What is the VAT? The policies and practices of value added tax on ebooks in Europe

This article addresses reduction of or exemption from value added tax (VAT) as a cultural- and media policy instrument and analyses the VAT policies on ebooks within the European Economic Area. Examining an area of media and policy studies that is largely overlooked, the article is partly an empirical analysis of VAT policies and partly a discussion paper raising issues applicable to other media sectors and of political and societal relevance. Section 1 of the article conceptualises VAT reduction/exemption as a media and cultural policy tool within national and supranational policy frameworks. Section 2 gives a comprehensive overview of the application of VAT on print books and ebooks in Europe and discusses some consequences of the concrete taxation practices. Section 3 reports and discusses initiatives to alter the European VAT policies on digital media and cultural products and services.     

On bullshit in cultural policy practice and research: notes from the British case

In 2005, Harry G. Frankfurt, a retired professor of moral philosophy at Princeton University, made it into the best‐sellers chart with his book On Bullshit. Taking his essay as its starting point, this article explores the analysis of bullshit and the prevalence of bullshitting in the contemporary public sphere. Frankfurt’s short essay indeed provides an intellectual framework to interpret and understand contemporary rhetoric and practice in the cultural policy field, as well as recent trends in cultural policy research. Through a discussion of selected New Labour’s cultural policy documents in Britain, the article aims to show that many of the key actors in the cultural policy debate indeed display the ‘indifference to how things really are’ and the cultivation of vested interests which Frankfurt attributes to the activity of bullshitting. The final part of the text discusses the implications of the present status quo for ‘critical’ cultural policy research.     

‘Many Nice People’: the nation‐state,post‐Fordism,and the policy norm of flexible ethnic relations in Estonia

This article uses historical research and ethnographic fieldwork to ask how policymakers interpret historical, political, and economic factors to construct inter‐ethnic communities that would bring security and economic growth to an enlarged European Union (EU). Focusing on post‐Soviet Estonia's ethnic integration policy, the article argues that ‘flexibility’ applies not only to post‐Fordist, individualized subjects, but also to relations between subjects of different nationalities that policymakers want to form organically in service sector employment. The article explains how this policy construction emerged in light of Estonia's historical trajectory from 1991 to 2001 and demonstrates how it conceptually resolved the fundamental tension between the territorialized nation‐state and deterritorialized global capitalism. A visual media campaign entitled ‘Many Nice People: Integrating Estonia’ captured the essence of this construction, which obscured how the Estonian nation‐state marginalized minorities while integrating into the EU.     

Power,ideology and economy cultural policy in China

Abstract: Relying on the institutionalist framework, much literature conflating the structures of public action in the field of culture has been produced (e.g. papers concerning the targets of cultural administrations, levels of action, ways of financing cultural policies). In this context, cultural institutions have been considered as something given, but the question of their origins and shape has hardly ever been at stake. In other words, institutionalist theories make comparisons possible, but they deny any form of inner life to cultural administrations. It allows one to make static comparisons, but it fails to explain why national cultural administrations differ from each other. Hermeneutic philosophy mixed with historical institutionalism could then be used to refine traditional models. My point will be made with references to the French and American case-studies.     

Towards a computational cultural policy studies: examining infrastructures of taste and participation

Like other disciplines within the humanities and social sciences, cultural policy studies has had to respond to the influence of computing technologies. Researchers have explored the changes wrought to the management of cultural organisations, to the models of the creative industries and to new forms of access to culture and the arts. This paper suggests that these emphases might miss how computing technologies are re-shaping the project of cultural policy in a more fundamental direction. The paper draws on the work concerned with the cultural values of computing technologies and their influence on contemporary modes of government. These values, of instrumental reason, categorisation and calculation underpin a range of technologies, which are increasingly present in and important to the management of everyday life. Reflecting on how cultural taste and participation are being re-shaped by computing technologies, the paper argues these infrastructures are informed by specific visions of the kinds of people who live with and through them and how such people can be governed. The long-standing focus of cultural policy studies – about how states are concerned with the cultural formation of their citizens – are keenly present in the strategic ambitions and imperatives associated with computation.     

China’s cultural future: from soft power to comprehensive national power

The Hu Jintao administration used the ‘four‐in‐one’ wording for the overall arrangement of development in China, that is, economic development, political development, cultural development and social development. The term ‘soft power’ was adopted to conceptualise the cultural development dimension. This paper used a tripartite taxonomy to examine Chinese approaches to soft power, as ‘resources’, as ‘strategies’ and as ‘outcomes’. Soft power in China was mainly used in a domestic policy context to mean cultural resources to be amassed and accumulated. Soft power could be measured as part of its comprehensive national power and compared with the hierarchical status of other nation states. Soft power as strategies meant using power softly in seeking normal economic and political advantages abroad. Soft power as outcomes meant the rise of China and its cultural renaissance.     

Science as culture and leisure: cultural policy,industry and scientific culture in the Canadian context

Government ministries of industry have long been promoters, co‐producers and even sometimes producers of cultural policy – from local and regional development strategies to initiatives that fund cultural organizations to support emerging fields such as the technological arts. This article explores the relationship between cultural policy‐making, science museums and industry ministries in Canada. More specifically, this article investigates the emergence and institutionalization of scientific culture policy as a result of advocacy by science centres in the 1980s. Beyond the delineation of scientific culture as a field and of the contribution of industry ministries to cultural policy, this article highlights the entrepreneurial strategies of cultural organizations and their impact on policy and facilities, thus suggesting that cultural organizations are not just passive instruments of social regulation and reform.     

Reinventing the British film industry: the Group Production Plan and the National Lottery Franchise Scheme

This article is a comparative analysis of two analogous attempts to restructure the British film industry: the Group Production Plan of the early 1950s and the National Lottery Franchises of the late 1990s. The Group Production Plan brought together key industry figures such as Michael Balcon and John Grierson, who endured a fraught working relationship. The Plan failed, largely due to indifference from the major combines, Rank and the Associated British Picture Company (ABPC). Forty‐five years later, the Lottery Franchises were criticised for failing to produce enough films, although the example of Pathé Pictures suggests that expectations were too high and resources too low. The economic theory of path dependence problematises the policy drive to create vertically integrated companies. This article concludes that historical precedent plays an insufficient role in British film policy discourse and that academic research in cultural policy should aim to improve the dialogue between the past and the present.     

Great expectations – the European Union and cultural policy: fact or fiction?

The European Union secured limited legal ‘competence’ to act in culture in 1992. This article examines the operational context and its complicated and countervailing tensions that make European cultural policy formulation and implementation difficult. Underlying problems originate in the failure properly to define what is meant by ‘culture’ in different contexts or to identify clear and pragmatic policy objectives, although legitimate ‘instrumental’ use of culture is common. The EU’s institutional structures (Council, Commission and Parliament) are often at cross‐purposes, while the national interests of member states can have a negative effect. The structure and internal politics of the Commission ensure that the Directorate responsible for ‘culture’ remains marginal, despite its growing ambition. An attempt to institute an ‘Agenda for Culture’ in 2007 has had some initial success, but given the definitional, legal, political and administrative problems, claims being made for significant progress seem somewhat premature.