Keynes was both a serious Liberal and a serious man. His work in two world wars and their aftermath is the stuff of legend. His contribution to economic thinking, recently somewhat vindicated, makes him a giant. Bertrand Russell found him intellectually formidable.
But he also built the Cambridge Arts Theatre and was the first Chairman of the Arts Council, created by the postwar Labour Government.
It would be too easy to say merely that a great man needs a hobby like anyone else. The Classical world and civilisation since have shunned the suggestion that somehow culture was an add-on, like sitting down to watch the X factor after a tiring week. Greek culture was defined by Homer. The Romans (or at least the ones who wrote about these things) saw beyond ‘bread and circuses’.
So the gathering of cultural luminaries in the House of Lords last week was not, by any measure, just a ‘jolly’. Familiar faces from film, old rockers and young soul performers rubbed shoulders with television actors, impresarios and even a specialist in high fashion jewelry.
Jane Bonham-Carter had organised, with the assistance of Nick Clegg’s office, something which was as much a political statement as a chance to see and be seen. Yes: the Party was launching a policy statement ‘The Power of Creativity’. More importantly it was making a statement that the arts matter. And that cultural people can and should support the Liberal Democrats.
Nick’s speech, covered last week in brief on LDV, was especially significant. In it he gave a clear pledge to maintain arts funding at current levels – something increasingly doubtful in the other two main parties, bent on cuts while sparing the largest spending departments the trouble of even modest belt-tightening. He also reminded us that the cultural sector was capable of new industries like video games, in which we have a considerable competitive advantage.
Culture is not an add-on. Nor is it a Disney theme park. It is a vital part of the life of the nation and of local communities. So when a right wing think tank suggests that a cut of 50% in cultural spending would not be noticed and when local council budget-making targets the arts development officer rather than the costly managers to whom he or she reports, it is time to speak up loudly.
Nick did this and hundreds were there to hear him. Let us hope that the Federal Policy Committee, which likes to remind us of how important it is in producing the Party’s General Election manifesto, was listening.
30 Comments
Funnily enough, I was wondering just today how we justify spending £1bn on Arts Council funding while public borrowing is at £178bn and we are going to have to cut essential services.
You talk about “right wing cuts”, but all this harking back to ancient Greek sculpture sounds remarkably like the kind of argument I would expect from elitist Conservatives. In fact, I’d be much more comfortable making the case for these “right wing cuts” on the doorsteps in the housing estates in my ward than arguing for the “left wing cuts” (healthcare, education) that would have to come instead.
We simply cannot continue to pretend that we can afford to spend as if nothing has changed. But if we admit that we must spend less, then it behoves us to decide what is essential and must be saved, and what is not essential and can be cut. I cannot believe that a Liberal Democrat party can argue that arts spending is as high a priority as healthcare.
Second time today I’ve agreed with you Tom!
This is either very worrying for one of us – or we are really really right!
It really is a simple economic calculation – if we prefer to spend our “culture” money on Sky Movies and online music downloads over theatre trips or buying art works or visiting a concert, then why on earth should the government then get to take more money off us to prop those things up?
Art, even great and beautiful art need not be expensive. It is about “culture” and you know, one cannot force “culture” on people. Art is an expression of innate culture, from children finger painting to industrial installation art, from my local Catwezle Club open performance art and music venue to the LSO and ROH.
I certainly have no problem with commercial organisations such as developers and land owners being encouraged to commission art for their “public” private property – and perhaps if we taxed them a bit less, both in money and regulation, they’d be more competitive about such things as an added attraction for drawing people into their shopping centres, city squares and so on. But that’s a far cry from public servants deciding that B of the Bang is worth the money, let alone pumping money into it out of our pockets as well.
The “arts” in their broadest sense already have the benefit of monopoly state-protection of their work to subsidise their efforts at our expense, and whilst that can be a scourge on less well endowed organisations wanting to perform something they’re likely to have to pay a hefty royalty for doing, scrapping IP rights would make more of a natural difference to arts spending than continued further subsidy.
If we don’t have enough money left each to spend on cultural goods we would like to, perhaps it’s because government already skews that market, whilst taking far too much of our earnings anyway to spend on other things.
And I have a feeling personally that most surviving art of the ancient civilisations was either for the wainglory of autocratic personal rulers, or religious or political propaganda and control purposes. Whilst they might be more lovely to look like than t’Angel fo the North the principles are the same – the state deciding for us what we ought to like, what sort of message about pride we should receive and so on.
Chris, this is absolutely spot-on. There is an eonomic argument against cutting this:
– 10% of the UK’s economy comes from the creative economy. This is the highest proportion in the world, and it will contribute massively to paying off our debt. It is also the only part of the economy to grow during the recession.
– estimates of wealth creation put the ‘arts’ as putting at leats £2 into the economy for every £1 invested (£3 according to our Don Foster, and £5 according to the probably a bit over-optimistic government figures).
– the budget of DCMS, rightly, is about 1% that of the NHS, to cut this, and to cut the lottery funding of the Arts Councils (which of course is highly contentious) would damage our economy significantly – this would then inevitably have a knock-on impact on front-line services which are obviously more important.
– the Arts are currently funded through a ‘mixed-economy’ model, benefiting education (improving literacy, maths etc…), the economy directly, and the health service indriectly (for example music therapy and preventative treatment is a significant professional choice). Cut the central funding: you cut the sector, and you cut 10% of the economy.
I think the commitment to maintaining that funding is a good thing.
I agree with Tom that Chris’ article seems to promote an Adorno-like model of ‘elitism’ and ‘high art’. But this is not actually the case, and it would be nice if you could like Greek sculpture and know about Homer without being or likened to an ‘elitist Conservative’.
I very much like the stuff we get for our arts spending – good theatre, most public art, etc. But I feel I largely have to agree with Tom.
Yes, culture is intrinsic to our being. But culture in this sense is not a product of arts and culture public spending. You simply wouldn’t destroy our culture even if one year you accidentally spent the whole arts budget on complete garbage. (I’m saying whether or not this hasn already happened once or twice.)
Whoops. Not an MP. Curse pre-filled form fields.
Of course if we had followed the LibDem policy of joining the Euro in 2000 there would be 25% cuts in Arts funding as part of an ECB/IMFsupport package
Harry,
If we had lower taxes or smarter taxes like LVT instead of income and corporation taxes, most of our economy would have remained, and could even now be returned to being, internationally competititve and we would not be so reliant on things like financial services. Having our debt paid off by Simon Cowell and Jedward is furthermore just embarrassing! They are part of the corrosive economy rather than the creative…:-)
Apart, of course, from the public sector so far.
Which does not of course prove that it would not geneerate £1, £2 or £4 respectively without taking the £1 from us, as well as the overinflated prices caused by the artificial “scarcity” imposed by their intellectual property protection, which costs both British and overseas buyers of their output. It does not prove a ‘multiplier’ effect, something is rather bound to make more money if we give it some to start with. But the fundamental point is that this is not the state’s money to spend. It is our money, and whatever the ‘multiplier’, if any, it does not justify taking money from us to let state play pick the winner.
Indeed, let’s hope that £1bn soon becomes far more than 1% of the NHS budget…:-) As to Lottery funding, of course that should go to wherever the people who fund it decide. It is also not the state’s money to direct as it likes. In the arts it has made some egregious decisions to be sure, such as £70m to the Royal Opera Elite, but I suspect that far more of its arts money goes to causes the lottery players would put way down their priority list nevertheless.
So cut its existing (IP) protections rather than give it more protective funding. Indeed, these services pay even more than an individual would for purchasing creative output, designated as they are as for commercial use or public performance leading to higher royalties. Cutting the IP protection across the board of course would likely mean significant savings to the NHS, from lower non-protectionist pricing of things like drugs, and give it more money to acquire the benefits of such alternative therapies!
First, that’s two non-sequiturs in one sentence and unproven except in the minds of the “arts lobby”, second it does not follow at all. Most of the profit in any case ends up not in the pockets of artists so much as media giants exercising IP farming, at the cost both of more expensive product for the consumer, domestic and overseas, and a loss of opportunity for the small artist whose access to markets is controlled by these IP farmers. Stop all this and the industry’s real creators would probably flourish and, moreover, to the benefit of labour rather than capital.
The art of the Liberal is to find ways in which the state already skews the economy and eradicate those rather than adding more intervention to cure the unforseen effects of earlier intervention. And state created monopoly behaviour and rent seeking has got to be one of the first things to eradicate.
Blimey, a strong reaction from the quantitative side of the economic argument over the qualitative side. I’m afraid I don’t agree.
Arts has lasting value even if it doesn’t have an immediate impact, so even if we were to compare spending on the NHS we could look at how a failure to consistently support appreciation of architecture in the post war period resulted in huge sums of money wasted building inappropriate hospital buildings which in many ways contributed to increasing illness rates and which would have paid for itself many times over through the life of the structure and we continue to pay for today.
But that is indirect savings from arts in addition to the direct stimulus on economic activity.
It is also a bit rich for Jock to complain he is embarrassed by the cultural or economic contribution of Simon Cowell, by comparison to his precursors such as on Opportunity Knocks he is a massive improvement. But then some people have shorter memories!
I have to agree with the so-called “right-wing cutters” here. I’m a big fan of subsidised theatre and opera, but I’ve never been comfortable with the principle of it. People make art, governments don’t. I doubt there is much connection between state subsidies for opera houses and modern art galleries, and the revenue-earning “creative industry” of Darth Cowell and the like.
Politically, I think it’s peculiar that we’re prepared to take the sensible, brave, but very risky stance of saying that you can’t ring-fence health (health!) spending from public sector austerity, then follow that up with “a clear pledge to maintain arts funding at current levels”. If government is about priorities, I know where mine would lie.
Incidentally, Henry: “it would be nice if you could like Greek sculpture and know about Homer without being or likened to an ‘elitist Conservative’.”
It’s not liking Greek sculpture or Homer that makes one seem like an ‘elitist Conservative’; it’s believing that the X-Factor-and-football-loving masses should pay for your enjoyment of them.
Malcolm, I am part of the football-loving-masses in that regard, and contrary to the assumption that I enjoy Greek Sculture and Homer, I know little about them 🙂
The point I was making was that Chris was unfairly criticised as being an ‘elite Conservative’ simply for mentioning Homer and Greek Sculpture in his argument – this would not have happened had he referenced other works.
I welcome the commitment to maintenance of funding precisely because it supports the whole range of art from popular to less-popular at a basic, but high-quality level. I think this sits well with liberalism.
And of course health is clearly more important, that is why I talked about the economic and health benefits of art rather than any ‘intrinsic value’ it may or may not have.
Jock, (my name is Henry by the way), we could go into more detail, and no doubt that opportunity will arise at some point. You are right that I do “not of course prove that [the creative economy] would not geneerate £1, £2 or £4 respectively without taking the £1 from us”. But there is an argument there.
And you are right about my ‘two non-sequiturs’ but there is an argument there as well. I just reached the stage of ‘efficient summary rather than whole essay’ 🙂 You’re right it wouldn’t all disappear, that was exaggeration…
I apologise for the use of ‘smileys’.
Compared to the amount of money being spent on culture, it would be foolish to cut. There are many benefits to art and beauty beyond the economic, and if government did one thing, it should be about culture.
So Malcolm implies his priority would be health – I must disagree. We must ask what kind of society we want. Living to old age, but in fake meaningless commerciality is not my idea of a good life.
I am suprised that so many on this thread are being so short sighted about cuts in the the arts. The coverage of the power of creativity last week inspired me to start blogging myself so I won’t go into too much detail here, but if you’ve got 10 mins spare, you can have a look at what I dribbled on about in my first post.
http://orangemarauder.wordpress.com/
And for those who haven’t got time/can’t be doing with that – I agrree with Chris!
I think several people get me wrong here. I wouldn’t prioritise art and culture for cuts any more than health say. I am anti-state, pro-social. Nonetheless, I do think there is a particular problem with a state agent picking winners and losers in culture. Culture *is* the province of the *social* not the *state*.
I have nothing against those who run, for example, schools (and preferably also not the state for state education is also troublesome) including art. I have nothing against public art by public subscription as in the days of the civic movement.
The world of commercially successful arts and the creative industries is already highly privileged by state action – through things like intellectual property monopoly – and this likely reduces the consumer funding available for less well commercialised art.
But I do not believe that government, of all people, should be somehow “feeding” art to anyone, whether the middle classes (whom I’ll lay money on it are the ones most likely to benefit from state art sponsorship, just as they are from state sport sponsorship and similar), or those deemed “deprived”. State action has largely created that dependency and deprivation and if we want people to live more fulfilled lives (and believe that art contributes to that) the answer is not for the state to spend yet more money, and getting to decide what’s “good for people” in culture, but to peel away the layers of state action that leave people with not enough to be able to procure whatever form of art and culture they do like.
Culture is a *social* issue and not a *state* issue, and throughout history state sponsored art has been the tool of propagandists and people who want to control our cultural life on moral and political grounds. State action is inherently not supportive of the “raucous and unpredictable” but of “bread and circuses”.
I liked your post on your own blog, Paul, and I’m puzzled that you seem to think that that vibrant, flourishing world of drama you describe would vanish if tax money wasn’t propping it up. Being a bit of an old leftie (and, to reveal my dark secret, a bit of an am-drammie), I don’t mind a certain amount of support for community-based art and theatre – and I certainly wouldn’t suggest ending drama teaching in schools 🙂 ; but there’s a huge step up from there to spending millions of pounds raised involuntarily on minority pursuits that apparently can’t raise the money from their own patrons. Sometimes ‘commercialism’ (or ‘commerciality’ – not quite sure what the difference is, but I like the word, Harry) is just a dirty word for ‘putting your money where your mouth is’.
Obviously, withdrawing all state support overnight would have a catastrophic effect, and we’re not in such a dire situation that we should think about doing that. But the idea that state funding for art should be exempt from cuts when life and limb services are not makes my head spin.
Incidentally, one of the most likely immediate effects of ending the state protected monopoly of intellectual property is that artists would need to find better ways of protecting their income than by relying on HMV/Warner Bros sending people home with their “culture” shrink wrapped in five inch squares of plastic, or digitally beamed to millions of disconnected people at a time across the ether. Most likely this would mean increases of and a drop in the cost of live performances, bringing their art back to real audiences at affordable prices, creating “cultural experiences” rather than iPod clones.
Just seen Jock’s post. While I don’t agree with the old anarchist on much, I think he summed up the point nicely with this:
Culture is a *social* issue and not a *state* issue
Unlike Jock, I think some things are “state” issues; but culture very much isn’t.
Oi! Less of the “old”! …:-)
Besides Malcolm, contrary to what you may think, I consider lots of things to be state issues:
War, institutional thuggery, corporatism, monopoly, incompetence, the degradation of social power and cohesion, the diminution of industrial and productive capacity, the wealth gap, economic exploitation, recidivism, ignorance, poverty and conformity…!
Yes, all caused by the state…:)
Ah, yes, ignorance and incompetence are caused by the state. What did the Romans ever do for us? If it weren’t for the state, I never would have been so rude as to throw the word ‘old’ in your gleamingly youthful direction. Sincere, state-subsidised (if I can wangle it) apologies… 😉
Okay, I take it back, ignorance and incompetence are not, strictly speaking, *caused* by the state; they are the state’s chief weapons…:-)
Oh, and surprise of course. Sunrise, ignorance and incompetence, these are the state’s…
“Sunrise”? Surely that belongs to the arts, if anything does!
I don’t think we need to go unilateral on any principles.
The main argument for the development of the social state was the imposition of minimum standards in any particular sphere.
I would not be happy if the market in ballet or opera dried up as a result of a recession reprioritising state spending on other more politically populus areas which saw all subsidies removed at a stroke and prevented any world-class performances being staged in the next Olympic city because alternate funding arrangements could not be found or set up.
But then I think this is an area where the state broadcaster has a responsibility to step in as a great populariser of the forms – isn’t there a question about the disproportionate expenditure of the BBC license fee on independently successful forms in the commercial arena (such as comedy) compared to some of the visual arts? In my view the recent craze for competitive dance on TV should be used to cross-over into the classical format, just as there is a Radio 3 for every Radio 1.
Surely this would satisfy the criticism of opponents of state subsidies on two counts – stratifying the administration of funding to remove bureaucratic wastage of tax-payer resources while giving clearer justification for their purpose where subsidies are provided.
So, rather than it being a matter of principle it’s a matter of where technically proficient administration is practised it is politically sustainable and legitimate – and where not, not.
I think where I agree with Jock and others is that government is not an end in itself, Government must be productive.
If it can’t be, then there wouldn’t be any support for the NHS (which you favoured earlier in this thread).
I’m saying that potential benefits to government are neither a given nor impossible – I’m opposed to the ideological belief of each side of the question and I’m arguing that it is something there is currently insufficient empirical evidence to definitively prove a case either way. A fair analysis would be to say it is a very mixed bag.
Until adequate measures can be found then we are resigned to proposing arguments of questionable relevance which go round in circles and we will continue to lack the administrarive tools to get a proper handle on the problems.
What is constructive about pushing for a bigger state or a smaller state per se? I’m completely agnostic on the matter. Surely whatever size of state is to be supported we must push for a better state which is more effective and more efficient in what it does do.
…and if that’s utopian, then I’m a monkey’s uncle!
Oranjepan…
I did? Show me where and I’ll repudiate it right away…:) What I said was that hoped that £1bn would soon be much more than 1% of the budget of the NHS – i.e. that the latter’s budget would fall (to zero for preference).
And I am saying that the actual, as well as potential – it can get worse! – disbenefits of the state are both visible and inevitable, as well as so destructive that they outweigh the few potential benefits to such an extent that almost any other mechanism of securing such benefits, even if they are not as great, would be better.
Personally, I think there are thousands of years of human history to show that the state is essentially a predatory beast, born of conquest and confiscation and the progenitor of economic exploitation. Including things as egregious as more than 200,000,000 additional and unnecessary deaths solely in conflict and atrocity over the past century, a period in which arguably the state reached its zenith in many ways and places (at least I earnestly hope so), never mind the countless millions who have suffered through the poverty imposed by the way states operate. I don’t know how much more evidence one might need to be convinced!
I’m not clear what you mean here. “Adequate measures” of doing things we currnet think “only the state can do” outside of the state? Many have been proposed, elaborated and even implemented in almost every area of social problems. Few of them are rocket science. Indeed most rest on considerably simpler arrangements than trying to arrange, control an monitor the lives of millions of people by bureaucratic elties about as far removed from the true processes of economic resource allocation as it is imaginable to be.
…is like asking whether we a lot of robbery or only a little robbery. We may try to justify robbery with the idea that what is stolen is somehow put to better use than if it were not stolen, but robbery is always robbery. And the state is always the state. And once you get a taste for robbery the recidivism rate is absolutely appalling!
Surely it must be a moral imperative, however, to find, first at least, ways in which one’s aims can be achieved without robbery? The state appears to take an opposite view.
What is utopian is to say that government can be productive. It cannot be. It has no resources of its own. It is always consuming. Once you allow that the only argument for the state must be a utilitarian one, that its consumption is somehow better for everyone than not doing so.
Jock,
you’re arguing from your conclusions and going backwards in a way that is unsound and doesn’t make sense.
Government ‘cannot’ be productive? That’s a bare assertion.
I wholly accept that human society has caused untold suffering through unnecessary wars etc, but at the same time I challenge you to demonstrate that the ability to support a massively expanded population which lives lives multiple times longer could have been possibly achieved without any form of structured system of government with a chain of command. Surely history provides ongoing judgement of the facts of the matter.
I also take a distaste of your desire to impose your own highly-politicised terms on the discussion. It may be your perspective that all taxation is ‘robbery’ by the sovereign representative body of the collective state and it is your right to dissent from prevailing opinion (we do have a state), but it is my view that the truth of this view is contingent upon the legitimacy, validity and relevance of the structured organisation in question, which themself are dependent on levels of participation, transparency and accountability in, of and around the decision-making processes.
It is to tend to polemicism to argue definitively, and I think it is unnecessarily constraining as well as inaccurate and unhelpful. It is impolitick and you are backing yourself into an ideological corner of your own creation in doing so, which explains your somewhat tense intellectual relationship with the party.
I thought it was clear that I am in some agreement with you that potential benefits are balanced by potential disbenefits, but to make a final pronouncement based upon selective readings of available evidence strikes me as being disingenuous and slipshod.
If it is the collective will of the democracy to grow or shrink either the real size and power of the state, or that relative to the individual and the self-organising groups within the whole then it is necessary to find ways to get there in the least disruptive and destructive ways possible.
I also tend to oppose the relative growth of the size and power of the state, but I think it is dangerous (on different levels) to set about deliberately trying to undermine it. Instead I think it is much more practical and feasible to set out to increase the real power of individuals by helping people fulfill their active potential.
Which brings me back to the topic at hand.
Art is a real tool which helps provide the inspiration to find the means of escape from our current predicaments, so to subject arts funding to purely commercial or corporate pressures risks upsetting the delicate balance of its’ spectrum of activity to the detriment of wider society.
The public discourse which is expressed through the arts is an extremely valuable contribution to all levels of life in our nation, so to use our opponents’ failure to steward the economy as a reason for us to attack a field of activity that supports and nutures the cultivation and refinement of personal expression would be an attack on the freedom of speech and conscience which is the very fundament of our party.
I think it is imperative that liberals (of whatever colour) support education through the arts and I am proud that the party leadership recognises the importance of it.
We should sing their praises for it (although that is no excuse not to do our sums too).
I’ll keep this short:
I don’t see how I am arguing from conclusions. In fact I am arguing from observation of the continuous history of the “state” in its many forms.
You seem to assume that the lack of a state implies no kind of “structured system of government (governance, or administration I would say) with a chain of command”. I don’t. I might quibble with the word “command” a bit, but nonetheless, market-anarchy would still have systems of, shall we say, management. Just not coercive ones.
On arts, I will offer you a policy compromise…by all means fund the sort of truly ground level arts projects that have the greatest difficulty competing with the media oligarchy, but at the same time sweep away the exploitative, monopolistic, protectionist system of intellectual property that currently robs the consumer, skews the market and acts as a tremendous barrier to entry for most “jobbing artists”. I suggest you would fairly quickly be able to remove the overt subsidy as well.
But I honestly cannot see how a system of allocating those funding resources that does not itself pick and choose what someone thinks is good for others can be devised.
It seems we’re on close to the same time schedule…
It also seems we’re not so far apart in what we want to achieve.
However I do object to the confrontational style of language you choose to use. Calling the existence of the state and the means it has to support itself ‘robbery’ is an analysis that precludes constructive discussion, so I’m glad you’re prepared to step back and offer a point of compromise.
I suppose ‘command’ and ‘coerce’ do have connotative meanings, but these are built from the measures I describe above and are in themselves contingent terms. How involved we are in the processes determines the implied level of negative or positive responsibility we have for those decisions taken on our behalf by our representatives.
I also think it would help if you could provide a specific example of the sort of problems facing ‘jobbing artists’ before it’s possible to address.
As I described, my problem is not with the principle of subsidies, but of the manipulated practice of double subsidies where state funding controls both ends of the barrel (ie production and distribution, mainly broadcast) without any formalised connection between the two. By recognising that there is a relationship it should be possible to coordinate them far better and thereby make far better use of the resources available. I agree it currently seems like there are factors which are holding the industry to ransom (although there are many views on their precise nature).
But it delves into a whole new debate to ask whether art must have a social purpose to have a social value, or wherther or not a subjective decision on this is enough to justify funding allocations.
Surely it is the artists perogative on the communicative process to make that judgement for themself during composition and creation according to their own method, while curation places the work in a context where any meaning can be derrived by and for the audience.
For me the real value in art can only be judged over time as different audiences appreciate the works within different contexts (for example Dr Who and Shakespeare last because their insights can be adapted universally; James Cameron and Damien Hirst probably won’t develop an afterlife because their works are basically objectified statements of universality), so by your own terms who are we to even say what is a valid work of art and whether there are indeed valid works of art which are prevented from finding an appreciative audience?
Art is much more than just a commercial product which abides by any pure economic theory – surely it is also the practice of creating new rules and forging new markets where the work can be discovered and properly understood for what it does.
Anyway, over to you for more examples…