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IJAN PAMPHLET 583 

\EATIVE FUTURES: CULTURE, IDENTITY 
ND NATIONAL RENEWAL 

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POLITICAL AND ECONOMIC SCIENCE 


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FABIAN PAMPHLET 583 

r 

CREATIVE FUTURES: CULTURE, IDENTITY 
AND NATIONAL RENEWAL 


Contents 

Introduction: Michael Jacobs 
1 

c 

1. 
Culture and our sense ofnational identity 3 
Rt Hon Chris Smith MP 

2. 
British identity and cultural renewal 10 
Trevor Phillips 

3. 
Culture and the new politics: reflections from 16 
a small country 
Bridget M cConnell 

4. 
The single currency ofthe imagination . 23 
JudeKelly 

This pamphlet, like all 
publications of the Fabian 
Society, represents not the 
Published by the 
Fabian Society 
I I Dartmouth Street, 
ISBN 07163 0583 6 
ISSN 0307 7523 
collective views of the Society. 
but only the views of the 
London SW I H 9BN 
Design: Tony Garrett 
authors. The responsibility of 
the Society is limited to 
approving its publication as 
Printed by College Hill Press, (TU) Ltd. 
London & Worthing 
worthy of consideration within December 1997 
the Labour movement. 


NTRODUCTION 

d ichael Jacobs 

S
S
etting out his vision for British society before 

the last election, Tony Blair said that he 

wanted Britain to be 'a young country'. This 
vas a rather shocking idea. Britain may be many 
hings in our minds, but being young is not generally 
me of them. 

It is this that Tony Blair and the new Labour Government are seeking to 
hange. Under the banner of 'modernisation', a concerted attempt is being made 

o refashion Britain's sense of national identity. What is perhaps most interestng, 
and certainly welcome, about this project is the central role being given to 
ulture. This is not a subject, frankly, to which British governments in the 
·ecent past have given much attention. But today we have a new Department 
,f Culture, with a new mission of making the arts accessible to all; new funding 
nechanisms through the National Lottery; a Task Force set up to devise a strat~
gy for maximising the strength of Britain's 'creative industries'; an exhibition 
llanned for the Millennium Dome to celebrate British innovation in science and 
echnology; and prominent figures in fashion, design, music and film being con.
picuously invited to party with the Prime Minister at No 10. 
Ithas been easy for superficial commentators to mock some of this as cheap 
or expensive) populism. But the deeper purpose here is important. For it is 
.hrough culture that collective identity is largely formed . This is true in both 
:enses of the word. In its broad sense 'culture' refers to those characteristics 
vhich make individual societies distinctive: language, customs, faiths, tradi.
ions, sciences and the vernacular arts. The crucial feature of culture in this 
:ense is that it is shared: in helping to defme a particular society -local, re~
onal or national -it gives the individuals within it a common identity, and 
;hrough this a sense of belonging to something bigger than themselves. 

By contrast, in its narrower usage to mean the high and popular arts of mu;
ic, literature, drama, painting and so on, one of the crucial roles of culture is to 
JUestion identity. Here there is no necessary sharing: there is iconoclasm, re)
ellion, individuality. This is crucial to the formation of identity. It is the hunan 
imagination, cultivated and expressed in artistic activity, which can explore 


what kinds of people we are, and who we could be. And there isn't a single 
version of this: in the modern world we have multiple identities, both as individuals 
and as a society. This diversity is both created and manifested in the 
flourishing of the arts. 

Itwas to explore these questions that the Fabian Society organised in September 
1997 a major conference in London entitled 'Culture, Identity and National 
Renewal'. Supported by Classic FM-which is itself a remarkable example 
of our changing cultural identities -the conference attracted over 250 people 
from throughout the arts and cultural world to debate the role of culture in our 
national life. Drawing on examples of both national and local arts activity, the 
conference examined the extent to which a government-led cultural policy could 
become a focus for shared identity, and through this an engine for regeneration: 
not only nationally, but in local and regional communities. 

This pamphlet reproduces, in edited form, four of the speeches given at the 
conference. In different ways each of these essays explores the complex relationships 
between culture, identity and nationhood, and the role that government 
can play in fostering creative endeavour. 

The conference took place at a momentous time, immediately following both 
the funeral of Princess Diana and the devolution referendums in Scotland and 
Wales. These events forced upon British society new questions about our national 
identity -both about the nations we live in and the kind of people we are. 
These questions will not go away. The devolution processes in Scotland and 
Wales (and in Northern Ireland) have only just started; and the ramifications 
for English identity have yet to become clear. The impact of Diana's death both 
on our sense of collective values and on some of our oldest institutions is still to 
be fully worked through. Meanwhile the approaching Millennium -a quintessentially 
collective event -will inevitably make us ask who we are as a nation, 
and where we think we're going. We hope that these essays will contribute to 
these debates. 

The Fabian Society would like to express its thanks to Sarah Atkin, whose 
own imagination generated the idea of the conference, to her conference eoorganisers 
at N eil Stewart Associates, and to Classic FM for their generous 
financial support of both the conference and this pamphlet e 


CULTURE AND OUR SENSE OF NATIONAL 
IDENTITY 

Rt Hon Chris Smith MP 

R 
R
obert Kennedy once wrote: 'The gross 
national product does not allow for the 
health of our children, the quality of their 
education or the joy of their play. Itdoes not include 
the beauty of our poetry or the strength of our 
marriages, the intelligence of our public debate or the 
integrity of our public officials. Itmeasures neither 
our wit nor our courage, neither our wisdom nor our 
learning, neither our compassion nor our devotion to 
our country. It measures everything, in short, except 
that which makes life worthwhile.' 

I'm not sure he was entirely right, because he was ignoring the strands which 
were already developing then, in the 1960s, of interconnection between culture 
and national economy to which I shall turn in a moment. But he was pointing 
with characteristic forcefulness to a profound truth: that there is a bundle of 
emotions, experiences and life-defining elements in all our lives that cannot be 
pinned down in mechanistic definitions, that cannot be counted by an accountant, 
that cannot be readily measured in a calculus, but that together form the 
most significant components of our character, and of our purpose in life. These 
elements form themselves into what we might call our own individual culture, 
our own sense of identity and self-worth; taken broadly together, across groups 
of people, they form what can more generally be seen as the culture of a community 
or a nation. 

These are almost impossible things to define with precision. Ifyou ask for a 
definition of the word 'culture' you will receive as many definitions as there are 
definers. It is a little bit like the word 'socialism', I suppose: it can accommodate 
as little or as much as the user wants. Itcan encompass the whole history 

1 


3 


of a people, or their current way of life, or their ideas for the future, or their 
religious beliefs, or the corpus of their thought or their literature or their music 
or their art. Matthew Arnold, of course, defined culture as 'the acquainting 
ourselves with the best that has been known and said in the world, and thus 
with the history of the human spirit'. I have always thought that this -fine 
concept though it is -has tended to place culture too formally outside the individual 
experience of the person, in some great intellectual tide that is seen as 
being divorced from the personal and that has to be struggled for and connected 
to before it becomes valid. I prefer to follow Kennedy and T. S. Eliot, in 
seeing culture as that which 'makes life worth living' -both as individual human 
spirits and as communities. 

AB someone rather neatly put it to me, when I migrated from being the Shadow 
Health Secretary to being (as it then was) the Heritage Secretary: 'Health is a 
sine qua non, but culture is a raison d'etre.' 

No-one who has lived through the weeks following Diana's death here in 
Britain can doubt, either, that there is such a thing as a national cultural sense, 
as well as a series of individual cultural experiences. What we have witnessed, 
I believe, is a real feeling that we are coming together as a nation, in shared 
grief but in shared purpose too. I felt it a little bit in those terrible weeks three 
and a half years ago when we lost John Smith, when suddenly the values of 
social justice to which he was so passionately devoted swept through the national 
psyche and became the normal stuff of political discourse in way that 
would have been inconceivable before. On a larger scale we are witnessing 
something of the same happening now. The death of the Princess of Wales has 
unlocked a tide of emotion that we scarcely knew we felt: of compassion and 
commitment to those who are marginalised and disadvantaged; of informality 
and a touch of irreverence; of respect for vulnerability; and of wanting to be 
part of something bigger than just ourselves. What a sea-change this represents 
from the go-getting, me-first, thrusting Thatcherite world of 1980s values. 
We are rediscovering the truth that there is such a thing as society after 
all. 

We must be careful, however, not to run away with the notion that there is 
some sort of monolithic British culture that shapes one form of national identity 
and one only. How can you possibly describe our national identity? Is it 
warm beer and the sound of leather on willow and old maids bicycling through 
the country mists to morning communion? Is it what goes on in Albert Square 
or Coronation Street? Is it the Notting Hill Carnival? Is it the crowd at Wembley 
rising silently to Candle in the Wind, or roaring at the goals that followed? 
Is it Italian opera at Covent Garden, Scandinavian plays at the National Thea



tre and Russian music at the Proms? Is it wallowing in the mud at Glastonbury? 
Is it marching down the catwalk in Paris, or designing a new gallery in 
Stuttgart? 

It is, of course, all of these things and a great deal more. Culture -or perhaps 
we should talk rather of cultures -have to be seen on the widest possible 
canvas. Today Britain embraces cultures from all over the world, as we always 
have, and the diversity of our society and of our experiences is precisely part of 
what makes for the richness of our cultural environment. Many parts of those 
cultures that we have gradually absorbed have already become so familiar to us 
that we no longer think of them as foreign at all. Someone hearing a sitar or 
South Mrican close harmony on the radio immediately accepts it as music, not 
"foreign music", in the same way that we have as a nation widened our gastronomic 
tastes over recent years, drawing on the best culinary effects of a wide 
range of traditions. So when we try to understand how our national culture and 
sense of identity intertwine, let us remember first and foremost that diversity is 
one of the key ingredients of both that culture and that identity. 

In this interweaving of cultures in Britain, there are now so many different 
and wonderful threads that make up a rich tapestry, and help to give us a new 
and modern identity. Just think of writers such as Ben Okri and Salman Rushdie 
and Kazuo Ishiguro. Bands such as Massive Attack and Eternal. Singers such 
as Ronnie Size and J azzie B and Apache Indian. Flourishing new fashion designers 
such as Ozwald Boateng. All these are new ambassadors for a new 
creative Britain. And all contribute to a diversity we should be shouting about 
from the rooftops. 

Sitting side by side with the concept of diversity is another equally important 
characteristic of our national culture: that it spreads -or should spread across 
the whole of society. Cultural experience and activity must, I passionately 
believe, be available to the many and not just to the few. IfI had to identify 
a defining motif of our new government and our new Department it would 
be precisely this: that developing our own individual sense of identity through 
cultural experience, and touching a sense of shared identity through shared 
cultural emotion, must be achievable by everyone no matter what their circumstances 
or class or background or location may be. Things of quality must be 
accessible to all. 

That is, I believe, a legitimate aim of government. No government can or 
should attempt to create culture, to dictate what its components are, or to second-
guess the creative impulses of individuals. But governments can ensure 
that the framework is in place that permits those creative impulses to flourish, 
and can ensure that as many people as possible have the chance to enjoy and 


absorb. 

There is a perpetual danger that 'culture' will be seen as something alien to 
the vast majority of people, something just for an elite and for special people in 
special privileged places. We must fight as strongly as we can against such 
notions. I have said on many occasions that culture, the arts, sport, the enjoyment 
of creativity are for all. I have also said that they must become much 
more a part of everyday life, not just reserved for special events. Both points 
are central to any understanding of how our sense of ourselves as a people can 
develop. But there is a further point to add, too. We must not define ourselves 
solely in terms of the past, or tradition, or what we have inherited. Culture and 
personal and national identity are every bit as much -if not more -about the 
future. 

That is of course one of the reasons why I felt it was important to change the 
name of my Department. Important though the conservation of our heritage 
is, it did not represent all that our work should be. I wanted something that 
was a bit more all-embracing, and a bit more forward-looking. Our new title 
reflects much more the modern nature of what we are about. 

This is something we perhaps need to take note of as a nation, too. The 
recent Demos report on British identity is frightening in the evidence it amasses 
about the way in which as a nation we look backwards-and the impact this has 
on others' view of us, as well as on our own view of ourselves. Japanese consumers 
have a higher regard for British products than we do ourselves. Only 
37% of 18 to 34 year olds believe that Britain 'is a better country than other 
countries'. British companies are dropping the word "British" from their titles. 
And the Demos authors drily tell us: kound the world ... Britain's image remains 
stuck in the past ... Britain is seen as a backward-looking has-been, a 
theme park world of royal pageantry and rolling green hills, where draughts 
blow through people's houses.' 1 

That is the perception, though I suspect that it is changing for the better in a 
way that the Demos polling work has not yet picked up. But contrast that with 
the reality. We export more per head than the USA or Japan. We lead the 
world in many of the new and growing industries, in design and fashion and 
music and computer graphics and the audiovisual world. Even the Japanese 
government admits that 70% of the products that have fuelled their own economic 
success in recent decades have been invented in Britain. Eight out of ten 
of the most profitable retailers in Europe are British. We have the busiest 
international airport and we host the largest international arts festival in the 
world. London buzzes with life and energy. 1.4 billion people live in countries 
where English is an official language. These are strengths. They are pointers 


to our future sources of wealth, and to our potential sense of pride and identity. 
But we have to play to these strengths, and this is where government can help. 

Recently the British Tourist Authority launched its new Union Jack-based 
logo. I think it's rather good. The research that led up to its development is 
very significant. In all the survey work amongst visitors to Britain, and potential 
visitors, two contrasting themes constantly emerged: that Britain was a 
place of tradition, and that Britain was a place of innovation too. Pomp and 
pageantry alongside 'cool Britannia'. 

We are of course a nation that is both buttressed and circumscribed by our 
history. This is true of every European country, in a way which North America 
and Australia, for example, are not. Nearly every piece of ground in our country 
has been worked on, lived on, loved and changed, over the centuries. Nearly 
everything we do has gradually evolved from things that have been done before. 
This is a simple fact of life. It is a strength, and it is also a limitation. But 
what we need to do is to use this platform of history and tradition in order to 
build a new and innovative future. In many fields of human endeavour we are 
now seeing a real renaissance of activity and imagination, here in Britain. It is 
true in everything from the performing arts to medical science. Let us make 
sure that-in setting out for ourselves a new sense of our culture and our identity, 
we keep fully in view that synergy between tradition and innovation that is 
almost unique to us, and that can give us a real edge for future success. 

That is why the initiative we have taken in establishing a Creative Industries 
Task Force, to work across the whole of Government, to draw together Ministers 
from all the relevant departments, and to work in coherent fashion to see 
what we can do to assist the development of these incredibly important industries, 
is so important. These are industries that depend on individual creative 
talent, and intellectual property, for their added value. They range from music 
and the visual arts through to film, television and design. They depend on a 
cultural ferment of talent, ideas, and encouragement to flourish. And none of 
that can or should be dictated by government. But what we can do is to make 
sure that the international framework of copyright law is right, that problems 
of piracy are being tackled, that the domestic market is not hampered by anticompetitive 
practices, and that the education system is enabling talent to emerge. 
These are the issues to which the Task Force will be turning its attention. If we 
get it right, then we will be able to assist some of the most important industrial 
sectors for Britain in the next twenty or thirty years. These are where the jobs 
of the future and the wealth creation of the future are going to come from, in 
substantial form. And I have to say, at last we have a Government in place that 
recognizes this, and wants to help. 


Nor should we ignore the importance of cultural activity and development 
for social regeneration as well as for economic success. Some of the work by 
Comedia published recently has shown this particularly strongly. Work to provide 
cultural opportunities in local communities -in the arts or theatre or multimedia 
or sport -can be far and away the most effective way of providing a 
spurt to wider regeneration of a neighbourhood or an estate. Providing cultural 
opportunities for local people to enjoy themselves, to fmd fulfilment, to 
develop skills they never realised they had, and to find the excitement of working 
together with others to make things happen -all this helps to generate a 
sense of purpose and of self-worth amongst those who have been constrained or 
patronised for years. This is a classic demonstration of the links between cultural 
activity and a sense of identity -personal identity for individuals, and local 
identity for communities. 

And it can lead on to the most remarkable rejuvenation of neighbourhoods 
in other ways too. Look at what has happened in areas all around the country, 
where music workshops or mural projects or creative writing schemes or mini-
festivals have been established: often in a small-scale way, but with enormous 
benefits for everyone involved. This is why I am so devoted to the future progress 
of the Arts for Everyone programme put together so imaginatively by the Arts 
Councils. And it is why I am looking further at how -within the proposals we 
have put forward in our recent White Paper for the reform of the Lottery-we 
can make further progress in the use of lottery funds in this way. 

Without education, however, there can be no culture. And the final point I 
want to make relates to this. Education is all about the best possible individual 
development for a child. Itis about finding fulfilment and developing skills and 
equipping yourself for the world and becoming a citizen. It is also about becoming 
a full person. In order to achieve all of this, we must not and cannot ignore 
the cultural aspects of education. A very young child finds something magical, 
something wonderful, about singing and dancing and painting, and relating to 
the world through the medium of what in an adult world we would recognize as 
cultural activity. Yet whilst much of our subsequent educational provision for 
that child is about logic and reason, we must never let the magic be suppressed. 
I want to ensure, naturally, that high standards in the basic skills of reading 
and writing and counting and relating to others are attained. But I also want 
the magic and wonder of the world of culture to be there too, alongside the 
other skills that are being learned and honed. Without that, fulfilment will not 
come and society as a whole will be the poorer for it. 

Nurturing our sense of culture in ourselves and as a society; cherishing diversity; 
ensuring that the opportunities to do so are available to all; building on 


our sense of inheritance to shape an exciting future; recognising the economic 
and social success that can come when married to a sense of culture; and ensuring 
that our education system encourages such a development: these are the 
key themes for anyone -particularly a government that dares to consider itself 
civilised -who wishes to ensure that a proud sense of cultural identity leads to a 
proud sense of national achievement. 

Sheila McKechnie recently remarked that for many people the word 'culture' 
represented something that you grow tomatoes in, or something you grow 
viruses in; but that it was actually something you can grow people in. Or rather: 
something in which people can grow themselves. In the end, after all, that is 
what this is all about e 

Note 

I Mark Leonard. Britain TM . Demos. 1997 


2 
2 
BRITISH IDENTITY AND CULTURAL 
RENEWAL 

Trevor Phillips 

ho do we think we are? The 

referendums on devolution in Scotland 

and Wales in the autumn of 1997 were-

indirectly -supposed to answer this question. The 

lack of enthusiasm in Wales, and the only just 

adequate turnout in Scotland, should really make us 

wonder whether we asked the right question. Are we 

trying to impose a kind of national identity that no 

longer has meaning for many of our people? This can 

lead to disaster. Let me explain what I mean by this. 

When we talk of taffs or jacks, niggers, yids or pakis we all understand the 
power of these words. In most circumstances they would cause serious offence 
ifused by someone who is not himself or herself of African, Jewish, South Asian, 
Welsh or Scottish descent. They are offensive not just because they are terms 
of abuse; they are offensive because they carry very specific, limiting ideas 
about people just because of where they or their families may have been born. 
These words carry baggage, and when they are used by others, they dump that 
baggage, usually unwelcome, on the person addressed. 

But what is most offensive is that someone else believes that they can decide 
who and what we are. That is why I for one have always been uneasy about 
most discussions about identity. Most such discussions frame the issue of identity 
principally in terms of nationality or religion or race. For someone with a 
Caribbean heritage this is a serious problem. 

I am clearly an African of sorts though I have no clue of which African nation, 
and no knowledge of any African language; I have a Scottish great great 
grandfather, an Indian great grandmother, and for heavens' sake a name which 
I share with dozens of people in every village in Mid Wales. My children, like 
millions of other British children, can claim a heritage that spreads across four 

10 


continents. 

So who are we? The fact is that, as any Artful Dodger knows, the answer to 
the question "Who are you?" is: "Who's asking?" In my own case, the answer 
could be any one of a dozen things -British, English, black, European, Londoner, 
journalist; today, the most important could be part of the Chelsea tribe, 
since we're near the top of the Premiership. My point really is that efforts to fix 
identity, to describe it in such a way that an individual can put it on like a suit 
are, today, pointless -except that they make it easy for everyone else to say -ah 
yes, I understand what he or she is about. There is unfortunately a thin line 
here between identification and prejudice. 

For centuries Caribbean slave owners believed that they could preserve the 
idea of a pure European by classification. They created a system in which you 
could trace identity through seven generations, and there was a name for every 
possible combination -mulattos, quadroons, octoroons, down to 88 parts Mrican 
and 40 parts European, the so-called marabous. That idea failed, of course 
-broken on the rock of human nature. 

I would urge us not to get too hung up on difficult, abstract, arguments about 
what it means to be British or English or Scottish or Welsh or European. It 
may be useful if what you want to do is market UK plc; in that case the task 
might simply be to work out what might be included when we talk about the 
British. The academic Stuart Hall got it right when he said recently that being 
Black is now just another way of being British -implying that there are a series 
of ways of belonging to the British tribe. Identity should not become a new 
cage, trapping us in a set of expectations; but should be a chance to express the 
range of opportunities implied in the word British. 

(I give a big tick, by the way, to Robin Cook for noticing that the Foreign 
Office is all-white and largely male. It doesn't surprise me. Some years ago, at 
a Foreign Office briefing one senior official told us that, "Of course, the Tanzanians 
are the niggers in the woodpile". He then looked at me and muttered 
"Only an expression". Amazing that this should take place in a department 
where attitudes can cost us trade.) 

So much for national identity. So how do we get a handle on the idea of 
"culture"? We should, I think, try to distinguish between three things, which 
we all from time to time confuse. One is identity, which seems to me to be an 
individual quality, which not only changes from person to person, but may be 
different from time to time and place to place. The second is heritage, which is 
given, fixed and derives from birth, and perhaps ownership of land; and the 
third is tradition, which involves rituals, practices, habits, even language shared 
by groups of people and often handed on from generation to generation. It is 


tradition, perhaps, which most closely helps us to define what might be defined 
as a national culture. Unfortunately the word has come to stand for the stuffy 
and backward looking aspects of our history. 

But it need not be so. Ifwe think of our culture as what we have done and 
achieved as a people, rather than what we are and have been, we can begin to 
think of our culture as inclusive, embracing a series of traditions. Anyone can 
share in them. For example: who, a generation ago, would have imagined that 
two black women would be wearing ermine this autumn? Traditions also belong 
to the people, and -as we have seen recently in respect to the royal family 
-can be thrown off by the people if they become suffocating straightjackets. 
And lastly, tradition has the virtue of being susceptible to -vogue word -modernisation. 


Itis worth adding one last point about what culture is. Broadly speaking we 
tend to think of this word as meaning our artistic, craft, and sporting traditions. 
I regret that we are not making greater strides to include science and 
technology in our definition. The British story involves Newton just as much as 
it does Shakespeare, Faraday as much as it does Elgar, Crick and Watson as 
much as it does Henry Moore. Itis a pity that we don't see scientists and inventors, 
just as intellectually vigorous and innovative as artists, in conferences like 
this. The proposed National Endowment for Science, Technology and the Arts 
is a powerful bow in the right direction, but we need to go further than that. 

Of course, as well as trying to work out what culture is, we also have to 
address the question of what culture is for. Everybody knows that culture is 
now big business. The sector makes billions of pounds each year for the nation, 
and it supports hundreds of thousands of jobs. But let us not fall into the trap of 
thinking of culture simply as brand marketing for UK plc. A nation's culture 
reminds us who we are-and it points us to where we are heading. Itis the story 
of our communal life. And today, the story that we tell of our own lives is increasingly 
told in the terms of film, television, popular print and music, media 
which are virtually instantaneously available, universally understood, and hugely 
persuasive. More than at any time in our history, our culture is playing a role in 
our democracy; the climate of opinion is crucially affected by the way in which 
our story is told. 

Thus we have to consider the role of our culture in the turn of the century 
world against a much wider background than simply what is good and right for 
audiences and artists, or what the government or the arts funding system might 
or might not do. Government does have a role, and that is a role of leadership establishing 
some aims for us in respect of a cultural policy. In my view there 
are three great issues that a cultural policy must confront above all else: 


globalisation, technology and the capture of talent. 

Globalisation could mean a culture that is bland, cheapening, dumbing and 
vulgar. Or it could mean that the ease of communication across the planet brings 
people closer together, making new ideas and experiences available to more 
people. It could mean support for innovation where it was never available before. 
And for Britain it could also mean massive new opportunities that in themselves 
work against social and economic exclusion. Our capacity for cultural 
innovation and our language have made us world leaders in several sectors media, 
publishing, multimedia products. Most of all, we know that cultural 
innovation thrives best in an energetically diverse society; and Britain is probably 
one of the most successfully and comfortably diverse societies on earth. 
Part of government's role should surely be to encourage us to take advantage of 
globalisation rather than to fear it. 

Technology: without doubt, the satellite dish, the video camera, and the digital 
transmission of information have transformed the manner and the speed at 
which we construct and reconstruct our history, and with which we can share 
cultural products. That is not to say that we are less entranced by live performance 
or the direct encounter with a piece of art. But once again, technology has 
made design, theatre, music so widely available that their ability to express our 
values as a society has been multiplied hundreds of times in a decade. But how 
do we make it the property of the people, rather than the exclusive preserve of 
the rich and the elite? 

The capture of talent: in the past half-century; private patronage has been 
supplemented by patronage by the public purse through the Arts Council and 
other bodies, including local authorities. But now, increasingly the ownership 
of musicians, artists and writers and their intellectual property is in the hands 
of huge global conglomerates. There are major principles at stake here: how 
much of a book or a piece of music or an image, say, belongs to the artists and 
how much to his or her backer -and does any of it belong to the public? Increasingly, 
as these assets are exploited, there are reasons for us to be clearer 
on these issues. 

Most of all we all need to consider the lessons of the success of the cultural 
industries of our time. One of those lessons is that the purveyors of popular 
culture place great store by putting their products in front of audiences, where 
those audiences are, rather than forcing them to come to 'temples of culture'. If 
we truly want to encourage a people's cultural policy, the first and most important 
element has to be how we allow people to experience the arts and culture 
where the people are, rather than where we would like them to be. 

This brings me fmally to the issue of national renewal. All that I've said 


impH that I beHeve that this i not omething that you can engineer. However 
I do belie e that governments can give a lead by offering opportunitie for u to 
celebrate our culture, compo ed of tradition old and new. That is one reason, 
de pite the co t and all other mi giving , to upport the Millennium Exhibition 
at Greenwich, and ju t a importantly the Festival that goe with it. But let' 
pay attention to omething el e that is taking place. As technology and affluence 
offer u all greater choice about how we pend our time, there i clearly 
le emphasi on the hi toric communal activities that bind u together-churchgoing 
for example. We know that one of the villain of the piece here is of cour e 
televi ion. But in the past year or two we have seen a new communal phenomenon 
in which TV plays a unique part. 

On VE Day, during Euro '96, for Princes Diana's funeral, a whole nation 

hared a ingle experience -but not imply as couch potatoe . In each case 
mo t of u pent part of the day at home, on our own or with our familie ; for 
part of the day we joined our friends at home or in community centres; and if 
we had the chance we joined in a local celebration. We all witnes ed the ame 
events and for once were talking about the ame things. One might ay the 

ame about May 2nd 1997. Each of the e moments was a time of national ex-
pres ion, telling u new elements in our national tory -in the case of Diana' 
funeral, for example, it was obvious that we are now a hugely, comfortably, diverse 
nation -you could ee that fact in the crowd on the treets. It' a les on 
we can draw on. The moments of national renewal need to be embraced and 
prepared for rather than con tantly taking u by surpri e. We know for example 
that there will be another uch moment on December 31st 1999. We won't 
all get into the dome, and we probably won't want to be-we'll want to welcome 
the new millennium with our friend and tho e clo e t to u . hould we not now 
be preparing for that day and night? 

The Millennium Party will tart at 4pm in London, when the International 
Dateline in the Pacific pas e midnight, and it will culminate in midnight at the 
meridian (that' a good name for a how). Why aren't we inve ting in the technology 
that would link a thou and communiti on the day? Why aren't we 
harne ing the abilitie of our regional arts board to bring together the performe 
and arti v e fund to create wonderful entertainment throughout the 
da and ni ht, howing off what they can do, and bringing people together to 
c I brate th ir bri!Hanc ? W could and hould put m ive creens in every 
town quar in major hopping centr and in public parks, o while we party 
with our fri nd w can ee and hear what i happening acro the nation, e en 

cro th plan t. 

And b. th w y, a thou nd video er n would be a brilliant legacy to th 

1<4 


21st century -carrying local information, offering pictures of, let us say, performances 
in local theatres and schools, the work of local artists, neighbourhood 
cable output -putting the most advanced technology at the service of local 
communities. 

You might say what a typically Caribbean outlook -let's have another party. 
Well, perhaps, and why not? Our tradition too is now part of British culture, 
and this is, in part, what I think of as national renewal. I hope that when we 
talk about cultural policy, in the midst of the no doubt soaring ideas and strategies, 
we find time to talk about the very practical possibilities for the expression 
of national renewal and culture. Let us not become too theoretical, too 
French; after all one of the great British virtues is pragmatism -our tradition is 
to get things done. Our tradition is of course, to look backwards; but let's change 
that and start to look forward. Our culture should surprise us and delight us 
with experiences we've never had, or that we never even knew were possible e 


3 


CULTURE AND THE NEW POLITICS: 
REFLECTIONS FROM A SMALL COUNTRY 

Bridget McConnell 

T
T
he referendum on Scottish devolution on 
September 11th 1997 was a historic moment 
for our country. But the 'Yes Yes' result was 
not a mandate for politicians, civil servants, local 
government officers or any other public sector 
officials to take on extra powers 'on behalf of the 
people.' 

This was a clear demand for a new kind of politics, a new way of doing things: 
a learning approach, a more participative democracy and a more egalitarian 
society. I think many of our 'high heid yins' will have a rude awakening when 
they eventually realise what this means. Itis the inevitable culmination of more 
wide-ranging and profound changes in Scottish, and indeed British, society. 

Over the past decade it has been in the cultural field that these changes have 
been most clearly manifested. There have been a number of significant cultural 
developments in Scotland which have both advanced the process of 'national 
renewal', and at the same time, reflected a broad-based public .desire for greater 
accountability and public participation in our politics. It has become clear that 
'culture' -what it is and what it means in contemporary Scotland -cannot be 
considered apart from other aspects of Scottish life. Culture is inextricably 
linked to politics, education, economic development and community regeneration, 
all of which shape and influence our sense of identity -as individuals, as 
communities and as a nation. 

This identity is not uniform. There is no single Scottish identity, as there is 
no single 'Scottish culture'. The Scottish Consultative Council on the Curriculum 
(SCCC) recently surveyed 1100 organisations as part of its Review of Scottish 
Culture and the Curriculum. 97% of respondents agreed that there was 
such a thing as 'Scottish Culture' and that this was something which was distinctive 
and unique to Scotland. But despite unanimity on the existence of 'Scottish 
culture', the variety and diversity of opinions on what that culture is proved 

16 


to be very wide. 

Indeed, it would seem that the more we consider th question 'What is cottish 
culture?', the more it fragments. On the one hand we have the Brav h >art 
mythologies and the historical sentimentality packaged in tartan for tourists. 
On the other there is the modern, dynamic, int rnationally celebrated arts seen : 
Scottish films such as Shallow Grave and Trainspotting; in the visual arts th 
internationally successful Belam y, Campbell and Howie; band!:! such as Wet 
Wet Wet and Texas; and the more classical expressions of musical culture, 
MacMillan and Maxwell Davis. Yet looking at the returns from the SCCC Hurvey, 
the definition of Scotti h culture is clearly not found in any one organisation's 
or individual's analysis. Rather, it is the plurality of these differ nt vi wH, 
experiences and expressions which makes up modern day Scottish culture. As 
the report put it, 'The sum total of cultural houses found in Scotland constitutcH 
the city called Scottish Culture' .I 

It is crucial to recognise that these 'cultural houses' are not just those containing 
narrowly-defined 'arts' activities. A major contributing factor to the 
new cultural self-confidence found in Scotland is th affirmation at local and 
national levels of the value and significance of vernacular cultures previously 
ignored or denigrated. These vernacular cultures are themselv s sources for 
internationally recognised arts excellence. 

Scottish languages provide a case in point. Thanks to the efforts of bodies 
such as Comunn Na Gaidhlig, the Scots Language Society, and the Scots Language 
Resource Centre, the future of Scotland's indigenous languages -Gaelic 
and Scots -are well secured. 

The Highland Clearances in the 19th century almost totally wiped out th 
language and culture of the Highlands. Less than 70,000 people in Scotland 
now speak Gaelic; but this is steadily increasing as local authorities and national 
government commit funding support to Gaelic teaching-and just as important, 
to Gaelic arts projects. Local authorities such as Fife and Highland 
have worked to ensure that local cultural and lingujstic traditions are not Hentimentalised 
and packaged as 'museum pieces', but are part of a living heritage, 
which local people can develop in modern contexts. A network of Gaelic initiatives 
from playschools to television programmes, rock bands to Gaelic magazines 
is allied to the burgeoning network of tuition-based local festivals in which 
Gaelic music, storytel]jng and other cultural skills are passed on to the younger 
generation. The international success of Gaelic bands such as Clannad has been 
nurtured from this local revival of Gaelic culture. 

Meanwhile surveys place the number of Scots language speakers at between 
1.6m and 3.6m. Ifthe latter figure is accurate, this would make Scots speakers 


the second biggest language group in the country. The increasing value placed 
on Scots has been a result of several factors: effective lobbying, greater use of 
the language in broadcasting and the media, the inclusion of Scots in the 5-14 
years curriculum, university courses in Scottish Studies and an expansion of 
publications in Scots. (Nonetheless, when a Scots teenager can be charged with 
contempt of court for using the Scots 'Aye' instead of the English 'Yes' in response 
to the Judge -as happened earlier this year -it is clear that the days 
when children using Scots at school were told 'to speak properly' are not yet 
entirely past.) 

As national and international successes continue to accrue to Scottish writers, 
writing not only in English but in Scots, increasing self-confidence in Scots 
and its usage is inevitable. Examples include James Kelman, winner of the 
Booker Prize; Jeff Torrington, winner of the Whitbread Prize; Ian Crichton-
Smith, winner of the Forward Award for Best Single Poem; and of course Irvine 
Welsh, author of Trainspotting and now an international literary figure. 

The importance of these achievements cannot be over-estimated. No longer 
is the Scots language regarded as a dying force with a relevance only in centuries 
past. It is now seen as a vibrant and expressive language used and appreciated 
not only in Scotland but elsewhere around the globe. As Seona Reid, 
Director of the Scottish Arts Council, said at the British Council Edinburgh 
Festival Seminar in 1996: 'It would be a mistake to assume that all this interest 
in our traditions, our linguistic heritage, was self-indulgent wallowing in all our 
yesterdays. The Catalan artist J oan Miro once said that 'Art can only be truly 
universal when it is fundamentally local'. That is a truth which straddles every 
art form. An artist can only function properly on the international stage ifhe or 
she first has a solid sense of their own identity and culture. There is a growing 
sense of cultural self confidence in Scotland and it is having a noticeable effect 
at home and abroad.'2 

Yet if you believed everything you read in the newspapers, you would think 
that Scottish culture was in crisis. To quote a recent headline in Scotland on 
Sunday: 'Culture is on the wane as the Nation rises'. To Fiona McLeod, the 
author of the accompanying article, 'the catalogue of Scottish arts organisations 
in disarray over recent months reads like a melodrama in its own right. 
From ballet to book, film to art gallery, almost all Scotland's arts organisations 
have been shaken by headline-grabbing rows' .3 

Ironically, this article was next to another which revealed that it is not Scottish 
culture which is on the wane, but our elitist definition of culture. This 
other article described how 'a privileged few Oasis fans shared an intimate rock 
'n' roll experience with their heroes-about 8,000 fans packed in to see the swag



gering Mancunians play their first British gig in more than a year.' An intimate 
audience of 8,000 -this would be many arts administrators' fantasy! 

In all this the question at issue here is: what do we mean by culture? And in 
terms of cultural policy, that inevitably comes down to asking searching questions 
about the kinds of national cultural activities which government should 
support. 

These are questions which Scottish local authorities have been answering 
with increasing confidence in recent years. Local authorities are the main supporters 
of the arts in Scotland, collectively spending about £250 million on a 
wide range of cultural services. AB the 'Charter for the Arts in Scotland', published 
in 1993, puts it: 'Local authorities are the structural pivot of cultural life 
in Scotland'. And over the past decade, a number of Scottish local authorities 
have been at the forefront of developing cultural policies and services which 
have sought to reflect the wider interests and needs of the community. Challenging 
elitist definitions of the arts and culture, they have increased access; 
enhanced the role of the voluntary sector, developed new partnerships, and 
nurtured personal and community confidence and pride in local traditions, 
achievements and abilities. 

Much of the work I am referring to is locally based, involving a wide range of 
individuals and groups. And in my experience the work is often of a quality artistically 
and organisationally -that is quite simply breathtaking, especially 
when it is recognis~d that most of this work is done on a shoe-string and often 
involves a huge element of voluntary effort. 

I have experienced and seen for myself the ability of locally based cultural 
activity to change individual lives, to put the heart back into communities, to 
open up job chances for young people, to help rediscover local and national 
traditions and heritage, to give people a real sense of belonging and achievement 
and hope and ambition for their futures. I could give countless examples: 
ranging from the self-confidence found in painting and drama workshops by 
people with special needs in Aberdeen to the tangible pride in their community 
displayed by Castlemilk People's Theatre, winners of a Fringe First at 1995's 
Edinburgh International Festival. There are the young breakdancers in Stirling 
regularly playing truant from school to dance on old bits of lino in 1985 and 
now in employment as fully qualified dance teachers, mainly as a result of a 
local authority dance initiative. And the group of over-60s from Inverkeithing 
forming their own theatre group following a local authority drama project, and 
before we know it, performing in Spain as part of an exchange programme. 

In Banff and Buchan a Folklore Archive has been developed as a result of 
local authority partnership with voluntary arts and heritage organisations. In 


the Borders of Scotland, the Council initiated a combined project with the 
Galashiels Camera Club, a professional gallery -The Stills Gallery -and the 
Scottish Youth Dance Festival which resulted in a remarkable exhibition of dance 
photography. 

In Fife, a major year-long music project has involved pupils in two primary 
schools, and their staff, with a professional musician and conductor from the 
Scottish Chamber Orchestra, the award winning composer Alisdair Nicholson 
and the local community orchestra. The project culminated in performances 
by the orchestra and school pupils and teachers of pieces they had themselves 
created, along with a specially commissioned piece on the theme of the Burns 
poem 'Tarn O'Shanter' by Nicholson. The performances took places in two Fife 
venues and in the Queen's Hall in Edinburgh. For a number of the children, 
living a mere 20 miles from Edinburgh, this was their first visit to the city. And 
what a first visit-on a grand stage, in a real concert hall! They will tell you that 
this experience was one they, the school and the community will never forget. 
Through a cultural activity they were able to tackle, even if only in a small way, 
the poverty of aspiration which blights theirs and too many other communities. 

This kind of work is not widely known about: in terms of media coverage of 
the arts and culture in Scotland it has a very low status. Yet in terms of cultural 
policy it is critical. Just what could be achieved if even a tenth of the money 
given to national organisations was instead invested in these local initiatives? 
The issue is a live one in the context of the new Scottish Parliament. Tom Brown, 
one of Scotland's most well known journalists and great supporter of Scotland's 
diverse culture (from classical music to Raith Rovers football team), spoke for 
many when he said recently: 'I hope that this new Parliament will take a different 
perspective and build from the bottom up, by encouraging local initiatives 
instead of doling out patronage to a few "national" institutions.' Local government 
in Scotland has much good practice to offer national policy making here. 

Clearly, government at all levels has an important role to play in valuing and 
supporting those local traditions and cultural activity which underpin national 
cultural identity. However, just as important is how public institutions -including 
the Scottish Parliament -make policy. How will they respond to the public 
demand for a less aloof and more inclusive style of government, which ensures 
wider public involvement in decision-making and provides more sensitive and 
responsive services? The issue is as relevant in cultural policy as in any other 
area. 

Interestingly, community-focused approaches to cultural policy at local government 
level, for example in my own Council in Fife, have been clearly influenced 
by, and have run in tandem with, the development of participatory models 


of service delivery in other areas. A multi-faceted approach to community 
participation has increasingly been adopted, experimenting with methods such 
as citizens' juries, local referenda, community arts forums and so on. For the 
first time ever in Fife, our current Arts and Heritage Strategies will be scrutinised 
by a Citizens' Jury, as well as being put out to a range oflocal and national 
organisations (both arts and community-based) and local businesses. As a result 
of this approach, new structures for supporting and developing arts and 
cultural services are being implemented. The aim is to ensure a more consistent, 
meaningful and ongoing dialogue with local artists and local communities, 
and to ensure that consultation and participation are real, not tokenistic. 

At the same time, many local authorities have sought to make cultural policy 
a corporate concern, integrating cultural work into other policy areas, recognising 
the role of cultural services in wider social, economic and environmental 
contexts. They have built new multi-disciplinary teams, encouraging the exploration 
of new ideas and new ways of working, and engendering a commitment 
to innovation, creativity and a preparedness to take risks. 

Partnerships, openness, a different style of politics and management and a 
corporate approach across all government departments -these are key themes 
emerging from the Scottish experience of cultural policy development. They 
reflect the profound changes in public expectations of government which have 
occurred in recent years -changes which have both fed and been fed by the 
parallel awakening of national identity and self-confidence. In fact, it may not 
be too far-fetched to argue that the process of cultural policy development could 
itself help to restore public faith in the ability of government to make a difference 
to people's lives. 

Thus is cultural policy an integral part of the new politics of Scotland and of 
our national renewal. Clearly, a sense of who we are is dependent on our awareness 
of our environment, our history, pride in the place we live, pride in our 
traditions. These in turn give us a confidence to engage with, and be influenced 
by, other cultures. 

The kind of national renewal we seek is not introspective; rather it is outward 
looking and liberating. This is precisely what a flourishing national culture 
provides. The Scottish writer, William Mcllvanney, speaking at a recent 
international writers' conference in Scotland, captured this well. 'My Scotland,' 
he said, 'has been given to me not just by my country but by many countries. 
Cultural identity is not something we hold like a passport, it is something we 
continue to discover by looking at ourselves through the eyes of other cultures. 
The world contains a fascinating Babel of diversity and the more we attempt to 
understand others without prejudice, the more we will be rewarded with an 


enhanced understanding of ourselves.'4 Let us hope that the advent of a Scottish 
parliament gives us the opportunity to make this vision a reality e 

Notes 

1 Review ofScottish Culture and the Curriculum, Review Group Paper 3, 
Scottish Consultative Council on the Curriculum, 1997. 
2 Seona Reid, 'The Arts in Scotland', British Council Edinburgh Festival 
seminar, 22nd August 1996. 
3 Scotland on Sunday, 14th September 1997. 
4 The Herald, 7th August, 1997. 


THE SINGLE CURRENCY OF THE 
IMAGINATION 

Jude Kelly 

H
H
alf a century ago the Yorkshire writer J B 

Priestley wrote unforgettably of a Britain 

characterised by both the Lion and the 
Unicorn. The Lion, the physical might of empire and 
war, was then in decline, but the Unicorn, our unique 
talent for imagination and creativity, could flourish as 
never before. If the Thatcher years were 
characterised by a desire for the Lion to stalk again, I 
want our new government to decide that the Unicorn, 
like that other apparently mythical concept, society, 
can become real for us all. 

We are familiar today with the fact that the 'creative economy' is now Brit-
ain's fastest growing sector of the economy and the fourth largest revenue earner 
for the Treasury. So it was only logical, though no less welcome for that, that 
the Government should establish a Task Force to develop a coherent strategy 
to further strengthen this booming asset. The real challenge is something else, 
something far more radical. This is the potential for a new civic enterprise on a 
par with health, housing and education -the commitment to providing creative 
expression and opportunity for all. 

This is not such a far-fetched idea. Article 21 of the United Nations Declaration 
of Human Rights states: 'Everyone has the right freely to participate in 
the cultural life of the community, to enjoy the arts and to share in scientific 
advancements and its benefits'. Yet to date no government has had the courage 
or faith to back human imagination as the most potent force for individual change 
and social vision. 

In the last century and in this it took extraordinary belief and political will to 
introduce the concepts of education for all and health for all. Now these concepts 
are pillars of modern society. Why then should it be impractical or ro



mantic to introduce the idea that our next major enterprise will be arts for all? 
Let us make the development of the imagination a democratic right and necessity 
for citizenship. 

Aristotle said, 'A citizen is one who has a stake in ruling and in being ruled'. 
But how in a 'stakeholder society' can we expect the participation of fully formed 
humans, confident emotionally and intellectually, when we still deny or 
marginalise most people's creative impulses? Our arts policy is still based on a 
theory of 'trickle down': the idea that if we provide arts for the elite, cultural 
improvement will gradually drip down to the masses. It is a theory we have 
long since rejected in the economic field, and we should reject it in the arts field 
too. 

Government must blaze the trail for vision and idealism. The new Government's 
commitment to culture is very welcome; but there is still a cautiousness 
in its commitment to a vision; and in this particular territory of all territories, 
that caution is inappropriate. Why are we saying 'we would like as many people 
as possible to have an experience of the arts'? Why aren't we saying, 'Everyone 
will have this experience'? Why are we going to 'encourage' education to 
develop the creative agenda? Why aren't we insisting that it does so? Why are 
we going to 'enable' talent to emerge? Why aren't we saying that we're going to 
raise our whole nation's quality of creative engagement and we're going to do it 
through policies to be implemented now? 

Education is surely the key to this. The arts and humanities are squeezed in 
schools because of the need to make education more relevant to the economy; 
yet a successful society needs to foster individuals with a sense of ambition, 
independence, individuality and uniqueness, and this is exactly what the arts 
can achieve. We need to recognise the fundamental role culture plays in raising 
self-esteem, strengthening and re-defining identity, fueling the entrepreneurial 
spirit whilst promoting moral and ethical responsibilities. Developing the creative 
capacity of every individual cannot be an afterthought of the national curriculum. 


So many young people today have been denied the right to explore their 
creativity. So what starts as the potential for constructive engagement quickly 
turns to apathy or acts of energetic destruction. We know that the individualism 
of the entrepreneur is often founded in the difficulties of conforming. So 
why do we confuse and depress our young citizens by downgrading their personal 
excitements as irrelevant to current economic or educational needs? We 
need to recognise that this decade's youth craze may be next decade's small 
business trend or artistic enterprise -and applaud it not suppress it. 

Allowing creativity to serve as a key stimulant within an educational context 


releases talents and motivates learning for both basic skills and ambitious conceptual 
projects. The education process must be culturally rich, encouraging 
self-expression and using creativity as a means of investigating moral argument. 
In the 21st century we shouldn't fear· individualism. 

Related to education is training. The establishment of the National Endowment 
for the Arts, Science and Technology is excellent. But we could go further. 
There is a great propensity in this country to have a sort of an academy or 
conservatoire approach to training artists. Of course, there is an important 
place for that. But there are other kinds of appropriate training for artists: 
about morals, values, curiosity and engagement. We need to train the artist as 
somebody who works in other areas of public life and social policy. Many artists 
do in fact find themselves in this position, but they're generally untrained in 
it. I think that's something we should look at, because we have thousands and 
thousands of artists who could do a great deal more in partnership with the 
education system and community services if they had appropriate training: 
There is an under-nourished and under-used resource there which we should 
develop. 

The preservation and celebration of cultural and artistic expression within 
the context of a changing urban and rural landscape is crucial to our sense of 
history, progress, memory and aspiration. AB individuals, as communities and 
as a nation, we need to know who we were, to define who we are -and to shape 
who we would like.to become. For that reason we need to view culture as an 
essential touchstone -the first evidence of where our imaginations are leading 
us. 

Popular, contemporary forms of expression, often springing from youth or 
street life, tend to be seen as minority tastes and ephemeral. However it is 
these edgy, iconoclastic movements, often fueled by the urge to buck convention, 
that will eventually form our 'heritage'. Bob Marley, hip hop, reggae and 
graffiti art influenced black and white British young people alike. Here began 
the process by which diversity came to inspire harmony. Cultural heritage and 
contemporary cultural activity has the capacity to change the aspirations of 
present and future generations. 

But if this is to happen, government must give proper status to culture. There 
is a huge ignorance in government, both centrally and locally, about all aspects 
of the arts. From inside the arts it seems that most of our political leaders, at 
central and local level, don't know what to make of it. Indeed sometimes this 
ignorance is worn as a badge of pride. 'I don't know anything about the arts, 
they say, I'm just a philistine.' Yet we cannot imagine now a politician saying, 
'Well I don't know anything about lead poisoning, the ozone layer and rainfor



ests. But we do give some money to the Environment Agency and they get on 
with it for us. I'm just a pollutionist.' We should no longer accept that attitude 
in the arts as we don't in the environmental field. We must bring the imagination 
into the proper sphere of political debate. 

This might result in a more rounded recognition of the importance of the 
arts -not just in the arts field , but in society generally. Why aren't artists 
apppointed to serve on public committees of all kinds, as industrialists are? 
Around the country there are thousands of fertile initiatives combining the energy 
and imagination of arts practitioners with all kinds of policy objectives: 
healthy living, citizenship, social inclusion, cohesive communities, urban regeneration, 
drugs education. So why not make artists a part of natural quango 
committee life, part of the framework of government (including local government)-
in areas beyond just arts and culture themselves? 

(Incidentally,.if anyone within the arts fears that this risks fine art and high 
art being contaminated by these kinds of social commitment, I would urge them 
to relax. Nothing is going to prevent art being joyously anarchic, being a playground 
for the seemingly irrelevant and fiercely irreverent. Art will survive, 
because it's an essential human activity and it's as mysterious and fundamental 
as sex and it's often much more fun. There's nothing to worry about here.) 

Bringing the arts in these ways into public life could play an important role 
in the achievement of the Government's wider political goals. Labour has set 
out on an ambitious attempt to change Britain's self-identity. It wants us to be 
an innovative society where pioneers and adventurers flourish; an inclusive society 
where diversity of class, colour, age and sexual preference are no inhibitors 
to respect and participation of all levels; a 'born again' civic society where 
duty is the exchange for having rights; and an outward looking so~iety whose 
imaginative democracy can influence codes of moral practice worldwide. 

Yet to harness the energies of a nation in these directions the imagination 
first has to be nurtured and refined. Culture is specific and local and yet it is at 
once universal, a common language available to all. As Britain enters the 21st 
century let us mint that other single currency -the single currency of the imagination; 
and distribute it widely e 


CONTRIBUTORS 

The Rt. Hon. Chris Smith MP is Secretary ~f State for Culture, Media and 
Sport. 

Trevor Phillips is Executive Producer of Factual Programmes at London 
Weekend Television, a columnist on the Independent, and a broadcaster. 

Bridget McConnell is Service Manager (Arts, Libraries and Museums) at Fife 
Council and an arts adviser to the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities. 

Jude Kelly is Chief Executive and Artistic Director of the West Yorkshire 
Playhouse. 

Michael Jacobs is General Secretary of the Fabian Society. 


f.S 
CREATIVE FUTURES: CULTURE, IDENTITY 
AND NATIONAL RENEWAL 
Under the banner of 'modernisation', the new Labour Government is making a 
concerted attempt t.o refashion Britain's sense of national identity, allying an 
ancient heritage to the new mood of 'cool Britannia'. 

Central to this project is a new emphasis on the arts and culture. It is through 
inherited cultures that individuals share a common identity; at the same time it 
is through the flourishing of the arts that identities are questioned, challenged 
and redefined. 

In this set of essays, four leading figures in the cultural field -the Rt Hon Chris 
Smith MP, Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, Trevor Phillips, 
writer and broadcaster, Bridget McConnell, arts adviser to Scottish local authorities, 
and Jude Kelly, Artistic Director of the West Yorkshire Playhouse explore 
the complex relationships between culture, identity and national renewal. 


As the processes of devolution in Scotland and Wales, the aftermath of Princess 
Diana's death and the approaching Millennium force us to reappraise what we 
mean by national identity, and the role in this of creative expression, these essays 
represent a timely contribution to public debate . 

The Fabian Society brings together those who wish to relate democratic socialism to practical plans for building a 
better society in a changing world. it IS affiliated to the Labour Party, and anyone who is eligible for membership of 

the Labour Party can join; others may become associate members. 

For details of Fabian membership, publications and activities, write to: 
Fabian Society. 11 Dartmouth Street, London SW I H 9BN