‘The Subsidised Muse’: The Case for State Funding of the Arts

'The Subsidised Muse': The Case for State Funding of the Arts1 John O'Hagan (bio) Politicians and taxpayers understandably want to know how their money is being spent and whether to good effect or not. This applies across the whole public sector, including expenditure on the arts. One might argue that the 'output' of the arts sector is very difficult to measure, and this is probably true, but so also is the output of the police service or the educational system or the health service. The arts sector is no different. This paper therefore addresses in some detail the possible societal benefits from state expenditure on the arts, and hence the justification for its continuance. These must be kept separate from personal benefits. Personal benefits may be large and intense, just like the benefits from doing yoga classes or going to church or hill walking or gardening might be, but they should not be paid for by taxpayers. The only role of the state in this regard might be to make individuals aware of the benefits before making their personal choice of what to spend their time and money on. This the state does in relation to many other activities, highlighting through information programmes the disadvantages say of smoking/gambling or the benefits say of regular exercise to personal health. The arts are used also in the educational and health sectors and the prison service and are funded in this case through the dedicated budgets for these activities. The focus of this paper is on the justification for direct funding of the arts, via central and local governments. As such, their funding is justified not because they improve education and/or health outputs for individuals, but because there are benefits to the wider society which only state funding can capture. The key issue is the freedom from market constraints that state funding provides. This of course as in the past and indeed today can be provided also by private patronage, be it through private individuals, foundations, or church organisations. One crucial issue in fact to keep in mind is that the vast bulk of state funding on the visual and performing arts sectors goes to the following: theatre, opera/ballet, art museums and individual artists. Small amounts are [End Page 10] also allocated to regional arts events, which often have a wider remit. There is no point then, when examining public funding on the arts, in devoting much attention to areas which receive little direct public funding, such as film, popular or church music, creative industries, or the media. A discussion of these activities is of interest in itself of course but does not link directly to the issue of large state direct funding, the focus of this paper. It probably relates more to industrial policy, where the creative industries are as worthy of state encouragement as other supported industries. Such support may take the form of tax breaks, or start-up grants or assistance with promotion/advertising. There are also many important personal benefits as mentioned above which flow from the consumption of the arts heavily subsidised by the state, but the role of the state in this regard might simply be to draw attention to these so that everyone can make more informed decisions. It is not the role of the state though to subsidise the consumption of these activities or for others to 'lecture' people on what is 'good for them' in this regard. The structure of the paper is as follows. The first five sections outline the various arguments for state funding of the arts, in Ireland and elsewhere. The following two sections then discuss the issue of access for all to the arts, in terms of several possible definitions and their relevance to the issue of societal benefit and hence state funding. The final section concludes the paper. Societal benefit 1: National/regional identity One of the societal outcomes of supporting the arts relates to the extent to which the arts can define those elements of national/regional life which characterise a country or region and distinguish its attitudes, institutions, behaviours, and way of life from those of other countries/regions. The protection of...