Who is missing from the picture? The problem of inequality in the creative economy and what we can do about it.

点击翻译按钮获取中文摘要

Many constructions of the creative economy are celebratory. The creative economy is lauded as a provider of economic growth and good, well paid, jobs. This is alongside the role of the creative economy in a whole range of policy and practice areas, including education, regeneration, and diplomacy. However, as the research giving rise to this proposal has demonstrated, the creative economy is also the site for significant exclusions and inequalities. These include the gender, class and racial character of both production and consumption in the creative economy. Who is missing? follows on from several AHRC funded research projects to consolidate work on the creative economy that has focused on the question of inequality. Moreover, the consolidation of this research will aim to offer approaches to challenge and change the structures of the creative economy that act to exclude. This follow on funding proposal aims to strengthen existing partnerships between academic experts on inequality and campaigning organisations; to disseminate the existing findings of research developed as part of several AHRC funded projects; to co-create new knowledge with organisations working to transform the unequal character of the creative economy; and to exploit existing research activities that will develop organisational, policy making, and practitioner capacity to respond to creative economy inequality. The project consists of three distinct, but complementary, work packages that address the dissemination, co-creation and research exploitation objectives detailed in this outline. The roots of the project are based in two longstanding and successful partnerships between academic researchers working on AHRC funded projects and organisations within the Creative Economy. The first partnership, between the PI and Co-I and Create London, an arts development organisation, resulted in the Panic! Whatever Happened to Social Mobility in the Arts? Project. The second partnership is between the PI and Co-I and Arts Emergency, a charity that supports young people aged 16-19 from disadvantaged backgrounds to pursue careers and education in the arts and then into the creative economy. This has been a four year working relationship informing Arts Emergency's use of academic research for media and public campaigning, as well as shaping their use of data and research in their practice.The project starts by thinking through the needs of the partners for data and research. Work Package 1 (WP1) is focused on co-creating a set of approaches to disseminate the existing research findings in ways that are understandable to public, policy and, most crucially, practice audiences. The second work package (WP2) responds directly to the needs of these organisations for data and research. WP2 will work with Arts Emergency to understand those aspiring to be part of the creative economy, along with re-interrogating existing research data to understand how current inequalities within the creative economy have changed over time. This latter point was the focus of the Panic! Project and Create London, alongside the academic team, are keen to develop and disseminate these findings more widely, particularly to audiences at Arts Council England and Creative Scotland (who have offered letters of support) and the UK's Department for Culture, Media and Sport. Work package 3 (WP3) takes up the dissemination activity for the project, with a PDF publication from Arts Emergency called Who is missing from the Picture: The problem of inequality and what we can do about it. This will be launched at a series of events, delivered by Create London, and produced by the young people working with Arts Emergency (paid as part of the research project), thus taking the research base beyond the academy whilst developing the skills, and the profile, of those aspiring to be part of the creative economy.