultural policy discourses.     

New technologies in cultural institutions: theory,evidence and policy implications

Publicly-funded cultural institutions such as theatre companies, symphony orchestras, museums, libraries and so on are increasingly engaging with new technologies as a means of improving their operational efficiency and extending the range of ways in which they pursue their cultural missions. For example, opera companies are broadcasting performances by satellite to cinemas, and art museums are using the Internet to show virtual exhibitions. These developments have implications for funding authorities who need to update their policy approaches to encompass a range of new technological phenomena. This paper provides a framework for assessing technological innovation in cultural institutions, and discusses the ramifications of such a framework for cultural policy. The paper is illustrated using the results of a recent research project that evaluated the UK National Theatre’s NT Live experiment and the Tate Gallery’s use of a web-based exhibition as strategies to expand their audience reach.     

Cultural retaliation: the cultural policies of the ‘new’ Front National

This study examines the conception of culture and the cultural policies of the French Front National. Tracing the developments of the party’s cultural agenda before and after Marine Le Pen took over the leadership of the party from her father, I show how the Front National has adapted its discourse on cultural policy to its wider programmatic profile. In the context of a strategy of de-radicalisation promoted by Marine Le Pen, recent years have witnessed focussed efforts by the party leadership to professionalise and modernise the party’s cultural policy programme. However, the analysis of the party’s current cultural policy agenda reveals a remarkable continuity in the way the party leadership conceives of national culture and of what cultural policy should promote. This programmatic continuity becomes apparent in the analysis of the local cultural policies of municipalities won by the Front National in 2014. Exploring the cultural agendas of ten local governments with a Front National majority, I argue that the cultural policies of the Front National remain deeply rooted in a nativist understanding of culture and a dirigiste approach that wilfully excludes postcolonial minorities.     

Political pragmatism and the creative economy: Singapore as a City for the Arts

Can the arts and culture prosper under a less than democratic political regime? This paper looks at the soft authoritarian Singaporean government and the making of Singapore into a ‘City for the Arts’. Many scholars advocate that a culturally vibrant and creative city must also celebrate diversity, tolerance and experimentation. This implies that a democratic space is needed for creative energies to flow. Singapore is not known for its democracy. But Singapore has become relatively successful in being the cultural hub in the region. A more liberal approach to diversity and criticism of the authorities can now be observed but there are still many strong‐handed social and political controls in the city‐state. This paper tries to answer these two questions: has Singapore become democratic because the authorities want the arts and culture to flourish? Is democracy necessary for the creation of a lively cultural city?     

布尔迪厄的文化资本理论在旅游规划中的应用

伴随着后现代主义的到来,以符号和影像为主的消费文化成为了社会消费的主导。因此,旅游业的发展与规划既需要满足消费需求,又要尊重消费文化。本文中我们试图从布迪厄的文化资本理论的三个方面:文化能力、文化产品、文化制度的角度分析旅游文化资本,希望以此推动旅游文化资本在旅游规划中的运用。     

Reforming Land and Water Rights in South Africa

Redress of historical injustice in access to land provided a mobilizing force for the overthrow of the apartheid government in South Africa. Inequality of access to water resources marks South Africa's history even more profoundly than inequality of access to land. Yet in South Africa, post‐apartheid legislative reform relating to land and water has followed largely separate, if parallel, paths. This article traces the development and current status of water reforms in the Inkomati Water Management Area, where water use is dominated by established commercial agriculture and forestry, by important environmental interests, including the Kruger National Park, and by demands for improved access to water from a black population of around 1.5 million living in former Bantustan areas. It indicates that in practice water and land reform are interdependent, but, although both have become more closely linked within local political and economic arenas, they remain largely disconnected and disabled by unresolved tensions within their separate policy processes. The article argues that the commoditized nature of land and water use within the established patterns of commercial agriculture sets constraints on what redistributive land and water reform can deliver to those historically dispossessed. In particular, increasing recourse to ‘strategic partnerships’ between African community landowners and commercial agribusiness as a means of maintaining the productivity of commercial farmland poses questions about the control and beneficial use of new forms of communal property.     

South Africa’s form of globalisation: a continental posture paradox for insertion and dependence

The fashionable form of globalisation has perpetuated Africa’s incapacity for auto-centeredness. As promises of political and economic reforms did not materialize and as economically powerful states continued to be indifferent, most African states resorted to the strategy of self-interest for international legitimacy and faith in foreign direct investment (FDI) and aid. Departing from its portrayal as a relatively developed, competitive and civil-minded state in Africa, South Africa reinvented modernity in the hope of servicing similar self-interests. I argue that South Africa’s form of globalisation is paradoxical. While positing as a voice for the voiceless and leader of African renaissance, that country simultaneously mediated Africa’s relations for appropriation of neo-liberal principles. Occurring predominantly through political and economic liberalisation, globalisation of Africa is ‘an old story’ of insertion for dependence on foreign capital. I show that South Africa’s neo-liberal agenda in Growth, Employment and Redistribution (GEAR), as well, engendered openness to imports. Given the commonalities between GEAR and the New Partnership for Africa’s Development (NEPAD), I argue that the latter is South Africa’s instrument of ‘reintegrating’ Africa. I also illustrate that South Africa’s foreign economic policy in Africa and NEPAD are founded on the marginalisation thesis, misreading of the paradoxical operations of neo-orthodoxy globalisation in Africa and the thinking that South Africa is suffering due to its geographical association with Africa. I conclude that that country’s form of globalisation will further empty Africa of its capacity of auto-centeredness and engender openness to imports, which are yet to deliver continental recovery.     

Creating the cultures of the future: cultural strategy,policy and institutions in Gramsci

Gramsci’s writings have rarely been discussed and used systematically by scholars in cultural policy studies, despite the fact that in cultural studies, from which the field emerged, Gramsci had been a major source of theoretical concepts. Cultural policy studies were, in fact, theorised as an anti-Gramscian project between the late 1980s and the early 1990s, when a group of scholars based in Australia advocated a major political and theoretical reorientation of cultural studies away from hegemony theory and radical politicisation, and towards reformist–technocratic engagement with the policy concerns of contemporary government and business. Their criticism of the ‘Gramscian tradition’ as inadequate for the study of cultural policy and institutions has remained largely unexamined in any detail for almost 20 years and seems to have had a significant role in the subsequent neglect of Gramsci’s contribution in this area of study. This essay, consisting of three parts, is an attempt to challenge such criticism and provide an analysis of Gramsci’s writings, with the aim of proposing a more systematic contribution of Gramsci’s work to the theoretical development of cultural policy studies. In Part I, I question the use of the notion of ‘Gramscian tradition’ made by its critics, and challenge the claim that it was inadequate for the study of cultural policy and institutions. In Parts II and III, I consider Gramsci’s specific writings on questions of cultural strategy, policy and institutions, which have so far been overlooked by scholars, arguing that they provide further analytical insights to those offered by his more general concepts. More specifically, in Part II, I consider Gramsci’s pre-prison writings and political practice in relation to questions of cultural strategy and institutions. I argue that the analysis of these early texts, which were written in the years in which Gramsci was active in party organisation and leadership, is fundamental not only for understanding the nature of Gramsci’s early and continued involvement with questions of cultural strategy and institutions, but also as a key for deciphering and interpreting cultural policy themes that he later developed in the prison notebooks, and which originated in earlier debates. Finally, in Part III, I carry out a detailed analysis of Gramsci’s prison notes on questions of cultural strategy, policy and institutions, which enrich the theoretical underpinnings for critical frameworks of analysis as well as for radical practices of cultural strategy, cultural policy-making and cultural organisation. I then answer the question of whether Gramsci’s insights amount to a theory of cultural policy.