Eleonora Belfiore

Art as a means of alleviating social exclusion: Does it really work? A critique of instrumental cultural policies and social impact studies in the UK

One of the most interesting recent developments of British cultural policy is that debates on possible ways to tackle social exclusion and debates on the role of the subsidized arts in society have intertwined, so that the contribution that the arts can make towards alleviating the symptoms of exclusion is today highly emphasised by the government and the major public arts funding bodies. Indeed, in the last few years, we have witnessed the widespread adoption of the philosophy of social inclusion within both the cultural policy arena and the debate among professionals in the arts sector. Young people and the socially excluded seem to be now—in the rhetoric of the Department of Culture Media and Sport (DCMS)— at the top of the funding agenda:

RETHINKING THE SOCIAL IMPACTS OF THE ARTS

The paper presents a critical discussion of the current debate over the social impacts of the arts in the UK. It argues that the accepted understanding of the terms of the debate is rooted in a number of assumptions and beliefs that are rarely questioned. The paper goes on to present the interim findings of a three‐year research project, which aims to rethink the social impact of the arts, with a view to determining how these impacts might be better understood. The desirability of a historical approach is articulated, and a classification of the claims made within the Western intellectual tradition for what the arts “do” to people is presented and discussed.

Beyond the “Toolkit Approach”: Arts Impact Evaluation Research and the Realities of Cultural Policy‐Making

This article presents a reflection on the possibility and potential advantages of the development of a humanities‐based approach to assessing the impact of the arts, which attempts to move away from a paradigm of evaluation based on a one‐size‐fits‐all model usually reliant on empirical methodologies borrowed from the social sciences. A “toolkit approach” to arts impact assessment, as the article argues, demands excessive simplifications, and its popularity is linked to its perceived advocacy potential rather than to any demonstrable contribution it may make to a genuine understanding of the nature and potential effects of artistic engagement. The article also explores the relationship between research, advocacy and the actual realities of policy‐making with a view to proposing a critical research agenda for impact evaluation based on Carol Weiss’s notion of the “enlightenment” function of policy‐oriented research. In particular, the article attempts to highlight the contribution that cultural policy scholars working within the humanities could make to this area of policy research.

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.

Determinants of Impact: Towards a Better Understanding of Encounters with the Arts

The article argues that current methods for assessing the impact of the arts are largely based on a fragmented and incomplete understanding of the cognitive, psychological and socio-cultural dynamics that govern the aesthetic experience. It postulates that a better grasp of the interaction between the individual and the work of art is the necessary foundation for a genuine understanding of how the arts can affect people. Through a critique of philosophical and empirical attempts to capture the main features of the aesthetic encounter, the article draws attention to the gaps in our current understanding of the responses to art. It proposes a classification and exploration of the factors—social, cultural and psychological—that contribute to shaping the aesthetic experience, thus determining the possibility of impact. The ‘determinants of impact’ identified are distinguished into three groups: those that are inherent to the individual who interacts with the artwork; those that are inherent to the artwork; and ‘environmental factors’, which are extrinsic to both the individual and the artwork. The article concludes that any meaningful attempt to assess the impact of the arts would need to take these ‘determinants of impact’ into account, in order to capture the multidimensional and subjective nature of the aesthetic experience.

“Defensive instrumentalism” and the legacy of New Labour's cultural policies

The paper identifies “defensive instrumentalism” as a main feature that has characterised New Labours cultural policies, and which constitutes an important aspect of its legacy. Yet, resorting to instrumental arguments to defend the arts and to make a case for their usefulness is hardly an invention of New Labour. However, in the past, such defensive arguments were built into a more constructive and creative attempt to elaborate a coherent theory of art and an intellectually sophisticated view of the effects of the arts on individual and societies. What the paper argues, then, is that instrumentalism under New Labour has retained its longstanding defensive character, but was deprived of the attendant effort to elaborate a positive notion of cultural value.

Impact, "Value' and "Bad Economics": Making Sense of the Problem of Value in the Arts and Humanities.

Questions around the value of the arts and humanities to the contemporary world and the benefits they are expected to bring to the society that supports them through funding have assumed an increased centrality within a number of disciplines, not limited to humanities scholarship. Especially problematic, yet crucial, is the issue of the measurement of such public value. This article takes as a starting point a discussion of the ‘cultural value debate’ as it has developed within British cultural policy: here, the discussion of ‘value’ has been inextricably linked to the challenge of ‘making the case’ for the arts and for public cultural funding. The paper discusses the problems with the persisting predominance of economics in shaping current approaches to framing articulations of ‘value’ in the policy-making context. It concludes with a plea for a collaborative effort to resist the economic doxa, and to reclaim and reinvent the impact agenda as a route towards the establishment of new public humanities.

Researching the social impact of the arts: literature, fiction and the novel.

This paper offers a contribution to current debates in the field of cultural policy about the social impact of the arts. It explores the conceptual difficulties that arise in the notion of ‘the arts’ and the implications of these difficulties for attempts to generalise about their value, function and impact. It considers both ‘essentialist’ and ‘institutional’ perspectives, first on ‘the arts’ in toto and then on literature, fiction and the novel with the view of making an innovative intellectual connection between aesthetic theories and contemporary cultural policy discourse. The paper shows how literature sits uneasily in the main systems of classifying the arts and how the novel and fiction itself are seen as problematic categories. The position of the novel in the literary canon is also discussed, with particular reference to the shifting instability of the canon. The paper suggests that the dilemmas thrown up in trying to define or classify the novel are likely to be encountered in attempting to define other art forms. The implications of these findings for the interpretation and conduct of traditional ‘impact studies’ are explored.

THE UNACKNOWLEDGED LEGACY

This paper presents a critical discussion of the treatment of mimetic art, and particularly poetry and the theatre, in the work of the Athenian philosopher Plato (427–347 BC). It centres on Plato’s discussion of the corrupting powers of the arts in the Republic, and the implications that his fierce attack on poetry and theatre have for his construction of the ideal polity. The legacy of Platonic ideas in later elaborations of the corrupting power of the arts is discussed. Furthermore, the paper investigates the relationship between current debates on cultural policy and the Platonic idea that the transformative powers of the arts ought to be harnessed by the state to promote a just society. The conclusion thus reached is that “instrumental cultural policy”, rather then being a modern invention, was in fact first theorized precisely in Plato’s Republic.

Personal Well-Being

The claims grouped under this category can be seen, in many respects, as a derivation of Aristotle’s theory of catharsis that was discussed in Chapter 3. In these cases, the medical metaphor which, as we have seen, has been at the centre of an interpretative debate over Aristotle’s definition of tragedy in the Poetics, has been developed into full-blown new theoretical developments focusing on the effects of the arts on individuals’ well-being and, more recently, quality of life. Two main derivations of the original Aristotelian ideas can be identified under the heading of ‘theories claiming that the arts can be beneficial to personal health and well-being’, one more theoretical, the other more pragmatic in its nature and aims.