Art at the right time (part x in an ongoing series)

I've referred before to my theory that art finds you when and how you need it, and it happened again this week with a particular song from Field Music's new album. The refrain 'them that do nothing make no mistakes' has been in my head all week. It's a good mantra, I think, for funders, funded and commentators, to apply to ourselves and others. And a hell of catchy tune, which also has a use of the word 'tight' I find absurdly pleasing.

Here's the video for you to enjoy. (Has Sunderland ever looked so lovely?)

Who's got the power?

According to The Power Gap, a new report from Demos, people in the Guildford constituency are the most powerful in mainland Britain, whilst those in Glasgow North East have the least power to be in control of their own lives. I live in the constituency at 294 in the list of 628. Doesn't sound great, but it is the 3rd most powerful part of the North East region, which illustrates one aspect of the gap the title of the report refers to - some very big regional disparities.

The relative power or powerlessness of people is calculated using 8 indicators, including education, occupational status, income, employment, freedom from crime, health, voter turnout where you live and the marginality of your constituency. So although Stockton South and Stockton North share many socio-demographic factors, the relative marginality of the seat may help explain why Stockton North is much lower at 519 in the index.

The report is an attempt to break through essentially class and deprivation-based analyses of inequality to focus on capability. As they put it 'it is power, not more narrow approaches of income or mobility, that is the critical inequality in Britain. This is the divide that matters to our wellbeing and progress as a nation, and the challenge to which politics and leaders must rise.'

Although I think you could argue the approximate nature of the indicators and the proxies used to measure them could lead to some misleading conclusions, the map looks and feels about right to me. The value of seat marginality is interesting. It's certainly the case party machines will be ignoring people in safe seats in the next few months, and concentrating on those in marginals. This can make you even more powerful if you already have a decent job, education etc. And much less so if your area suffers from multiple deprivation but is unwinnable by anyone but one party. Logic therefore suggests people in, say, Middlesbrough, should make their seats less safe in order to have more influence. (This could, of course, be a risky strategy.)

This matters - and here I agree absolutely with the authors because feeling you have control over your life breeds confidence and virtuous circles, whilst powerlessness leads to anger, depression and spiralling disconnection.

That the arts can sometimes make someone feel more in control of their life, with great positive effects, is a familiar argument, and a thing I've seen in reality many times. I've not had chance to do a detailed comparison, but I suspect from a quick look there is some correlation with arts attendance, albeit complicated by the spread of indicators. The recent figures for national indicators of cultural participation suggest the disparities run roughly parallel, although they are reported on a local authority basis rather than constituency so it hard to compare exactly. There is something in here for someone to mine. We might then look at how building capabilities could impact on participation, and how that may relate to control over one's life, and where the arts can usefully join up with other players. (I'm reminded of the lack of power some people said they felt in relation to the arts in the Arts Debate.)

So, it's worth a look, even just to see how their view of where you live compares to how powerful you feel. There is a nifty little 2 minute video version, too, which you can see above, or here.

How do we grasp uncertainty and save the economy?

Been a little quiet on here over the last fortnight - no apologies, I've just been unusually occupied at home and work - so today I will fearlessly attempt to link (to) three things in one post...

I'm quoted in MMM's latest 'communique' (great word for a Wednesday!) about their collaborative pilots, three of which are in North East England, as wanting to encourage 'resilience not reliance'. This is my new mantra, so be warned.

Resilient Nation is a new publication from Demos. It has a focus on emergencies and civic defence, but not exclusively so. It proposes 'we need to rethink the concept of resilience in a way that resists the temptation to think only in terms of the ability of an individual or society to 'bounce back' but suggests a greater focus on learning and adaptation. In a new definition of this concept, responsibility for resilience must rest on individuals not only on institutions.' It concludes by putting forward a focus not on intervention bu on building 'the four Es of community resilience: engagement, education, empowerment and encouragement'. It's an interesting read, if not slightly worrying as a citizen to hear about police refusing to sound flood sirens even during floods 'in case it spreads panic'.

There is a very powerful quote from a farmer, in the aftermath of the foot and mouth crisis: 'Everything is the same, but nothing is the same. Part of you is trying to find where you fit in the new reality, part of you wants to the safety of the old ways. Slightly dislocated from your surroundings, but the physical surroundings are the same, but I suppose you have changed, and the old certainties, that were not certain but seemed it, have made way for new changeable ways that are not certain, and you know that they are not certain.'

This resonated throughout my reading of Lifting People, Lifting Places, a new paper from the DCMS. This sets out the contribution culture, media and sport can make to economic recovery. Much is a summary of things already underway, but it brings them together so one can get a sense of the big picture. There are some aspirations set out, and a useful annex of data on how the sectors are being affected by the downturn. (I don't know whether it's irony or paradox or something worse that those organsations who've most diversified their income streams who may be worst hit, and those who were arguably 'simply reliant on public funding' who for the moment are most stable.)

It could have done with an edit by someone with a strong aversion to cliches, but perhaps that's quibbling. (I gave the Creative Business Award out recently at the North East Business Awards, and swear I was the only person not to say 'in these difficult times' - it's true, but then it's always true for some people.) In the foreword Andy Burnham writes: 'Rather than sitting on the fringes, culture, sport and the creative industries are part of the core script for recovery and prospoerity.' Noting budgets were 'slashed' in the 80s and 90s, he says 'That mistake will not be repeated.' Others will also quote him on that, I'm sure. (I guess the £4m lost from next year's Arts Council England grant-in-aid needs to be seen as not a slash but a flesh wound?)

The document does set out DCMS's stall in an encouraging way, and from everything I hear they are fighting their corner strongly, and posing a healthly and correct challenge to the sector. We need to respond to this opportunity with new and fresh thinking for this changed, uncertain world, not simply protecting what's been built, or wanting to play nicely in the corner. Building resilience not reliance...

10 quotes and thoughts on resilience (4 - 7)

4. ‘What’s the difference between a complicated system and a complex adaptive system? Consider the situations of Cogworld and Bugworld. Everything in Cogworld is made of interconnected cogs; big cogs are driven by smaller cogs that are in turn driven by tiny cogs…. Bugworld is quite different. It’s populated by lots of bugs. The bugs interact with each other and the overall performance of Bugworld depends on these interactions (as does Cogworld). But some subgroups of bugs are only loosely connected to other subgroups of bugs. Bugs can make and break connections with other bugs, and unlike the cogs in Cogworld, the bugs reproduce and each generation of bugs come with subtle variations in size or differences in behaviour. Because there is lots of variation, different bugs or subgroups of bugs respond in different ways as conditions change. As the world changes some of the subgroups perform better than other subgroups, and the whole system is modified over time. The system is self-organising. No one is in control.

Now let me be unequivocal: I’m not comparing arts councils, artists or RFOs to bugs. But the way Bugworld is described makes more sense of the arts ecology than a model which suggests you can turn a crank and definitely get a certain result out, and then keep doing that for ever more. Funding, for instance, should not be seen by either funder of funded as a turn of a cog that will deliver, in linear, predictable fashion, great art for everyone. We have to look very closely at the interactions of the different areas, rather than concentrate on individual subgroups. (That's why I have, for instance, always welcomed the move away from pre-defined ‘artform’ budgets in favour of a holistic approach, though I know some disagree.)

5. Social-ecological systems are complex adaptive systems. They do not change in a predictable, linear, incremental fashion. They have the potential to exist in more than one kind of regime (sometimes referred to as ‘alternate stable states’) in which their function, structure and feedbacks can drive them across a threshold into a different regime.

This builds on the last point but adds the notion of ‘threshold’ – those points where fundamental change happens. Recorded music helped push music-making and performance from one regime into another as the live communal tradition morphed. Digital downloads are pushing the music industry towards another threshold right now. Change is possible, however.

6. Knowing more hasn’t helped because the underlying expectation of the people in the region is that they want to continue doing things the way they’ve always done things. Consequently they have thus opted to fix up short-term problems rather than address the large system-wide issues.

This refers to one of the case studies, to do with an agricultural region. I think it applies to some people in the arts and cultural sector too. There are times when the short-term fix is necessary as a first step – emergency response to cuts or recession for instance – but they need to be seen in the bigger context, and not taken as a full response.

7. Though social-ecological systems are affected by many variables, they are usually driven by only a handful of key controlling (often slow-moving) variables. Along each of these variables are thresholds: if the system moves beyond a threshold it behaves in a different way, often with undesirable and unforeseen surprises. Once a threshold has been crossed it is usually difficult (in some cases) to cross back. A system’s resilience can be measured by its distance from these thresholds. The closer you are to a threshold, the less it takes to be pushed over. Sustainability is all about knowing if and where thresholds exist and having the capacity to manage the system in relation to these thresholds.

Developing a sense of what the key 'slow' variables are that might affect your resilience is key. Much of the sector has a long way to go on this. The ‘bottom line’ beloved of tough finance types is one such variable. Reviews might be another. Audiences figures and ages a third and fourth. What are the really vital ones – that might push you towards a threshold? The alleged pressure on arts organisations to be socially usefully in return for funding might be one such. At what point do you change function? The choice is up to you – it’s knowing what you’re doing that’s vital. There is a contrary thought from this quote also. Risk is key to innovation in the arts, and many organisations live healthily with it. Might an over-awareness of your thresholds lead to risk-aversion? Too great a distance from one a kind of 'safeness'? Perhaps this gives a new meaning to living on the edge?

Wednesday Word of the Week: Resilience

This is a word I think we’ll be hearing a lot more of this year and next, in the arts as elsewhere. Enjoy it now before it gets tiresome. It draws on thinking in the field of ‘ecology’ – a word I’ve been using a lot lately in describing the needs of the sector, though there is also a strand of thinking about personal or 'emotional resilience'. This sees the sector not as a fixed infrastructure which may or may not reach a state called ‘sustainability’, but as a system or field where individual elements will grow, shrink, give birth, die and mutate, with organisations of different size and nature both co-operating and competing for the greater good. It also draws, as that description might suggest, on systems thinking. It’s not about simply pulling a lever or inputting something to get an output – it’s about often overlapping systems and their impact. (This is one of the reasons I don't think simply protecting funding is the answer to all the issues of the recession - unless we understand the complex systems at play that may only be a sticking plaster.)

So the best definition of Resilience as it applies to the arts sector I’ve seen is ‘the capacity of a system to absorb disturbance and still retain its basic function’. For the arts the ‘disturbance’ (not always a negative) might be loss of funding, sudden influx of funding or commissions, change in funders’ priorities, change in environment (eg a multiplex opening down the road from your arthouse cinema), changing audience patterns, changing technology and so on. Many arts organisations are already highly resilient, but there may more that can be done by thinking this through as a sector. Size does not guarantee resilience – note, for instance, that the best independent record shops may be surviving the download era better than the chain stores.

I plan to return to some of these themes over the next month, as they seem some of the most urgent things to think about, and there a number of possibly fruitful parallels I want to throw up to be challenged. (I’m currently pushing Resilience Thinking by Brian Walker and David Salt onto people – it’s a really good exposition of these ideas. There’s an article summarising them here .)

I also recommend an article by Peter and Trudy Johnson-Lenz about the ‘Six Habits of Highly Resilient Organizations’. It's worth thinking whether your organisation does these things:

1. Resilient organizations actively attend to their environments.
2. Resilient organizations prepare themselves and their employees for disruptions.
3. Resilient organizations build in flexibility.
4. Resilient organizations strengthen and extend their communications networks – internally and externally.
5. Resilient organizations encourage innovation and experimentation.
6. Resilient organizations cultivate a culture with clearly shared purpose and values.

Wednesday Word of the Week: Capacity

Not long after I began working for the Arts Council, a friend of mine said to me, menacingly, that she would be checking how often I used the word capacity. It is a bit of a jargon bingo classic.

It is often used to mean:
1. Ability (organisational or individual) to do the ‘right’ or necessary things
2. Training or support provided so people learn how to do things more effectively
3. The number of staff an organisation has (more people = more capacity)
4. The number of good people an artform or other ‘subject area’ has working in it
5. A mix of the above that can be created by investment of money, or staff time.

It is often used in the negative: eg this organisation/sector lacks capacity, or needs to build capacity. It can therefore be a kind of code for brilliance, failure, lack of willingness to do the right thing or 'correcting' a lack of funding for an organisation or sector.

Interesting dictionary definitions include : innate potential for growth, development, or accomplishment and the quality of being suitable for or receptive to specified treatment alongside definitions clearly relating to the above.

My preferred meaning is a mixture of skills and ability; understanding and willingness; stamina and strength. Being a metaphor kind of guy I think of organisational capacity as being like lung capacity for an athlete: you need to learn how to breath, build up stamina and technique and know how to use it at the best time.

The importance being that building capacity that lasts requires investment, practice over time and real motivation. (If I think of my own ‘capacity’, it’s mainly come from the most testing situations, usually lasting some time, where I could ‘put learning into practice’.)

If you’re interested in capacity building in the arts you could have a look at Annabel Jackson’s work in this area as a starting point.

(I should say that none of these comments, or on other words, should be taken as ironic or critical. I won’t bother with words that don’t have their uses. I just think it’s helpful from time to time to observe and think about the words we use, and the linguistic conventions that build up around them.)