Andrew Horwitz: The Arts, The Work and the Gift Economy.

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There's been a lot of talk lately about supply and demand, trying to place market economic models on the arts. Which is all well and good except for the fact that the performing arts don't exist in a barter or mercantile economy, they exist in a gift economy which has very different customs, rules and regulations. Until we start thinking about arts funding in terms of a gift economy, we can't really start addressing the problems.

As a gift economy, the arts are predicated on the idea – and this is something I believe – that there is social benefit to the enterprise. Support of the arts is a form of altruism in the best of circumstances or a way of conveying social status in less ideal scenarios.

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Neil Mulholland: Old lamps for New Labour?

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Shortly after taking up his new position of Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, Andy Burnham launched the government’s latest ‘strategy for the creative economy’. Creative Britain: New Talents for the New Economy promises to continue the shift from an economic to a cultural understanding of economies, to ‘build a dynamic and vibrant society, providing entertainment alongside opportunity’ (DCMS, 2008). While it offers a clear definition of which industries are the ‘creative’ ones [1], Creative Britain is far from transparent regarding what it means by ‘culture’.

Throughout the document ‘culture’ is equated with an unproblematised national identity and with an Arnoldian exploitation of community and customs as a centripetal unifying force (see Arnold, 1869 and Gordon Brown, below).

[See also: The Flexible Personality : For a New Cultural Critique. - Reflections on Cultural Politics. - Internet Subcultures and Political Activism. ]

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