The creation of cultural policy in the media: a field research of cultural discourses in Germany

Abstract

In Germany, cultural policy is formally made on the level of municipalities, the Länder (federal states) and the federal government. With approximately eight billion Euros per year, they finance a large percentage of cultural and arts activities: music, theater, dance, museums, libraries, film and the preservation of sites of historic interest. The federal government sets the legal framework in which art can be produced and distributed, and finances it indirectly through tax reductions (VAT reduction), copy right laws, and special health insurance and retirement arrangements for artists (Künstlersozialkasse). Within this institutionalized legal and governmental setting, the discursive dimension of politics is often forgotten, particularly when policy creation is being discussed. This article focuses on the discursive dimensions of politics within the field of classical and contemporary music and offers a discourse analysis of mass media coverage to investigate policy‐making.

Keywords:

• discourse analysis
• innovation/reform
• classic concert
• audience development
• arts funding

Acknowledgment

We would like to thank Jason L. Mast, visiting fellow at Zeppelin University, for his editorial contributions, and the two anonymous reviewers for their useful comments.

Notes

1. Wagner (2010) also states that there is no definition of cultural policy, nor in the political science either the cultural studies have discussed this term in depth. In the encyclopedia of political science the term just is missing (Wagner 2010). For example, Lepenies (2006) discusses in Kultur und Politik the interdependence of culture (understood as a anthropological/sociological factor of society) and politics from eighteenth to the twentieth century, which has little to do with how the term is used in this context. Also in the three volumes strong Handbuch der Kulturwissenschaften (Jaeger et al. 2004) one will hardly find the word museum, concert, or theater on 1800 pages. Wagner (2010) concludes that besides some empirical works on visitor studies (e.g., Schulze 1997) one finds no in‐depth, scientific discussion of the term.

2. For a detailed historical overview on the interdependencies of art‐culture‐society‐politics see also Wagner (2009).

3. Cultural policy in Germany as an academic field of research is rather young. In the universities, it is usually integrated in departments where art administration is taught. Only since 2006 have these institutes formed a scientific association, Fachverband Kulturmanagement. The association initiates and supports the dissemination of discourse(s) within the discipline, organizes a yearly conference and publishes a reviewed yearbook (www.fachverband-kulturmanagement.de). The Kulturpolitische Gesellschaft (Kulturpolitische Gesellschaft, ed. Kulturpolitische Mitteilungen: Zeitschrift für Kulturpolitik der Kulturpolitischen Gesellschaft [Information of cultural policy: Journal of cultural policy of the association of cultural policy]) has a longer tradition. It was founded in 1976 as one outcome of the 1968 movement that desired a new, less traditionally based understanding of cultural policy (www.kupoge.de). The society has about 1400 members and works in the art administration of cities and ministries, art organizations, or universities. According to their mission, the society promotes the development of cultural policy in Germany by initiating debates about participation, funding, art education, developmental policies, and others. The society publishes a journal called Kulturpolitische Mitteilungen (literal trans.: ‘News from Cultural policy’) on a quarterly basis. The society also publishes the Jahrbuch für Kulturpolitik (Yearbook of Cultural Policy) that gives broad insight into a large number of different authors – from scientists, art politicians, and practitioners in the field to single themes. Besides this important and influential society, others also exist, such as the Deutscher Kulturrat (Deutscher Kulturrat, ed. Politik und Kultur: Zeitung des deutschen Kulturrates [Policy and culture: Magazine of the German cultural council]; www.kulturrat.de) or the Deutscher Musikrat (www.musikrat.de). They are important lobby institutions that try to promote the ideas and needs of the (mostly publicly funded) art institutions in politics. All of them publish magazines too, but these are often not very focused on research.

4. Statistisches Bundesamt Deutschland, Kulturausgaben der öffentlichen Hand http://www.destatis.de/jetspeed/portal/cms/Sites/destatis/Internet/DE/Presse/pm/2008/09/PD08__339__216,templateId=renderPrint.psml

5. By following this approach, we have to keep in mind that our analysis is focused on media representatives and probably will lack the voices of the concert audience.

6. Evaluation of the study in the entire article: unclear/neutral (no arguments mentioned); clearly for (only positive (and neutral) arguments); positive with arguments against; ambivalent (pro and contra are named); against with pro arguments; clearly against (only negative (and neutral) arguments).

7. This argument was voiced in a radio piece by the Bayerischer Rundfunk on the book Das Konzert. The reportage was not evaluated, since it took place outside of the period of investigation.

8. See also Sarah Zalfen (2007) who discusses the term ‘crisis’ using examples of the opera houses in Berlin, London and Paris and locates the concept in a societal discourse.

9. For the concept and evaluation of pedagogic measures, see Wright (2007).

10. Here one can also add a system theory perspective on the art system as proposed by Luhmann (1999), or in reference to the specific rationality of cultural organizations by Tröndle (2006).