| For the Labour government, it is not enough to attempt to control how we work, how we teach or how we heal. They want to control our culture as well... |
Cultural imperialism
WORKERS, SEPT 2005 ISSUE
In JANUARY WORKERS wrote: "The state machine developing under Tony Blair & Co. is broadening and deepening its campaign and powers to intervene into the lives of workers in Britain, telling us what is good for us..." Then we spoke of childcare, asking Do we really think the state knows best? Now our culture — in a sweeping definition, every aspect of living — is on their agenda for control and meddling.
A prototype has been launched in Scotland. The overblown, rhetorical and divisive devolutionary 2003 speech of Jack McConnell, First Minister of the Scottish Executive, has translated into the expensive Cultural Commission Report (cost: over £500,000).
That report was matched by the Arts Council England exercise to "map creative industries" in 2001 for the Department of Culture, Media and Sport, which proceeded to create a five-year plan (2005—2010) entitled "Renaissance in the Regions". This will "enable different areas to tailor the cultural 'menu' according to their local cultural resources". Previous good practice of, for example, free tuition to a high level of skill for young musicians is replaced by diluted "rights" to an "experience" of culture, carrying the usual edicts of a divisive multiculturalism.
"Cultural rights"?
It is this enshrining of "cultural rights" in law (due for legislation in Scotland in 2007) which imposes the dead hand of Labour's state machine on cultural workers and audiences alike.
Worse, it is the key proposal of the Cultural Commission (foreshadowing similar moves in England and Wales) to abolish the relatively objective and "arms-length" civic bodies such as the Scottish Arts Council and Scottish Screen and recreate them as two companies, Culture Scotland and Culture Fund. In a word, privatisation.
This proposal would result in bodies that subsuming all hitherto independent and successful arts ventures, museums, national libraries, etc, and exercise control over two of the most successful festivals in the world, the Edinburgh International Festival and its Fringe.
This handing over of national assets, our cultural organisations, to capitalist control is deeply connected to the "liberalisation" of goods and services, hallmark of globalisation and the European Union.
At its outset the report undermines the very notions of workers or resistance: it quotes Richard Florida's Rise of the Creative Class as indicating a "seismic shift in the global economy away from the mechanical or efficiency improvements driving economic growth, to creativity as the main driver of the economy". In other words, don't bother producing anything in Britain, its workers are past history!
The report quotes "leading business leaders" and Scottish Enterprise as being enthusiasts for this viewpoint, and the EU plans for developing policy on "cultural rights".
In fact, in the key company proposed (Culture Scotland) the report recommends the presence of EU cultural agencies on its governing council, as well as business representatives.
It is no surprise that capitalism is keen to govern culture, to free it up for greater exploitation — its true value has been revealed. Arts Council England research showed that British creative industries (ie, wider than just arts alone) had 1.3 million workers generating turnover of £112.5 billion, with exports of £10.3 billion. The creative industries now account for 5% of GDP, having grown 34% from 1991 to 2001.
Musicians' Union member George Cuthbertson, left, and MU regional committee member Fraser Speirs handing out flyers condemning the use of recorded music in Matthew Bourne's ballet Highland Fling at the Theatre Royal, Glasgow. Photo: Dave Arcari
Globalisation
No wonder culture has to be opened up to gold diggers in tow to globalisation, GATS and the EU. Seizing control of proudly skilled institutions, they would weaken resistance to breaking up Britain.
Sending Scotland off with its own blueprint for culture is another step in that direction, further widening division, as if culture is being used as a wedge. And used, too, for a divergent economic and immigration policy — this report wallows in the role it sees for culture to play in the Scottish Executive's Fresh Talent scheme, which aims to encourage migration of workers to Scotland as "a corner stone of the Executive's current economic policy".
Another function of privatised arts governance would be to gradually wrest control of cultural activity away from the local authorities, where at least a vestige of democratic influence remains. No surprise, then, that the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities has distanced itself from the report's conclusions.
Resistance
The drive to mergers and rationalisations in the cultural arena is being resisted. The National Trust and Historic Scotland have long defended their roles. The International Festival and the Fringe refuse to countenance merger. Dance and orchestral organisations are on guard against cuts.
In recent years the strongest rejections have come from the Musicians' Union's campaign to stop the loss through merger of the orchestra that performs the Scottish Ballet, and last year's fight for jobs at Scottish Opera (See Workers, July 2004).
The Cultural Commission's chair was James Boyle. As former head of BBC Radio 4 he should be well acquainted with the successful Britain-wide strike of 1981 to save the six BBC orchestras. Where there is resistance they fear to tread!
Those working in culture are represented by Equity, BECTU, the Musicians' Union, the Artists' Union, the Writers' Guild, the NUJ and the Society of Playwrights. They are now, with their joint body (the Federation of Entertainment Unions) digesting the implications of this extension of government influence.
Indeed, the commission's proposal for a "National Council of the Creative Individual" would seem designed to undermine the influence of trade unions in the sector. But their members continue the task of remaining their own masters, ensuring decent wages and preventing the takeover of their long-fought-for cultural heritage.
