Abstract
This chapter seeks to deepen our understanding of processes of cultural relations, often today labeled “cultural diplomacy,” from at least two perspectives. First, it highlights the role civil society actors play in international cultural exchange and draws attention to their motivations, values, and efforts. These are influenced, often unnoticed by the actors themselves, by structural inequalities, for example, funding sources or the “resourcing model,” which could lead, again often unintended, to paternalistic relations. Second, the potential of Bourdieu’s field theory is sounded out to gain a deeper understanding of these processes. It becomes obvious how the definition of diversity, for example, is deeply dependent upon the cultural and social capital, tastes, dispositions, beliefs, and perceptions of key cultural intermediaries. The contribution therefore helps to reflect on and thereby get a more balanced understanding of the assets and drawbacks of both value-driven and interest-driven international cultural relations.
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Notes
- 1.
I gratefully acknowledge the support extended to me by the faculty, notably Prof. Anna Triandafyllidou, and fellows of the EUI’s Global Governance Programme, where this text was principally drafted.
- 2.
Initially as an official in UNESCO’s culture department and subsequently as a consultant to the European Commission; as president of the European platform organization “Culture Action Europe”; and lastly as the Scientific Coordinator in 2013–2014 for an EU Preparatory Action on “Culture in EU External Relations”.
- 3.
The CVP findings also remind us that individuals and groups that do succeed in gaining funding (and sometimes repeated funding) usually possess knowledge of funding concepts and processes (grantsmanship) or are able to find an intermediary to do so on their behalf. They are the “happy few” who have learned how to talk the talk and flatter the self-regard of otherwise well-intentioned “donors.”
- 4.
The co-editors identify the domain as “arts and cultural management,” conflating the labels of two vocationally oriented university disciplines—arts management and cultural management.
- 5.
Since Europe is the locus, a North-South focus is appropriate. But would the shape of the field and the forces at play within it change significantly if a South-South axis is foregrounded instead? See Isar (2012).
- 6.
A few words on Bourdieu’s characterization of the “field”: by likening social activity to a game, he did not mean that there is a formal agreement by which agents enter into the game, or a set of codified rules by which all agree to play. Almost unconsciously, agents play the game by virtue of their doxa, their beliefs in the game, and its stakes. Because of their investment in the game, what Bourdieu called illusio, they compete with one another, but always according to the implicit, unspoken rules of the game.
- 7.
The expression is to be found in Bourdieu (1987).
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Isar, Y.R. (2022). Civil Society Actors in International Cultural Diplomacy. In: Hoelscher, M., List, R.A., Ruser, A., Toepler, S. (eds) Civil Society: Concepts, Challenges, Contexts. Nonprofit and Civil Society Studies. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-98008-5_16
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