Running Up That Hill

Description

In many European countries, arts and culture are deemed a ‘public good’¹ in government policy and thus recognized as valuable for society in both tangible and intangible ways. However, promises in policy do not necessary result in consensus regarding the value of a public good and its subsequent resource allocation. The fiscal fortunes of public goods are inherently intertwined with the general health of the public purse, subject to fluctuations in both political will and economic growth annually. The appetite to protect culture as a public good varies from country to country and government to government, though in recent years it has gained traction through global networks (UNESCO, ‘Culture as a Public Good’, Mondiacult 2022). However, more than a decade and a half on from the 2008 economic crash, for many artists working in post-austerity economies, a sense of recovery has not emerged despite strong economic growth nationally and the ensuing international momentum regarding policy commitments. If economic growth is reported as strong, and government policy recognizes and protects culture as a public good, then why is this not felt on the ground by artists working and living in these economies?

There is no universally agreed method of assessing arts and cultural value financially within public policy, and yet, for funding to be delivered so that arts and culture can be resourced, a financial value must be ascertained. As ‘The Price of Performance’ research project sponsored by Research Ireland (2023-2025) comes to a conclusion, this conference explores how financial resources are sourced by independent artists and organizations particularly on the island of Ireland and Scotland, how resource allocation occurs within public funding schemes, and what constitutes the evidence that underpins the rationale for resource allocation.


Public good’ is defined by the UN Secretary-General Report ‘Our Common Agenda’ (2021) as resources that belong to humanity and cannot be adequately provided by individual states or non-state actors: https://www.un.org/en/content/common-agenda-report/

Period	22 Oct 2025 → 23 Oct 2025
Event type	Conference
Location	Galway, IrelandShow on map
Degree of Recognition	National