Directing change? Reflections on participatory programmes and inclusive theatres cultures

ABSTRACT

Participatory programmes in theatres typically aim to amplify the voice of people less commonly involved in ‘mainstream' theatre. Past scholarship has evaluated their impact on participants but paid less attention to the reciprocal impact on the internal culture and ‘diversity climate' of theatres. Drawing on exploratory research at two leading UK theatre companies, the National Theatre and the Young Vic, we reflect first on what this tells us about the relationship between participatory programmes and the institution’s diversity climate, and second on what this might tell us about efforts to become diverse and inclusive more generally.

KEYWORDS:

• Diversity and inclusion
• inequality
• participatory programmes
• theatres

Introduction

In recent years, participatory programmes in theatres have been designed to meet a variety of social, political, and artistic agendas, though generally this is intended for the ‘common good’ of audiences and participants (Afolabi 2017). The impact of these programmes on participants has often been subject to formal evaluation yet the impact on the internal culture of theatres has been relatively overlooked. This is understandable given that typically, these programmes are designed to ‘reach out’ to under-served communities and audiences rather than ‘look inwards’ in this sense. However, our purpose here is twofold. First, we reflect on the relationship between participatory programmes and the host institution’s ‘diversity climate’, where ‘diversity’ is defined as demographic variation amongst theatre workers in a more objective sense, and the related ‘climate’ as the degree to which formal structural characteristics of the theatre and its informal values support a sense of inclusivity and belonging on these grounds (e.g. Gonzalez and DeNisi 2009, 24). Second, we reflect on what this exploration of participatory programmes might say about the culture of theatres more generally, and implications for their wider efforts to become more diverse and inclusive.

To provide some brief context for these questions, in recent decades diversity and inclusion has moved up policy agendas across the cultural and creative sector, to help redress poor representation amongst minoritised groups in the ‘production, distribution and consumption of both publicly subsidised and commercially produced cultural forms’ (Hadley, Heidelberg, and Belfiore 2022, 246). Beswick (2018) attributes this development to a change in the cultural climate, as improving demographic diversity is seen as an important goal amongst senior theatre managers, amidst growing recognition of the need to include a wider pool of talent. In the UK, a number of policy and academic reports have pointed to the nature and scope of the problem with one for example finding that just under five per cent of workers in music, performing and visual arts are from ethnically diverse backgrounds and just over eighteen per cent from working-class backgrounds, representing considerable under-representation on both counts (Brook, O’Brien, and Taylor 2020). Despite this, the same study reported that many workers within the cultural and creative sector, especially those whose identities are constructed in some sense as ‘normative’, typically white, middle-class and often male, believe achievement is based on merit: in other words, talent and hard work. Attention to diversity and inclusion has been positioned by theatres as one way to address related challenges.

Our specific interest in how participatory programmes might contribute to goals of diversity and inclusion was particularly motivated by an external evaluation of Pericles, the inaugural production of the UK’s National Theatre participatory programme Public Acts, staged by Chris Bush and directed by Emily Lim. The stated aim of Public Acts is to build partnerships with theatres and community organisations, which share the National Theatre’s vision of theatre as a force for change, including to give people space to come together, and to see themselves and the world differently (National Theatre n.d.). Public Acts specifically aims to ‘create extraordinary acts of theatre and community’ and a formal evaluation reported not only that rehearsals and workshops for Pericles were ‘joyful, often noisy, and always full of laughter’, but also that participants experienced enhanced confidence as a result, and collaborations with community partners helped the latter build skills and resources (Nicholson 2019).

However, of particular interest here, this evaluation also hinted that the production had positive impacts on the internal culture of the theatre as, for example, it allowed theatre professionals to learn ‘about inclusive working practices in workshops and rehearsal’ (Nicholson 2019). Related activities noted in the formal evaluation included practical opportunities for theatre professionals at the National Theatre to extend their understanding about working with vulnerable groups, as they received training on safeguarding and learned how to respond to new challenges or situations. Public Acts also offered opportunities for current theatre workers to understand how performers with additional access needs, religious commitments and cultural sensibilities could be welcomed and accommodated in theatre-making and theatre buildings.

These were intriguing findings which also require an initial and early note on positionality. This is always important in qualitative research, where situated knowledge reflects the conditions in which it is produced and the social locations of the producers. However, especially relevant here is that while the second author has a close and lifelong immersion in cultural and creative arts as a trained dance artist, the first author is a sociologist of work located in a management school, whose primary research focus is ‘elite’ professions, such as law, accountancy and medicine. There is significant debate in methodological literature on the benefits of insider/outsider status in the conduct of research. One argument is that meaningful insights are more possible given close familiarity with the field of study, while another is that a certain distance from the field allows alternative perspectives to emerge (e.g. Merriam et al. 2001). The first and second authors aimed to bridge this divide, by sharing notes and comparing our perspectives during the process of data collection and analysis, to arrive at the conclusions we present here.

Despite this, we acknowledge that the first author’s outsider status suggests certain biases and a particular perspective through which efforts towards diversity and inclusion might be understood. As we call on a particular set of overlapping literature, exploring these themes in commercial spheres. However, the first author’s perspective as an outsider may have especially highlighted a certain ambivalence in the external evaluation of Public Acts, to the extent this focused on activities rather than outcomes, and offered quite limited material evidence of quantitative change in terms of representation of theatre professionals or qualitative improvements in working lives. Again, this might partly be explained and justified as the primary focus for Public Acts was the impact on participants and as such it was not designed with changes to internal cultures in mind. It is also characteristic of much wider efforts relating to diversity and inclusion as an equality agenda, which has also been accused of prioritising actions over outcomes (e.g. Kersten 2000). However, we felt these findings offered a useful platform from which to consider the impact of participatory programmes on internal cultures and diversity climates nevertheless.

To help us explore these themes, we started by conducting a series of interviews in 2021 with key figures working on Public Acts at the National Theatre, at which point we also extended our research to the ‘Young Associates’ programme at the Young Vic, also based in London. These programmes have different aims though both have a community focus and aim to open-up the life and work of the theatre to individuals and groups who might otherwise be excluded. This empirical research pointed to some ambiguities in relation to the positive impact of participatory programmes on internal theatre cultures, though suggested these impacts certainly look promising, including as findings corresponded with a wider literature suggesting related benefits, as we will explain. A less expected outcome of this exploration was as it also directed our attention to aspects of theatre cultures which may have an important influence on efforts to become more diverse and inclusive, especially where interviewees explicitly prioritised relatively subjective values as measures of impact, such as ‘happiness’ and ‘joy’. In the final part of the paper we broaden our reflections accordingly, to explore how the culture we identify implies both risks and opportunities when it comes to ‘doing’ diversity. This leads us to the conclusion that paradox and ambiguity are fundamental to related interventions and activities, in the theatre, as elsewhere. Rather than seeking to resolve these tensions, we suggest they should be embraced, as they reflect the nuances of organisational life and can be seen in a productive light. Before expanding on these points, we provide further details about our case study theatres and describe our approach.

Introducing the case studies and research methods

The National Theatre is the UK’s leading publicly funded venue for the performing arts, located in a complex of buildings on the South Bank of the river Thames though, as its name suggests, with a national remit. The Young Vic started life as part of the National Theatre, in a building located a short distance away, becoming independent in the mid-1970s. Both operate programmes aimed at participation though these are somewhat different. At the National Theatre, and in its own words, ‘Public Acts’: ‘creates ambitious new works of participatory theatre and is built on sustained partnerships with theatres and community organisations across the UK who share our vision of theatre as a force for change’. A key stated aim of Public Acts is to unite communities and reduce isolation through participation though, as already noted, external evaluation had identified a number of benefits that went beyond the impacts on participants, to strengthen inclusive working practices and inform related conversations within the theatre (Nicholson 2019). The Young Vic takes a slightly different approach to participation, and here we explored their Young Associates programme. This employs a group of young people who reside in its local London boroughs of Lambeth and Southwark, who work part-time at the theatre in a range of roles, for which they are paid London living wage. The specific aim of this programme is to facilitate ‘meaningful ways into work in the creative and cultural industries for young people’, and as such the programme is aimed to help them develop relevant skills and experience and a strong CV.

We chose to focus on both programmes as we wished to build on existing information about Public Acts provided in the external evaluation, and outlined above, but also wanted to extend our analysis to a programme operated by a theatre company with a different culture and repertoire. Further, the over-arching aim of encouraging wider participation was similar for both programmes though while Public Acts is focused especially on building relationships with community organisations and individuals, the Young Associates programmes is intended to open access to theatre work for young people in the local area who might struggle to access these opportunities without this support, and who may not be representative of current theatre workers in terms of their ethnicity and socio-economic background. This programme is expected to contribute to further employment opportunities for participants in theatres over the long-term, and reflects one of the theatre’s core values as described on their website: ‘We believe theatre is at its best when everyone participates’.

We approached leaders of programmes at both theatres with the aim of investigating in further depth how these programmes reflected, informed and perhaps influenced their internal cultures. This research was intended as small scale and exploratory and, rather than assuming particular outcomes or answers, was launched in the spirit of inquiry. However, the study design was also affected by the particular circumstances in which the research took place. Generally, the cultural and creative sector had been subject to a variety of pressures in the period running up to our research. The death of George Floyd and a resurgent Black Lives Matter (BLM) movement had increased attention to racial injustice, and internal reports and some policy documents had drawn attention to problems with limited demographic diversity and a lack of inclusion for people working within the sector. With respect to class (which in the UK often intersects with ethnicity), Brook, O’Brien, and Taylor (2020) had reported an over-representation of the managerial/professional class in every creative occupation and an under-representation of those from working-class backgrounds. ‘Making it’ in creative jobs, they explained, requires economic, social and cultural resources that are not fairly shared. This matters both for reasons of social justice and for outputs as: ‘Who produces cultures reflects social inequality’ (Brook, O’Brien, and Taylor 2020, 2). This follows earlier work including by Morton et al. (2004, 13), who pointed out that when it comes to equity and inclusion: ‘successful organisations model internally what they wish to express externally’.

Questions of diversity and inclusion were then relatively high on the agenda but also inevitably sensitive. A second important factor was that data collection took place at the tail end of the COVID pandemic, during which productions had shut down and most workers were physically remote for a period at least. This context influenced and, to some extent, constrained our approach, and we used techniques that were possible and practicable given the ongoing need to acknowledge related sensitivities and limit social contact. As such, we deployed a form of convenience sampling, speaking to interviewees who had the most relevant knowledge but who were also available during this especially busy and at times stressful period. At the National Theatre, we were granted interviews with four key stakeholders in leadership positions and/or who had close involvement in planning and implementing Public Acts, particularly focusing on the Pericles production in 2018 and surrounding activities. Interviews here took place online, were conducted by the first author, and covered areas such as the aims and objectives of Public Acts, and how interviewees believed it had influenced the internal culture of the theatre, if at all. At the Young Vic, we combined participant observation during a site visit with one-to-one interviews, three of which were with participants and one with a programme lead, all of which were completed by the second author. Young Associates were asked how they heard about the programme, their experiences while on it, their hopes and aspirations for their careers, along with basic demographic details, while the programme lead discussed motivations for the programme and how it corresponded with the wider culture of the theatre.

Data collection primarily involved semi-structured interviews, which we felt offered good opportunities to ask in-depth questions relating to our research aims, and which allowed interviewees capacity to offer their opinions without being influenced (or overheard) by colleagues and peers. However, this was supplemented by participant observation in the case of the Young Associates and this allowed the second author to familiarise herself with the content of the programme, and with the participants and their work, which in turn helped inform questions raised in the interviews. All interviews were transcribed with field notes and, as we analysed our data, we were interested in how interviewees understood the potential impact of participatory programmes on internal cultures, as well as any evidence they could provide for these impacts, and read and re-read our transcripts and field notes for relevant examples, words and phrases. We describe our emergent findings next.

How participatory programmes reflect and reproduce theatre diversity climates

More (democratic) space to participate?

One of the first findings that emerged from our analysis was that participatory programmes appear to reflect and reproduce more inclusive and democratic use of space within theatres. Use of space is often considered a critical element in relation to democracy, which requires places where any body can meet to share ideas, discuss, and perhaps demonstrate. Space of this type can then be an important factor allowing diverse constituents to access power and express voice. At the organisational level, space has also been highlighted as an important theme in diversity scholarship, in relation to which Nirmal Puwar made a useful contribution in 2004, as she introduced the notion of ‘space invaders’ to describe how certain bodies are ‘entitled’ to certain spaces, or at least seen as such, while others (often female and ethnically diverse) are not. Puwar (2004) drew on case studies in a variety of sectors including politics and academia to demonstrate how these spaces become normalised as white and male, with people fitting these characteristics representing what she called the ‘somatic norm’. This concept has been extremely influential in wider research on diversity and inclusion, and it is notable here that interviewees at both the National Theatre and the Young Vic referred to the progressive use of space within the programmes we explored. We suggest this could represent one example of the ‘disruption’ Puwar believed necessary in pursuit of inclusion and social justice, while also hinting at a more democratic approach to theatrical life, which we characterise as allowing new ways of being within our case study theatres.

For the National Theatre, ways in which the physical space of the theatre was occupied and used had been highlighted within the external evaluation of Pericles, which determined that the exceptional diversity of the cast meant workers and employees were sensitised towards issues of accessibility and feelings of ‘belonging’ for individuals and groups in spaces with which they were less accustomed (Nicholson 2019). Our interviewees expanded on these themes by pointing to a symbolic disruption of space. For example, they explained that employees responsible for designing and developing Public Acts were given relatively prominent places in the organisational hierarchy, to suggest quite highly formal or ‘positional’ power, while also symbolising the value attached to these roles by leaders. Interviewees here and at the Young Vic also pointed to a direction of flow between core and participatory programmes so that while historically the ideas, cultures and innovations developed in the former are used to inform the latter, in this instance this flow is reversed. This is cause and effect of a situation where participatory principles are embedded within apparently more democratic theatre cultures and are also enabled by a second form of disruption which is more physical.

In this sense, interviewees revealed that staff responsible for Public Acts are physically located at the heart of the theatre, central to what one interviewee called its ‘artistic nucleus’ and (quite literally) sitting close to senior leadership. For those involved, this physical proximity was considered an important means to bridge what might otherwise be seen by theatre workers as ‘separate worlds’, to unite participatory activity with the everyday activities of the theatre and situate both as having equal value. Another important theme was the aim to disrupt hierarchies between people by ensuring that everybody within the company was treated the same: as ‘VIPs’. In addition, they described constant mixing between community partners and theatre workers and leaders, which interviewees believed enabled mutual learning and exchange of ideas. According to one interviewee, members of the Pericles cast developed a ‘different relationship’ with the buildings, becoming happy to simply ‘hang out’ in ways which might not have felt comfortable previously, one way in which the theatre opens up to people from diverse backgrounds.

At the Young Vic interviewees also highlighted the use of space and hinted at a relationship with more democratic decision-making within the theatre. As already noted, the Young Associates programme is designed to allow participation by young people who might otherwise struggle to access theatre work and the spaces in which it takes place. The significance of space and having places to physically meet was specifically illustrated by a networking event a team of Young Associates had organised for other young people already working in theatre, or hoping to do so, which was supported within the programme and which interviewees told us about. Several positioned this event as close to the ‘ideal’ in terms of true inclusion as participants were able to mix on equal terms. This was partly possible as there was limited hierarchy or power asymmetries between the organisers and participants, and amongst the latter, as they often had similar experiences in work and life and were generally of a similar age. Critically, nobody who took part had formal ‘positional’ power over others, and this helped make this, as one interviewee said: ‘a very democratic place’. Another called this ‘a really rich and fulfilling experience . . . just to facilitate a space where people can meet and mingle’.

To an extent, interviewees felt the culture and environment of the Young Vic also reflects these ideals. One interviewee described the theatre as ‘anti-hierarchical’, referring especially to the direction of leadership in which the theatre was headed, and also called it a ‘democratic place’. They underlined this was facilitated because the theatre feels like a very open space, both to its wider community and to participants in the programme. This is possible because for example the theatre has an open-to-the-street café on the ground floor but the physical space of the building is also designed as open-plan, and this allow for significant interaction between the Young Associates and other staff, with areas to work and to relax and connect, with few physical barriers and shared workspaces. As the physical space of the theatre encourages and allows what one called a sense of ‘flow’, Young Associates were able to regularly interact with each other and most other members of staff, thus enabling less sense of hierarchy. Those we interviewed also believed the programme had been deliberately designed to ensure participants are ‘visible’ within the organisation, signalling once again the cultural and symbolic value of the programme and those who take part. Overall, there was a sense amongst interviewees at both theatres that this relatively open use of space had the wider effect of helping to normalise the presence of ‘diverse’ bodies within these workplaces, thus again, allowing new ways of being.

Participation and different views: seeing ourselves and others differently?

A second key theme emerging from our data concerns how participatory programmes encourage current workers and new entrants to look differently at themselves and others, which we characterise as new ways of seeing within theatres. This was evidenced in part as interviewees described how these programmes build empathy and trust. Empathy is defined as the ability to understand and share other people’s feelings, and to see a situation from another person’s point of view, while trust refers to a belief in the reliability of something, including relationships, where trust can facilitate risk-taking and mitigate uncertainty. Empathy is often positioned as central to theatrical communication (Etherton and Prentki 2006), with Rowe (2007, 146) arguing that empathy can close the difference between self and other to transcend difference and help find universal truths. Empathy and trust are also necessary parts of more inclusive cultures, to recognise different perspectives, opinions, values and behaviours. One way in which empathy can be built is where individuals and groups who represent demographic diversity work closely together on an everyday basis while, on the other hand, it is undermined through distance, which can enable the ‘othering’ of certain groups. This is significant because empathy was both a positive characteristic of the participatory programmes we explored and an important effect. In other words, interviewees from both theatres suggested that as these programmes facilitated engagement with and between wider communities, this encouraged theatre workers to develop in turn not only empathy with ‘others’ but also empathy with themselves.

Once again, concepts such as empathy were emergent but for example, at the National Theatre, there was a sense Public Acts had encouraged, in the words of one interviewee, more ‘reflective practice’ internally, also giving people working on it employed by the theatre the ability to ‘navigate things with a slightly different lens . . . being just kinder or giving more thought’. Another interviewee described an ‘alchemy in the room . . . you’re starting to view everyone else with more, I don’t know, kindness, just more understanding’. There is of course no guarantee this empathy extends across the theatre and to all workers but, as programme leaders on Public Acts took seriously the wellbeing of the Pericles cast, interviewees believed this had a wider positive impact by encouraging greater attention amongst theatre leaders to see to the wellbeing of all staff. They considered this a vital contribution to inclusivity and belonging in an industry which, we would add, often also assumes a vocational commitment to the work which can encourage long hours, sometimes for low pay.

Empathy was also developed at the National Theatre through more material interventions, as a variety of activities during Public Acts encouraged mixing between individuals and groups who were diverse according to job role and demographic characteristics: for example, during ‘Big Breakfast’ meetings, security staff mixed with members of the Pericles cast, and the latter were able to communicate their experiences of coming into the theatre using security passes, which enabled the former to develop their own new ways of seeing and understanding this experience. This was considered important for both parties, given reports that workers who are less familiar with these spaces and in these spaces can be made to feel alien and out-of-place. Interactions of this sort ensured security staff were sensitised to these issues, and interviewees felt this was likely to have a wider effect, beyond this particular production. Further, as audiences for Pericles were more representative of both the cast and of the nation than is typically the case, this was said by interviewees to offer a vision to current workers and leaders at the National Theatre in terms of what audiences could look like in future, for ‘mainstream’ productions.

Similar issues were taken-up by interviewees at the Young Vic, where the Young Associates interviewed for this study described how being part of the theatre production experience had encouraged new ways of seeing themselves. Reflexivity is often considered a vital factor for self-determination and for agency: people in a state of ‘misrecognition’ are often unable to identify structural and cultural barriers which limit their progress, or find ways to challenge them, which may limit their ability to act strategically with respect to career (e.g. Bottero 2019). Participation of the sort described here can help individuals and groups who are under-represented as theatre workers and audiences adopt a more consciously aware and critical stance in relation to industry ‘norms’. As one interviewee said, participation in this programme: ‘allows us to question our environment and society, but also allows us to look inwards at what we would do to make a change’. Amongst the changes deemed necessary were issues of low pay which interviewees often felt had not been taken sufficiently seriously by the sector as a whole. These criticisms were not directed at the Young Vic as an institution, as interviewees saw low wage work as an endemic problem across the cultural and creative sector, yet as their experiences helped them recognise related injustices, this could encourage a more activist approach, as Young Associates felt better positioned to advocate for themselves and others.

Overall, the Young Associates programme includes a variety of informal and formal mechanisms to ensure participants had new opportunities to reconsider how they saw themselves and what or who they could ‘be’. These changes were not only psychic but also practical. The interviewee quoted above went on to say that their experience on the programme had helped them see what is valued within theatres and what they and others like them were capable of. That, she said: ‘has been a big eye-opener for me’. Armed with this knowledge, this and other interviewees felt better equipped to progress within the sector and that through their physical presence, they might help disrupt established norms around who can get in, and who can get on, in cultural and creative work.

Thinking about ambiguity and ambivalence: feeling hopeful – with qualifications and caveats

Our exploratory research points then to some of the ways in which participatory programmes might encourage new and different ways of relating to each other for theatre workers but there were of course many ambiguities and uncertainties. It is worth pointing first to some counter-evidence especially as, while the Young Associates we interviewed were positive about the programme overall, including as it changed how they saw themselves, they also expressed some contradictory concerns. One anxiety related to being seen. Most obviously, these concerns related to questions about whether their work on productions would be visible to external audiences, and their efforts recognised as such. As important perhaps were limits to the democratic use of space as they explained that, while they could move freely through most of Young Vic’s premises which were also open-plan, executive offices were relatively closed-off: as one Young Associate said, a ‘no-go’ zone. Interviewees conveyed a sense of a relatively open set of public areas, compared to an ‘inner sanctum’ protected for senior leaders alone, which arguably points to the persistence of established hierarchies. Difficulties with space may also point to questions about the realistic scope of progressive practice in established theatres. For example, allowing unfettered access to all areas for all staff members may be impractical and it is also unclear how far hierarchy can be dismantled while maintaining control which might be necessary for ‘excellence’ in cultural and creative work.

A further complexity is that the programmes we explored originate in theatres already committed to generating more diverse and inclusive cultures, in relation to which they have already made progress. For example, in their own literature our first case study organisation, the National Theatre, states its aim to ‘develop a culture where diversity is hard-wired into everything we do’. In quantitative terms, this is supported to the extent that in 2020 18% of the National Theatre’s staff were from the global majority and 57% were female. The Young Vic’s Artistic Director Kwame Kwei-Armah is well known within the cultural and creative arts for his many public interventions into this debate including to suggest in 2011 that opportunities to break the ‘glass ceiling’ in performing arts were only possible in the United States, as a result of cultural ‘gatekeepers’ in the UK who run key institutions and influence what is being staged (Quoted in Derbyshire 2022, 210). The Young Vic is now a Black and global majority-run theatre and Kwei-Armah’s leadership since 2018 has a particular focus on anti-racism, with the aim of prioritising ‘the wellbeing of Black people and people in the Global majority . . . to create a culture of care for all’ (Young Vic n.d.). Reflecting these themes, one interviewee in a leadership position at the Young Vic described their work in this area as a ‘service’ and suggested this was part of a ‘cultural transformation’ taking place across theatres more generally. Another spoke of the strong focus on accountability around issues relating to diversity and anti-racism, institutionalised as part of the ‘Accountability Group’ at the theatre and said: ‘I definitely think it’s a culture that celebrates openness and openness to listening’.

As an exploratory project, our research was not designed to address questions of hierarchy and control which emerged from our findings rather than being the initial focus of our study and, while our analysis suggests participatory programmes have certain positive effects on the internal cultural of theatres, we are not able to say whether this translates into improved outcomes for under-represented groups working in these theatres and whether experiences reported here are common to all workers. This indeterminacy can partly be traced to limitations with our research design: our study rested on a small number of qualitative interviews with key informants and included only those directly involved in the participatory programmes rather than a wider range of theatre workers. As already noted, this can be explained in turn by limitations imposed by the time at which this research took place, as access to a wider range of theatre workers may have yielded more comprehensive insights. However, some lack of certainty is characteristic of qualitative and interpretive research of this type, where it is difficult to say whether observed relationships between interventions and outcomes are casually related, not least given the number of confounding variables.

Despite these uncertainties, we want to suggest the programmes we explored are likely to be doubly recursive: in other words, their positive impact on the ‘diversity climate’ of theatres may reflect cultures already orientated in this direction, to which they also contribute, and may also overcome some pitfalls associated with the diversity agenda more generally, and it is helpful here to trace a brief history of the latter. Attention to ‘diversity management’ originated in North America in response to increasing demographic diversity in many organisations. Originally, this was positioned as a human resource practice to help reduce conflict and generate more inclusive cultures, leading to anticipated benefits in measures of organisational performance such as profitability though, in practice, the more obvious aim was to avoid legal liability and expand compliance (Dobbin, Kim, and Kalev 2011; Kelly and Dobbin 1998). By the late 1990s and into the early 2000s, similar terminology had diffused to the UK where it spread at least in part through imitation and corporate fashion, though ‘diversity’ was also expected by some advocates to counter the failures associated with the legislative agenda, focused on equality of opportunity (EO) (Ashley 2022). While EO is based on the principle of same treatment and social justice, the diversity approach is motivated more explicitly by the business case and recognises that as people do not start in the same place, achieving similar outcomes may require different treatment, in theory at least (Kersten 2000; Noon 2007). In practice, it can be difficult to delineate between these models of equality, though perhaps the key point here is that while ‘diversity’ has been so widely taken-up to become a multi-million pound industry (Newsinger and Eikhof 2020), organisations in many sectors continue to lack demographic diversity, especially in more senior roles, and often fall short when it comes to realising genuinely inclusive cultures (Unerman, Jacob, and Edwards 2020).

One problem is that within diversity and inclusion agendas, questions of equality have become ‘depoliticised’. In other words, instead of focusing on entrenched systemic barriers which reflect and reproduce hierarchies of value and worth, the causes of inequality have been individualised and psychologised, as have the solutions (Noon 2018). At times, ‘diversity’ is taken to mean any body and every body, making it highly diffuse (Nkomo and Hoobler 2014), while at others ‘diversity’ is used to refer to all those outside the ‘norm’, with the latter again typically represented by the white, middle-class man. An agenda notionally seeking to displace people with these identity characteristics from their location at the pinnacle of status hierarchies, can therefore reinforce their position as the established ‘standard’ against which all others are measured and, perhaps, found wanting (Puwar 2001).

Alongside these critiques, there is some evidence suggesting what does work. This underlines that despite a dominant focus on cultural, attitudinal, language and behavioural change, structural adjustments tend to have the most meaningful effect. Diversity scholars (Kalev, Dobbin, and Kelly 2006; Dobbin, Kim, and Kalev 2011) have made an especially important contribution here, to show that improvements in both outcomes and experiences for under-represented groups rest on interventions such as reducing hierarchy, as this allows for greater mixing between different groups, and can in turn break down barriers and foster mutual understanding between individuals and groups. They advocate democratic decision making within organisations, so that power is more equally shared, including between people with diverse backgrounds and identities. Their research also underlines that diverse and inclusive organisations rarely result from specific interventions but tend to require systemic change.

Much of this work has been conducted in the corporate sector and in the US. However, while there are obvious differences from the cultural and creative sector in the UK, there are also some important similarities. For example, corporate organisations are often relatively diverse overall, yet characterised by vertical and horizontal segregation, where female and global majority workers more likely to be found in roles which are lower status and less well paid and/or in more junior positions (e.g. Ashley 2022). Similarly, theatres often have some demographic diversity but are somewhat hierarchical, with sharp status differences between different job roles. These can be particularly obvious between front and back of house staff, between performers or ‘creatives’ and administrative staff, and between permanent employees and freelance workers, the latter of whom make up a substantial proportion of the workforce and whose literal status is often quite precarious (e.g. Brook, O’Brien, and Taylor 2020). These differences sometimes map on to demographic variations: in other words, higher status roles may effectively be reserved for social actors whose identities have already been constructed as ‘higher’ status’, perhaps because they white and/or male and/ or middle or upper-middle-class, and this can contribute to ‘stratified’ careers.

It is notable then that, according to our evidence, principles embedded in participatory programmes appear to reflect at least some of the characteristics suggested by other diversity scholars as most effective in facilitating inclusion, including the construction of more democratic and less hierarchical organisations, as outlined above (Dobbin and Kalev 2022). This hints in turn at how participatory programmes might also be positioned to realise more inclusive cultures and perhaps permit more demographic diversity in theatres, where they share some similar features.

Also relevant is that research on the management of diversity within organisations and studies on participatory programmes overlap since, within both, democracy and diffusion of power are important and consistent themes. For example, Hadley, Heidelberg, and Belfiore (2022) suggest that participatory programmes are often directed at democratising culture. While this goes beyond our organisational focus, more relevant is their suggestion that related changes might require organisations within the creative industries to become more democratic themselves. This in turn requires a certain self-reflexivity amongst individual practitioners to understand how their own identities and immersion within this world could mask and obstruct reflection on the role of the cultural sector in perpetuating inequality. They quote Thiarai (2020) who argues for the need to: ‘relinquish power where we have it and create space for new possibilities, if we truly seek to encourage cultural democracy’. Elsewhere, Nicholson (2016, 250) has argued in relation to the parallel case of applied theatre that the ‘interactivity and relationality of performance re-sites and re-situates the locus of power’. Drawing from development studies, Afolabi (2017) describes similar themes, speaking of participation in applied theatre as potentially repressive, but less so if it is seen as a noun not a verb. When used in the latter sense, participation maps on to epistemic discourses which suggest a particular way of seeing the world, which may miss how people are naturally endowed with self-agency and determination. However, in instances where participation is used as a noun, participation is understood as an innate characteristic of humanity, allowing for community and collaboration, co-ownership and relationships, and a planning process where participants are seen as shareholders rather than stakeholders.

In summary, and in response to the research question that initially informed our research, we argue that that the relationship between participatory programmes and more inclusive theatre cultures, while not conclusive certainly seems promising, and is worthy of additional research. Useful directions might be to explore whether and how new and progressive practices have evolved as a direct result of these programmes, and to what extent they have become institutionalised, while recognising that making unambiguous causal links between actious and outcomes might not always be possible. However, we also argue that our exploration of participatory programmes is valuable as it directs us to specific features of theatre cultures, in particular, allowance for a relatively emotional approach to decision making and a willingness to prioritise positive values such as beauty, happiness, wellbeing and joy, when it comes to assessing the impact of theatrical work, whether on or off-stage. This may have implications for the operationalisation of diversity and inclusion more generally, which we discuss next.

Lessons of participatory programmes for efforts to become more inclusive and diverse

A feature of our research which stood out as we conducted preparatory work for this study and empirical research was that previous literature, and programme and theatre leaders, conveyed extraordinary passion and commitment when describing the benefits of participation. In the literature, one example was Afolabi (2017) who we cited above, and who builds on the work of Habermas, to position communicative embodied practice as related to ways of being in the world, allowing for a constant state of becoming. Afolabi suggests that when done ‘right’ participatory theatre can build and mobilise communities of love, conviviality, unity, simplicity, respect and collective endeavours, encourage active listening, sharing, caring, friendships, relationships and hope, to acknowledge cultural convergence and confluence, enable diversity, and cultivate possibilities of action through integrity honest and sincerity, and support change from within and creative journeys into the unknown, to help produce ‘a society that is whole’.

This is an exceptional list of benefits and we question whether participatory programmes can deliver on all these fronts. Hadley, Heidelberg, and Belfiore (2022) have warned of a tendency towards ‘fakequity’ within some cultural organisations, where talk happens without action and where equity statements fail to engage with the required work of dismantling oppressive systems. Dominant belief systems within the cultural and creative sector may amplify risks of a more performative outcome in a professional context which may sometimes prioritise more subjective and experiential benefits of participation. The wider backdrop to this latter point is a situation in which participatory programmes may allow organisations to perform an image of themselves, doubling-up as the way in which organisations ‘perform in the sense of doing well’ (Hadley, Heidelberg, and Belfiore 2022). Etherton and Prentki (2006, 144) suggest that drama and theatre activities are often associated with a strong ethical potential as the credo which determines such activities, and which in turn rest on concepts of equity and fairness: whether they live up to these standards is uncertain since, in their words, people who make their living from the field are ‘understandably loath to peer too hard at the goose which lays at least silver, if not golden, eggs’.

It is notable then that our interviewees were cautious not to overstate the impact of participatory programmes, pointing out for example that only long-term commitments could generate meaningful change. One interviewee at the National Theatre acknowledged, ‘some kind of unhealthy discourse around change and art . . . there is an idea that we, as artists, can gift this piece of work . . . and then disappear and expect everything's changed’. This interviewee was also cautious to say that any positive impact on internal cultures is likely to ‘increment over time’. Nevertheless, celebratory language similar to that cited above was used by interviewees one of whom, with responsibility for the delivery and design of Public Acts, made the following comment about the impact on participants:

[Productions like this] house imagination and possibility . . . [that] limitless kind of imaginary space feels like such a beautiful context in which to explore who we are and our potential . . . there’s a lot of that aspiration and potential that I feel is essential to this work and the process of allowing someone to re-see themselves . . . [it] can really alter the way that people see the course of their lives, both in the immediate present moment and in the future.

Other interviewees framed participatory programmes as impactful on both participants and theatre workers using words such as ‘exciting’ or ‘fun’, and including concepts such as ‘beauty’ and, especially common, ‘joy’. Some also acknowledged a more intuitive approach to related decision-making. As one senior leader at the National Theatre said: ‘I respond emotionally and experientially to things’. This tone particularly struck the first author for whom, as already noted, theatre is comparatively a foreign land, both personally and professionally. Although similar enthusiasm is evident in the type of corporate contexts with which she is more familiar, in her experience this is often expressed in quite measured terms. Of course, recourse to emotions can be positive, given that they are an inescapable part of human interaction, which ideally are embraced rather than suppressed or ignored. However, we raise these points here as we think considering this tendency to valorise these more positive emotions in relation to impact and outcomes helps direct us towards related opportunities and risks when it comes to ‘doing’ diversity and inclusion in theatres.

With regard to risks, we could ask first whether the valorisation of positive or intuitive feelings as signs of progress is common to the sector, and if so, could this occasionally substitute for more material changes for under-represented and excluded groups? Equally, we have suggested this is a sector where emotions and ‘intuition’ are important foundations for decision-making, which could in turn inadvertently encourage a tendency for practices to be taken-up on the basis of corporate fashion rather than efficacy when it comes to diversity and inclusion, as emotions may substitute for hard evidence in terms of ‘what works’. This is an acknowledged issue when it comes to diversity and inclusion as a managerial agenda, where previous research in the corporate sector has found organisational leaders and managers fear individual and institutional reputational damage if they fail to adopt practices deployed by their peer group (Ashley 2022). Where interventions are generated by reputational concerns they can have a cosmetic approach, but generating more inclusive cultures can require quite radical disruption of existing social relations so that new social orders can be established. Since this requires organisations shed the legacy of historical power relations and deeply embedded norms relating to the ‘rightful place’ of people defined as ‘different’ (and ‘lesser’), this is undoubtedly a difficult task.

One factor which hints at possible challenges was that the external evaluation of Pericles noted how everyone working on the programme received training in ‘unconscious bias’, including people on the stage door and in security (Nicholson 2019). Unconscious bias training is intended to alert individuals to biases which might be deeply internalised and therefore largely invisible, nudging them towards changed behaviours, and has been very widely adopted in workplaces as a central tool in efforts to become both more diverse and more inclusive. This is despite very limited evidence that unconscious bias training has a meaningful positive effect on outcomes for under-represented groups (e.g. Dobbin and Kalev 2022). Janssens and Zanoni (2021, 5) point out: ‘As patterns of stereotypes and biases are not merely inside the heads of people, but rather inextricably embedded within historical asymmetric power relations and the privilege of some, remedies cannot be limited to addressing individual behaviour’. Some studies suggest that rather than proven efficacy, unconscious bias training has been adopted as it has become seen as the ‘right’ and ‘appropriate’ thing to do, and as such offers organisations legitimacy (Ashley 2022). This is a common theme in diversity and inclusion scholarship, where the popularity of unconscious bias training is also said to rest on its individualised and psychologised approach to problems of inequality which compares to a potentially more effective structural approach which would engage more thoroughly in questions of unequal power (e.g. Noon 2018).

A second question is whether a tendency toward subjectivity and positivity could rest on wider assumptions amongst theatre workers that the work they do is necessarily a force for ‘good’? This might seem a rather cynical question here but alongside earlier work considering the need to align what theatres wish to express and what they do (Morton et al. 2004), we were also thinking here of work by Brook, O’Brien, and Taylor (2020), suggesting that culture can be bad for us. For them, this position is justified as the current composition of theatre workers means productions tend to reflect a narrow set of cultural tastes, and because work in the creative industries is insecure and casualised, so that workers often experience anxiety and stress, which is especially acute for those from non-traditional backgrounds for the sector. While not suggesting a direct parallel, this also directs our attention to a wider literature in critical diversity studies, which suggest commitments to diversity and inclusion amongst managers and leaders can be ‘non-performative’, where they do not have the effects they name. Most famously perhaps, diversity scholar Sara Ahmed (2012) has framed diversity discourse as a form of ‘happy talk’ where it suggests a relentless focus on positivity and on findings leaders want found, which may obscure less palatable ‘truths’.

To reiterate, these comments do not relate solely to our case study theatres but are also expected to be relevant to theatres in a more general sense, as they hint at some risks associated with an emphasis on emotion. Further, and to add complexity, we want to reiterate that the valorisation of feelings and emotions offers opportunities too, and this requires us to briefly revisit the wider literature on diversity and inclusion, which notes an obsession in the corporate world with justifying change in relation to a ‘business case’. For critics of the latter, this arguably reflects an obsession with metrics and measurement characteristic of the neo-liberal environment in which the agenda was developed. The business case also tends to suggest a relatively linear relationship where inputs predict outputs, so that ‘more’ diversity and improved inclusion is thought to necessarily equate to higher performance including for example in terms of profits.

For critical scholars, this is often considered a highly instrumental agenda, where people and their experiences become the means to a more profitable end. This is both philosophically reductive and practically problematic given that it is doubtful a straightforward relationship between diversity and organisational performance, using metrics such as revenue and/or profit, exists. A related danger is that an emphasis on objective outcomes over subjective experience replicates the rationalisation and marketisation of wider economies: what Ritzer (1996) has famously called, the ‘Mcdonaldisation’ of society. These formulations can suggest that generating equality and realising inclusivity is a ‘science:’ a ‘puzzle’ to be solved which is complex no doubt, but which can be addressed using appropriate processes and tried and tested techniques. This may offer diversity and inclusion a certain status as a policy idea but misses out much that is valuable in social and organisational life. As Schostak and Schostak (2007, 4) point out: ‘If the world of science is to be conceived as composed of measurable entities . . . then words like ‘soul’, ‘mind’, ‘love’ that cannot be measured and whose definitions seem able to change according to whoever does the defining must be excluded’.

Of course, some similar trends are evident in theatres, where how to measure and define ‘impact’ has become increasingly important in response to social policy. where related metrics are increasingly expected to determine the cultural value of the arts. This has caused controversy and debate. As one example, and thinking specifically about participation here, critics have warned of constructing crude causal accounts of the relationship between participatory action and particular progressive outcomes (e.g. Daykin et al. 2008). Afolabi (2017) underlines that where participation is used as a verb not a noun, the tendency is to focus on measured impacts and metrics, which may have this reductive effect while others argue that an emphasis on outcomes can focus on targets at the expense of process, which could have the effect of ‘drying out’ the artistic content of work which should start from its ‘own swing – from what is the core of the activity’ (Thompson 2000, 103).

However, what seems much more positive is as our study has suggested that while theatre workers take improved outcomes seriously for under-represented groups, they are also capable of resisting pressures to subsume emotions and feelings beneath a relatively mechanistic and instrumental obsession with numbers and measurement. Again, this is not to suggest the latter are entirely overlooked but where concepts such as ‘beauty’ and ‘joy’ are retained, we are optimistic that theatres can continue to prioritise less tangible qualities and outcomes, which are equally important to many of us in everyday life, as they work to become more diverse and inclusive.

Conclusion

Our initial aim in this paper was to reflect on the relationship between participatory programmes and the host institution’s ‘diversity climate’. Based on exploratory research, we have provided some evidence that these impacts do exist, including as practices deployed within participatory programmes help challenge what (and indeed who) counts as ‘normal’ within theatres, by helping to embed new ways of being and seeing. We argue that participatory programmes may represent more than the sum of their parts, as they are implicated at least in the type of systemic and structural change which some commentators believe is necessary throughout the sector (e.g: Brook, O’Brien, and Taylor 2020).

However, we have also underlined uncertainty and ambiguity, including as these impacts are likely to be highly context specific. As such, we argue that the most appropriate answer to the question of whether these programmes could and should be designed with reciprocal impacts in mind is not either ‘yes’ or ‘no’ but more accurately, ‘perhaps … . sometimes’. Understanding related complexities in further detail is an important subject for further research and, if we wish to take the reciprocal effect of participatory programmes on theatre cultures seriously, this might also consider how this can be assessed while avoiding an ‘audit’ approach which could stifle creativity.

Our second question, which emerged from our exploratory research, was to consider what these findings told us about the culture of theatres and in turn, continuing efforts to generate demographic diversity and deliver more inclusive cultures. Here, we argued that an apparent tendency to valorise emotions and subjectivity in theatres may represent a double-edged sword: on the one hand, a potential risk that feelings are valued over material changes which improve outcomes for under-represented groups and on the other, a means to retain less mechanistic and ‘rationalised’ ways to assess associated outcomes and impact. The tendency of theatre workers to prioritise emotions and feelings is arguably one factor which makes theatres distinct from other organisations, including their corporate cousins, as they not only allow for but positively encourage more humanistic values, where people are seen as valuable beyond narrow concerns with profit and productivity.

Our emphasis throughout has been on ambivalence and ambiguity, which is arguably in line with a wider body of literature which sees both as integral features of organisational life. This contrasts with a historical tendency where managers and leaders have sought to ‘rationalise’ away contradiction and conflict, often in pursuit of goals such as ‘efficiency’, and where researchers have sought to resolve related tensions theoretically, especially where they pursue a pseudo-scientific ‘objectivity’ (e.g. Grey 2005). More recently, higher numbers of both these groups have recognised that in our complex world this is as an impossible goal, and that tensions are not only inevitable but can also allow the type of creative friction which drives more innovative thinking (e.g. Smith and Lewis 2022). In the performing arts, work by Lindelof and Janssen (2022) follows Chantal Mouffe (2000), to frame all organisations as a contested space, and suggest critical artistic practices engaging with counter-hegemonic struggle should aim to foster dissent and create a ‘multiplicity of agonistic spaces where the dominant consensus is challenged’. We support these calls for both/and thinking, rather than considering the answers to complex social problems should be either/or (Smith and Lewis 2022), and conclude by advocating for further work exploring how participatory programmes might leverage concepts such as empathy and emotion as they influence both the diversity climate of theatres and the communities they serve.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by Arts and Humanities Research Board [Grant Number AH/T012609/1.