Why cultural diversity is central to Australia’s future promise – a refocused Labor arts policy?

Can Australia successfully navigate the treacherous and confusing times in which we live? Understanding the crucial importance of our cultural diversity to our cultural, social and economic future will be essential. Applying that in the policies and practices that shape our future at all levels across Australia can ensure we have a bright, productive and interesting 21st Century. An important part of this are the political parties, major and minor, that are increasingly negotiating the compromises that shape our world. The recent launch by the Labor Party of a new group, Labor for the Arts, is an important development. Combining as it does a focus from an earlier time on both arts and multiculturalism, it could potentially open the way for some innovative and forward-thinking policy.

Without a grasp of the importance of Australia’s cultural diversity to its future – culturally, socially and economically – we will find it impossible to navigate the treacherous and confusing times in which we are living. Due to failures of leadership and lack of vision we have drifted into a world in which diversity is increasingly under attack and borders are closing.

Innovation is applied creativity – and it’s more than a catchphrase
In this landscape it cannot be stressed too many times that cultural diversity is inextricably linked to pressing issues such as innovation – which is, after all, just applied creativity – because where cultures intersect, new ideas flourish. It fosters new approaches and helps breed the innovation needed for the modern knowledge economy and our creative industries.

Where cultures intersect, new ideas and approaches flourish.

However, for this to be reflected in strategic policy and the day to day decisions that flow from it, it is critical that decision-making bodies that affect our future understand it and its implications. This includes an array of organisations across Australian society at all levels – small and large businesses and their industry bodies, community organisations and local, state and territory and national governments. This includes the political parties, major and minor, that are increasingly negotiating the compromises that shape our world and determine our future.

Arts, culture and a map of the future – the limits of arts policy

In the arts, from a virtual policy-free zone, we’ve now got policies – not as many as we could have hoped, but enough to be going on with. Some of them might even get implemented. Importantly, the others will help to frame the debate and offer ideas for the future. Those parties that have arts policies offer good solid and productive proposals which, if implemented, would lead to definite improvement for Australia’s arts and culture. However, that’s just the starting point. This article is the first in a series of two about the arts policies of parties in this #AusVotesArts election. This article outlines what they are offering – or not. The second article, ‘Vote 1 Australian arts and culture – who is painting the big picture?’ considers what we need in a big policy that ties together all the disparate areas that arts and culture flows into.

The election we didn’t realise we had to have until it was too late just became a lot more interesting. It didn’t take much because even though there are real issues at stake in this election, they keep being hidden away and drowned in hyperbole and bluster. In the arts, from a virtual policy-free zone, we’ve now got policies – not as many as we could have hoped, but enough to be going on with. Some of them might even get implemented. The others will help to frame the debate and offer ideas for the future.

Election arts policy - something for (almost) everyone.

I’m not going to criticise anyone for taking time to produce their policy. If a thing’s worth doing, it’s worth doing well. Better to take time and get it right. Of course, it helps if the policy is produced before the election. Otherwise we might get more of the sort of surprises George Brandis seemed so adept at. I’ve tried to capture any party which has an arts and culture policy – and any major parties which don’t. I even looked without success at the Australian Sex Party policies in search of one, since they have some quite ground-breaking policies on other major (and minor) social issues that take a refreshingly lateral and creative approach. They’ve managed to persuade Professor Ross Fitzgerald to stand as their lead NSW Senate candidate, so they must have serious substance.

Election mode for Australian arts and culture – a policy-free zone?

A policy and the understanding of issues that leads to its adoption, provides arts and culture with a stature that underpins funding by providing a rationale for support. Otherwise funding will always be ad hoc and insecure, piecemeal, project-based, intermittent and at the mercy of whim and fashion. We have to get arts and culture to the stage where it is seen like public health or education and debated accordingly.

It will be interesting in this #Ausvotesarts election if we see many arts policies, in contrast to thought balloons or bland and meaningless statements about how such and such a politician ‘likes’ the arts.

Without good policies, our elected representatives are just warming their seats.

Back in ancient times when Tony Abbott was Prime Minister, faced with the prospect that it could become the next Australian Government, the Labor Party started reviewing its ‘arts’ policy. We know that Mark Dreyfus supports arts and culture and knows the arts sector. As yet we don’t know where the Labor Party as a whole stands. It has a website called 100 positive ideas, which is one positive idea in itself, but which, alas, has no sign of any policies about arts and culture. It promises more policies to come, so here’s hoping. Until it releases it’s arts policy, which I understand will be a new and improved cultural policy along the lines of the National Cultural Policy, we won’t know. I wonder if the updated policy will reflect Dreyfus’ interest in human rights – something sadly neglected in Australia in recent years. Whatever happens, it’s important that the Labor Party doesn’t reinvent the wheel.

The power of good policy – historical tax distortions waiting for a fix

In a time when arts and culture support is being reduced incrementally, while the size of the economy and the level of both population and demand increases, where is the money going? What better uses is taxpayer money – whether actually collected or foregone – being put to?

We live in an era where arts and culture support – relatively small proportion of overall government expenditure that it is – is continually being cut and restructured. The argument seems to be that there are limited funds and many demands, that there is a 'budget emergency' or, beneath the surface, that government shouldn't be involved in this space at all.

In this context it is interesting to consider where government resources are allocated, how relatively worthwhile are alternative uses of taxpayer funds - whether actually collected or just foregone. The discussion around negative gearing takes us into just such an area.

Negative gearing has been distorting the shape and nature of our cities for a long time.

For decades negative gearing has been distorting the shape of our cities, our suburbs and our communities. It is an inefficient way to achieve the desired result. Because it has been around for so long, it's negative impact has been able to magnify, cumulative like lead poisoning.

Arts funding changes on the run – doing less with less

‘The announcement by new Arts Minister, Mitch Fifield that he will step back to a degree from the decision of his predecessor about national arts funding is a good call – but not good enough. This is what happens when there is no policy framework or set of strategic principles guiding changes to programs or development of new programs. Flexibility is an excellent thing and so are attempts to develop new programs to support areas that might not have been able to gain support before. The problem is ad hoc policy on the run is no substitute for carefully thought through changes. In a context where there have been significant long term cuts to arts and culture funding in the last two budgets, particularly the 2014-15 one, these changes only worsen the situation’.

The announcement by new Arts Minister, Mitch Fifield that he will step back to a degree from the decision of his predecessor about national arts funding is a good call – but not good enough. The original decision by previous Arts Minister George Brandis transferred $110 million over four years from the Australia Council to the Ministry for the Arts to create a new program, the so-called National Program for Excellence in the Arts.

Instead Fifield will only retain $78 million dollars over four years for the Ministry and return $32 million to the Australia Council over the same period. The problem is that the amount being retained  is almost 71% of the original amount, so the amount going back is not that significant.

When redrawing the arts funding map it's crucial to have both a sense of history and a strategic framework

This is what happens when there is no policy framework or set of strategic principles guiding changes to programs or development of new programs. We see chopping and changing, shifts of position for no apparent reason. Flexibility is an excellent thing and so are attempts to develop new programs to support areas that might not have been able to gain support before. The problem is ad hoc policy on the run is no substitute for carefully thought through changes. What happens is that, without an overall framework that provides a rationale and a guide, even well-intentioned attempts to fix a problem don't really ever succeed.

Full circle – where next for Australian national arts and culture support in the 21st Century?

With a Coalition Government which now stands a far better chance of being re-elected for a second term, the transfer of the Commonwealth’s Arts Ministry to Communications helps get arts and culture back onto larger and more contemporary agendas. This move reflects that fact that the new industries in the knowledge economy of the future, with its core of creative industries and its links to our cultural landscape, are both clever and clean. Where they differ completely from other knowledge economy sectors is that, because they are based on content, they draw on, intersect with and contribute to Australia’s national and local culture and are a central part of projecting Australia’s story to ourselves and to the world. In that sense they have a strategic importance that other sectors do not.

I used to joke that in my almost 15 years working in the Commonwealth Arts Ministry, without ever deliberately changing jobs, I managed to move around the national public service like a comet roaming the far reaches of space. Just as comets reappear at regular extended intervals to terrify the inhabitants on the planet below, the Arts Ministry has reappeared in the sky above the Department of Communications to re-establish Communications and the Arts after nearly eight years of absence.

Leadership challenge over breakfast with 'The Age'

I started with Arts in the Department of Communications, Information Technology and the Arts in late 2000 and then, with the election of the Rudd Labor Government in 2007, began a series of moves to four different departments over the next six years. Arts traveled from Communications to Environment, then to Prime Minister and Cabinet, on to Regional and finally to Attorney-General's. Now, Arts has returned to where I first started.

My nephew just got a job with Weta – the long road of the interconnected world

My nephew just got a job in Wellington New Zealand with Weta Digital, which makes the digital effects for Peter Jackson’s epics. Expertise, specialist skills and industry pockets can occur just about anywhere, as long as you have connectivity, talent and a framework of support that makes it possible. This is part of the new knowledge economy of the future, with its core of creative industries and its links to our cultural landscape. Increasingly the industries of the future are both clever and clean. At their heart are the developing creative industries which are based on the power of creativity and are a critical part of Australia’s future – innovative, in most cases centred on small business and closely linked to the profile of Australia as a clever country, both domestically and internationally. This is transforming the political landscape of Australia, challenging old political franchises and upping the stakes in the offerings department.

A while back, when my nephew connected with me on Linked In, I said, ‘this will give me far more street cred than it will ever give you.’ He’s a visual effects artist, one of the new internationally sought after labour aristocracy of the digital universe. He’s currently head of Visual Effects at Resin in Adelaide and has worked for Image Engine Design in Vancouver.

‘In the new digital industries of the future, work is international and workers travel the world looking for opportunities to develop their skills and expand their experience’

I don’t even understand exactly what he does but I know he’s described himself as a character rigger, someone who ensures that the figures in digital animations actually move as though they are real. He’s worked on Hollywood blockbusters like ‘Elysium’, the remake of ‘The Thing’ and ‘Battleship’. I’ve never seen any of them but ‘Elysium’ was made by the South African director of the quirky ‘District 9’, produced by Peter Jackson, which I haven’t seen either but it sounds cool.

Australia, the largest island, is just the start of the island kingdom of the Greater Pacific. Compared to the tiny isles further East, New Zealand rises from the ocean like a large lost world.

Nowadays he’s like so many of us, someone who manages other people to help them do better what he used to do and would still probably really like to do himself.

The neighbouring world of Weta Digital
Now he has got himself a job at Weta Digital. You may ask what Weta Digital is but when I heard the news, my response was ‘wow’. Weta Digital is part of a stable of companies, including Weta Workshop, and makes the digital effects for Peter Jackson’s epics. If you’ve seen ‘Lord of the Rings’ or the remake of ‘King Kong’ you’ve been watching Weta at work. It’s named after a New Zealand insect, supposedly one of the largest on the planet, reflecting I presume Peter Jackson’s fascination with all things insect – so strangely evident in ‘King Kong’.

Out from the shadows – the other Arts Minister

I ventured out through the dark wilds of the Australian National University to hear the Opposition Spokesperson on the Arts, Mark Dreyfus, share his view of what a contemporary arts and culture policy might look like. It was a timely moment, given the turmoil stirred up by recent changes to national arts funding arrangements and the #freethearts response from small arts and cultural organisations and artists. Luckily, as he himself noted, he has a very recent model to work with. The National Cultural Policy is little more than two years old.

Last night I ventured out through the dark wilds of the Australian National University to hear the Opposition Spokesperson on the Arts, Mark Dreyfus, share his view of what a contemporary arts and culture policy might look like. He was there to give the annual Fraser lecture at the invitation of local Federal member, Andrew Leigh.

A recent model to work with

It was a timely moment, given the turmoil stirred up by recent changes to national arts funding arrangements and the #freethearts response from small arts and cultural organisations and artists. 

Luckily, as he himself noted, he has a very recent model to work with. The National Cultural Policy is little more than two years old. At that stage of a seriously strategic policy – something becoming rarer by the minute –a government might just be starting to review how it was tracking and making some tweaks to fine tune its rollout.

Distorted images of modern Australia - Mark Dreyfus has a portfolio wider than arts but of crucial relevance to the subject matter of artistic expression.  

Having seen the National Cultural Policy we have a pretty good idea where the Labor Party is coming from with its approach to arts and culture. Mark Dreyfus stressed the need for a ‘modern, outward-looking, innovative society’ and underlined the importance of creative industries. He noted that the relevant minister in the new Labor Government in Victoria was called the Minister for Creative Industries but commented that he wasn’t sure this would catch on at Federal level. I would have to say that if it did, it would not be soon enough.

'Arts' policy and culture - let's not reinvent the wheel

The issues covered by the National Cultural Policy are far bigger than just art. So many good things in the Policy make no sense at all if we only talk about art and the arts. These include high profile matters of central importance to Australia's economic future like creative industries and how we treat Indigenous culture and languages.

It appears that after only one term in the backblocks of Parliament, faced with the increasing prospect that it could become the next Australian Government, the Labor Party is reviewing its ‘arts’ policy.

It's always good to plan ahead but whether we see a Labor Government again any time soon or whether the current Coalition government continues its particular brand of arts support, considered and strategic discussion of arts and culture policy is critical to Australia's future.

As the most recent comprehensive strategic approach to government support for Australia's arts and culture the National Cultural Policy won't go away. The wide-ranging issues it raises are relevant to any discussion of arts and culture in Australia. To my mind reviewing Labor arts policy could easily be a case of reinventing the wheel. The National Cultural Policy is still fresh, less than two years old, having been announced as 'Creative Australia' only in March 2013 after a protracted period of development based on very broad consultation. This had the advantage of being undertaken by a party in government with all the resources that entailed.

The National Cultural Policy had a long and difficult birth and went through several ministers, most notably Simon Crean, before coming into being. It's final announcement was by no means a certainty, with mixed support from other ministers who didn't agree on it as a Government priority. It is a credit to the Government of the day, and especially the Minister of the day, that it was finally announced but make no mistake - it was a miracle.

Chinese temple, Bendigo. Cultural diversity is a hallmark of contemporary Australia, with its roots deep in our past.

If, as originally envisaged, it had been announced in the first term of the Government, it would have had a full term to prove its worth and consolidate its impact. Instead it was announced as the Government lost office and while much of value still continues, important elements were starting to be unravelled early into the term of the new Government.

It is far from perfect - I could list a number of important areas where it could be stronger. The emphasis on cultural diversity, support for intangible cultural heritage and understanding of the integral role of community arts and community cultural development in the overall arts and culture landscape could all be strengthened. Despite this it is the best thing we have seen for a long time or are likely to see for even longer.

'Creative Nation' - Keating's cultural legacy

Hard on the heels of the death of Whitlam comes an article about another Labor icon and his policy creation. There was so much focus last year on the second Australian National Cultural Policy of all time that little was said about the first, 'Creative Nation'. In this article a strong point is made that 'Creative Nation' acknowledged two distinct and very different strengths in Australian culture. The first was the contemporary diversity of Australia. The second was the economic significance of the arts and culture sector, including creative industries.

The Keating cultural legacy bridged the disparate aspects of cultural life - encompassing both a recognition of cultural diversity and a view of culture from an economic standpoint.

This is interesting because the widespread public consultation underpinning the development of the National Cultural Policy towards the end of 2011 strongly echoed much of this. According to the overwhelming majority of respondents to the online survey during the consultation process, the most important element in a new national cultural policy was recognition of Australia’s cultural diversity. In fact, if anything, this view was even stronger in the consultation than it was in the final policy itself.

Nation building - dam busters turned dam builders

The building of community culture is about nation-building from the ground up – but a different kind of nation-building. It’s not so much about bridges, dams and buildings but about connections and skills and capabilities and social institutions that can make a country worth living in.

Chou En Lai once famously (and perhaps actually) said when asked what he saw as the long term effects of the French Revolution, that it was too soon to tell. I like that sort of sense of history. We all have different histories that steer us in different (and similar) ways. My uncle was a navigator on the bombers that burned Dresden. My father was an engineer who built dams. He was part of that generation which helped build a modern Australia that embodied diversity and tolerance – his generation turned from dam busters to dam builders.

It’s a mantle I am happy to have tried to pick up. It’s partly why I feel an affinity with Canberra – it’s integral to a sense of national development as opposed to the narrow state-based view we seem to be moving back towards and it is central to the nation-building vision I identify with so closely.

Disused mining equipment near Maldon, Victoria, © Stephen Cassidy, 2012

It’s no accident that Kevin Rudd, despite all his faults, managed to combine that nation-building vision with the requirement for an apology to the Stolen Generation. As in South Africa and Germany, true leaders saw that grasping modernity had to include coming to grips with the past and mobilising that history to take the country forward. A bad history doesn’t have to be a negative for the future as well as the past, it can actually be something that empowers future generations to do better.