Fireworks going off over the Bird’s Nest Olympic Stadium in Beijing, China.

On the evening of August 8, 2008, I sat in the Bird’s Nest in Beijing with 91,000 other spectators and a television audience in the billions, watching China tell its story through the arts. Sure enough, after the final firework exploded over the Bird’s Nest, China had accomplished its goal: prove that, through discipline and creativity, it had become a formidable player on the world stage.

After winning its bid to host the Olympics, China stirred with excitement as it crafted the image it would project to the world. Nationalism was palpable among school children, taxi drivers, government officials, and Olympic volunteers. The games may have been about athleticism, but the prelude, the Opening Ceremonies, was about artistry and the Chinese identity. A blank traditional scroll unfurled on the ground and dancers used their bodies to paint the scroll as they danced. Performers danced on a large globe suspended in the middle of a dark Bird’s Nest giving the illusion of being in outer space.

Dancers performing on a globe suspended in the Bird’s Nest.

Leaders in Beijing knew that their creative abilities were being tried along with their ability to pull off an event of this scale and importance. They spared no expense in making it what many critics hailed as the most spectacular opening ceremony to date.

Nation-building and image-building

All countries engage in what political scientists call “nation-” and “image-” building. Nation-building (not to be confused with state-building) is the internal process of creating a shared identity among citizens through policy and the allocation of public funds. Its external counterpart, image-building, deals with shaping outsiders’ perceptions of a country. The arts often factor into these endeavors: domestically, they affirm a sense of shared culture and enrich social life, while through their export, they help communicate a nation’s identity and may serve as a benchmark for international competitiveness. As countries develop, it is thought, investments in image-building can yield both economic and diplomatic returns.

As the globe’s richest and most heavily armed nation, the United States is in a unique position relative to the rest of the world. Looking at examples beyond our borders shows how other countries handle limited budgets, growing or diminishing international stature, and the desire to be competitive. The four countries compared here—Korea, China, Cambodia, and Brazil—are in different phases of development and provide an important contrast to the industrialized European nations to which cultural policy in the United States is so often compared.

In each of these cases, we will examine the importance of the arts to nation-building efforts, as evidenced by public spending; the degree to which the arts are included in nation-building as an explicit or implicit response to America’s perceived cultural dominance; the degree to which the arts are included in a country’s concept of international competitiveness; and the status of the arts as part of an image-building strategy. Looking at examples such as these can offer fresh insights into the arts’ role in creating a national identity and projecting an image of vitality to the outside world.

China

Historically, China’s cultural sphere spanned the Asian continent. Today, however, it sees its influence in danger of being eclipsed by that of its neighbors—and of the West. China’s investment in the arts is a safeguard against the perceived infiltration of American culture, an attempt for its cultural products to carry more economic weight and status within the region, and a natural extension of its ascendance as a global economic force.

As a relative newcomer on the international stage, China believes that a strong arts sector can help put it on equal footing with developed countries. In recent years, officials have valued culture’s role in “the competition of…national strength.” In 2011, a comprehensive plan for cultural reform was unveiled. China already spends significantly on culture. In 2012, China spent 54.054 billion yuan, or 9.3% of its national budget, on culture, sports, and media. Teasing out the amount for the arts is challenging given China’s notoriously opaque budgets, but if we assume one-third of that 54 billion goes to culture, China’s financial support would be the equivalent of nearly $3 billion in US dollars.

This spending is driven in large part by a reaction against encroaching foreign values. The Chinese consume more American than Chinese cultural products. This trend, and the accompanying values shift, is so alarming to Chinese officials that they counter it with increased spending on theater, television, and radio and regulations restricting foreign programming. In 2006, China’s contribution to the global cultural market trailed that of its smaller neighbors. Japan and Korea made up 13% of the global market for cultural products including literature, popular culture, and games, while the rest of Asia, including China, made up only 6%.

Whatever funding China dedicates to the arts risks being seen by people in more open governments more as a political maneuver than an earnest attempt at moving the arts forward. Financial investments remain undercut by China’s most contentious policy: censorship. From things as trite as blacklisting Lady Gaga and as pedantic as pixelating Michelangelo’s David-Apollo’s privates, to filmmakers and writers being restricted to the point that it forces mediocrity, China tries to keep a tight rein on the ideologies communicated through cultural products. Works of modern dance require approval from a member of the party before they can be performed for the public, and certain topics such as the infamous 1989 Tiananmen Square crackdown remain taboo.

Korea

Once upon a time, South Korea’s national investment in the arts was a response to the United States’ cultural dominance. After the Korean War, arts policy in South Korea prioritized fostering national identity by highlighting the uniquely Korean aspects of culture. Article 9 of the Korean Constitution declares “states have an obligation to put forth effort in bequeathing and developing traditional culture and creatively enhancing national culture.” In 1973, Korea’s first five-year cultural plans stipulated new funding for culture, 70% of which was allocated for folk arts and traditional culture. Subsequent government administrations drafted their own national cultural plans, and by the 1980s the arts were more broadly included in goals to promote the excellence of the arts and foster contemporary art. By the 1990s, the advent of democracy shifted the focus to cultural welfare, where the arts are used to address social issues and enhance the nonmaterial aspects of life. Recently, however, its motives have changed. The government now looks to the arts to promote soft power, national image building, and economic growth.

Today, Korea has a strong arts infrastructure—arts agencies, university arts programs, performing arts companies, and festivals— that has surprisingly little visibility outside the region. In 2010, Korea’s central government spent approximately 5.7 percent — $56 per capita — on culture through its Ministry of Culture, about a quarter of which went specifically to the arts. The local government spends twice as much. In recent years, arts and culture in Korea is the one category of spending to enjoy an increasing proportion of government budget allocations, a trend mirrored in few other national budgets.

Korea also has a robust set of policies that support the arts -112 in all. These policies cover public art, the promotion of museums, arts education, tax incentives for businesses and individuals, and artist welfare issues. The country’s largest state-funded arts council and funding agency, Arts Council Korea (ARKO), was mandated as part of the Culture and Arts Promotion Act in 1973. The Public Art Promotion Act requires new large construction projects to allocate 1% of their total costs to public art. Corporations can claim higher exemptions for allocating money to cultural services.

With the rising popularity of Korean television, music, and movies abroad, the government has sought to capitalize on their profitability. South Korea’s overseas shipment of cultural goods came to $4.6 billion in 2012. Comparing cultural exports is a regular practice within East Asia, each country hoping to outdo each other and establish its own world-class arts, entertainment, and creative industries. While Korea enjoys relative success in exporting its cultural products within the region, and there is growing interest among the Korean diaspora abroad in cultural products and traditional culture, it also continues to work on spreading its influence to the States and beyond.

Brazil

Brazil has experienced rapid development in recent years. Like China, it has enjoyed growing economic power and attention on the international stage, but unlike China, its arts policies are not a reaction against the perceived threat of US cultural influence. In one way its motivations seem closer to Korea’s: attaining peer status among developed countries. It also has an increasing demand to keep up with its citizens’ purchasing power, as interest in consuming culture and the arts grows.

Because it’s not possible to unite all Brazilians behind a shared ethnic identity, a strategy used in more homogeneous countries like Korea or Japan, the government must take a more active role in creating a sense of shared identity based on other factors. It seems fitting then that following the 2005 UNESCO Convention on the Protection and Promotion of the Diversity of Cultural Expressions, Brazil has allocated funds to promoting social cohesion through the arts and culture.

In 2007, direct funding from the Ministry of Culture accounted for only 0.7% of the national budget, or approximately $420 million USD. But what Brazil’s government lacks in direct funding for the arts it makes up for through a series of innovative policies, including tax incentives. The Social Service of Commerce (SESC), among other things, is Brazil’s leading private financer of the arts. The SESC’s budget for programs in Sao Paulo alone is roughly equivalent to the NEA’s yearly budget. The organization’s funds are tied to a 1.5% payroll tax on companies that is virtually unopposed by policymakers and companies. In addition, the so-called Rouanet Law has allowed corporations to divert their owed taxes to finance cultural activities since 1991 and now drives about $630 million towards the sector annually. In January 2013, the government began offering small annual stipends for each citizen to use on “cultural expenses.” Employers foot the bulk of the money that funds the stipend, with individuals supplying the remaining 10% through their paycheck.

Brazil enacted a ten-year cultural plan in 2010, which lays out strategies and priorities for Brazil’s cultural development. The top priority includes using culture and the arts to help bolster Brazil’s image abroad. One of the others is a series of bills promoting culture and cultural exports, such as a plan to work with trade organizations in hopes of becoming one of the world’s top 20 cultural exporters.

Cambodia

Until relatively recently, Cambodia held prominent cultural status within mainland Southeast Asia, and many artists traveled there to train in their craft. But today, the arts struggle for rehabilitation and revival. When the Khmer Rouge took over Cambodia between 1975 and 1979, intellectuals and artists were targeted for purging. While 25% of the population that died during that period, an astounding 90% of museum workers, professors, performing and visual artists, and writers were killed, forcing the closure of many institutions. Many of the artists that survived subsequently sought to return Khmer arts to their former glory. When things finally stabilized, protection for the arts—both its institutions and practitioners—was written into the new 1993 constitution. However, funding for them did not always follow.

Robert Turnbull describes the situation in the book Expressions of Cambodia: The Politics of Tradition, Identity and Change: “While the Cambodian establishment frequently alludes to Cambodian classical arts being the ‘soul of the nation,’ it has been largely unwilling to develop performance culture in ways that are sustainable or give artists under its charge reason for optimism.” Government funding for performing arts, for example, is on average just 0.25% of the national budget.

Faced with limited government assistance, arts organizations often rely on foreign individuals and foreign-backed NGOs for financial support to rebuild a national identity and improve Cambodia’s image abroad through the arts. Cambodian Living Arts, one of the most active arts organizations, exists in part to “facilitate the transformation of Cambodia through the arts” and specifically, “to create an understanding of what it means to be Cambodian and to create a sense of unity and shared culture.” Amrita, Cambodia’s premier contemporary dance and performing arts organization, seeks “new life for Cambodia’s ancient artistic heritage” in part through networking internationally both to raise the status of Cambodian arts overseas and to find donors.

American influence in Cambodian culture has only recently become an issue, in part because of how reliant the arts are on funding from foreign sources. Cambodian artists and arts administrators are investigating ways to become more self-sustaining. Artists and performers, rather than waiting for acknowledgment from the government of their value, are thus demonstrating initiative in ensuring the arts don’t get neglected while the government focuses on other important development issues.

Bringing It Home

Ironically, the United States, whose arts infrastructure is envied around the world, devotes hardly any government support to the arts at the federal level compared with other nations. Even if you look beyond the National Endowment of the Arts and include appropriations to entities like the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, the Smithsonian Institution, and the National Portrait Gallery, the US still spends less than one one-tenth of one percent of its budget on arts and culture – orders of magnitude lower than some of the countries covered here. Even Cambodia’s investment in arts and culture dwarfs our own – on a relative basis, anyway.

While government support for the National Endowment for the Arts in particular has declined in recent decades, the truth is that Washington has never played a central role in the shaping of the arts ecosystem nationally. In part this is because of the decentralized nature of government arts funding: a recent NEA analysis shows that state and local funding for arts and culture outweighs federal support by a factor of nearly 5 to 1. And of course, the strong history of private giving in this country makes up for the lack of centralized support to no small degree.

So how has the United States been able to achieve such cultural dominance with so little government support? Certainly, the country’s economic and military might, developed largely without the help of state-supported museums and symphonies, are contributing factors. But it’s hard to ignore the role that the for-profit cultural industries, Hollywood in particular, have played in spreading American identity and influence abroad. US cultural exports in 2011 reached almost $40 billion, with over half coming from the motion picture industry.

Indeed, our examples here confirm that the private sector can have an energizing influence on the arts even when governments have limited capacity to invest directly. In Brazil, the government supports the arts through tax benefits that incentivize private investment; in Cambodia artists and arts administrators have taken the situation into their own hands and been active where the government has been silent.

In this light, the efforts of China and, to a lesser extent, Korea to explicitly build national power and identity through government investment in culture represent a fascinating natural experiment. Every year, the World Economic Forum ranks countries by international competitiveness. Twelve “pillars” including infrastructure, macroeconomic environment, higher education and training, financial market development, market size, and technological innovation determine a country’s rank. Each pillar matters, but each affects countries in different ways. According to the report, economies fall either squarely into one of three stages of development or are “transitional,” falling between them. The first development stage consists of economies like Cambodia driven by unskilled labor and natural resources, with low wages, and only the most basic commodities. Here, competitiveness depends on the strength of institutions, infrastructure, public health, primary education, and a stable macroeconomic environment. China is at the second stage representing “efficiency-driven” economies that thrive on manufacturing. Competitiveness at this stage hinges on higher education and training, an efficient goods market, mature labor and financial markets, technological readiness, and large domestic or international markets. Brazil is in transition between the second and third “innovation-driven” stage, where economies become more competitive by improving business sophistication and through technological innovation. South Korea and the US both fall into this third category, but interestingly, the US’s rank has been declining over the past several years. Will America’s cavalier attitude toward nation-building prove shortsighted in the end? Only time will tell.

Entry to the Kennedy Center for the Arts. Photo courtesy of Adam Fagen.

While living in China, I befriended a Japanese classmate who spoke no English. I spoke no Japanese, but we both spoke Chinese—and more importantly, we both played guitar.  Our connection to music served as the foundation of friendship. She taught me to play Japanese rock songs, and I memorized the lyrics to harmonize with her.  Years later, I stayed with her family in Hiroshima and learned Japanese well enough to correspond with her via email. Along the way, I also amassed nearly 24 hours of Japanese music which I share with others every chance I get.

This was one of my many experiences with informal international cultural exchange since first venturing abroad after college. International arts exchanges reflect centuries of artistic exploration and the possibilities of an increasingly interconnected world. They can come in a variety of forms: formal or informal, undertaken by individuals or organizations, funded by private foundations or the government. This article examines how the more formal of those models have come to exist and the ways they are supported. (Note: while not all cultural exchanges can be considered arts exchange, for the purposes of this article I will use the terms interchangeably.)

Funding and Context for International Exchange

International cultural exchange’s long history is intertwined with the history of trade and conflict. Since the end of World War II, formal exchange initiatives and policies in the United States have been directly tied to the prevention of and recovery from international conflict.

In 1945, Senator J. William Fulbright proposed that surplus from the sale of war property be used to support educational, cultural, and scientific exchange, arguing nothing could better humanize international relations and promote goodwill among countries. The Fulbright Program, the State Department’s flagship international educational exchange program for students, scholars, professionals and teachers, was born a year later. The program was designed to promote mutual understanding between countries and work toward meeting shared needs. In 1961, the Mutual Educational and Cultural Exchange Act led to the creation of the Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs (BECA) under the US Department of State to oversee government funded international exchange programs. Today, the Cultural Programs Division of BECA awards grants to individuals and organizations through 46 discrete grant programs, about a third of which are related to the arts such as DanceMotion USA, American Music Abroad, and smART power. Grantee organizations may also solicit funds from the BECA directly for international project expenses, or seek funding from an independent nonprofit whose pool of money for funding exchange comes from the US government.

After the fall of the Soviet Union in 1991, government funding for cultural diplomacy weakened. But a decade later, shaken out of a false sense of amity by 9/11, the federal government reaffirmed the diplomatic value of international exchange by nearly tripling BECA’s budget from $233 million in 2001 to $600 million in 2011.

Source: US Department of State
Figure 1 Government support for international educational and cultural exchange from 2001 to 2011

As government support for international exchange has waxed and waned since the end of World War II, so has private foundation investment, which has declined in recent years. The Robert Sterling Clark Foundation’s 2008 look at trends in international arts exchange giving shows a drop in foundation support from the heyday of the 1990s, when arts exchange funding made up 1% of total arts giving by major funders.

Despite inconsistent funding streams, a number of factors make international exchange programs more relevant today than ever before. Demographics are changing and international partnerships may help arts organizations engage new audiences. As the arts sector around the world professionalizes, we can learn from international counterparts’ approach to their work and vice versa. New learning theories and a better understanding of the creative process leave us primed to grow by crossing national and intellectual borders. To top it off, technology has made exchange across disparate parts of the globe easier. If a 21^st-century citizen is a global citizen, arts organizations must begin to see how their work can and does transcend their immediate surroundings and seek integration into a larger, richer community.

This doesn’t mean they have to send staff on the next available flight to India to bring back tablas for inner city youth. International exchange is only meaningful insofar as it aligns with organizational mission. With exchange encompassing a seemingly limitless range of activities, examining what’s being done and done well can offer valuable lessons. The examples below offer a sampling of approaches to international exchange, with varying objectives, lengths, and target audiences.

Models

International Collaboration as Mission

Some organizations’ missions give preeminence to international exchange and build all activities around it. The Silk Road Project, for example, has international collaboration written into its DNA. Musicians from over 20 countries perform with and compose for the Silk Road Ensemble. Blending musical traditions from different cultures, they experiment with the creation of new music for their unique makeup of instruments and engage artists and audiences in the United States and abroad by raising awareness of different musical traditions around the world. With funding from corporations, the government, foundations, and even Sony Music, Silk Road’s education programs extend the benefits of their multinational and multicultural focus to provide “a gateway to greater understanding of the world” for youth.

International Youth/Artist Collaboration

I first heard of the Battery Dance Company when the ensemble was in Bangkok last year working with young hip-hop dancers as part of the Dancing to Connect (DtC) program, sponsored by the US Embassy in Bangkok through funding from the Department of State. Through DtC, Battery Dance Company teaching artists travel overseas to work with young dancers for a week, collaborating on original modern dance choreography that culminates in a joint public performance. DtC has put on programs in 25 countries to date, and trains outside teaching artists in its methodologies through the Dancing to Connect Institute. International work has become so central to its work that the company is putting together a resource on cultural diplomacy. Funding sources for DtC vary, with the Battery Dance Company often receiving in-kind corporate sponsorship for airfare or accommodations.

International Community/Community Collaboration

While DtC asks professional dancers to work with amateurs, Museums Connect asks museums to facilitate exchange between their peer communities. A BECA grant program administered by the American Alliance of Museums (AAM), Museums Connect brings together museum audiences with similar interests in disparate communities using a matchmaking tool provided by AAM. The process is reminiscent of online dating: museums first submit an organizational profile and collaborative project ideas to AAM. All profiles are posted online, allowing each museum’s project coordinator to browse for institutions with similar or intriguing project ideas, missions, or audiences. Project coordinators then reach out to prospective partner museums; if both sides agree to the “match,” they craft a grant proposal focused on connecting their respective audiences around a topic of common interest. If funded, proposed collaborations play out through a range of practices carried out by the participants in pre-identified groups from within the museum’s larger community that include but are not limited to travel, shared online prompts to spur artistic work, conference calls, and virtual exhibits. After the infrastructure for collaboration is set up, the communities take over the project.

The matchmaking process is critical to Museums Connect’s success, as these ambitious projects, which typically run over the course of a year, could easily stress institutions with limited capacity, particularly those in foreign countries.

International Institution/Institution Collaboration

One standout example that seeks to build capacity and inspire creativity over a longer period of time comes from the Netherlands’s Tropenmuseum and Indonesia’s Gajda Mada University. The Tropenmuseum’s parent organization and main source of funding, the Royal Tropical Institute, specializes in international and intercultural cooperation, leaving the museum well poised to take on a number of international partnerships. In the case of Gajda Mada University, the Tropenmuseum is helping to establish a graduate museum studies program, not by building a satellite museum, or committing staff as permanent full-time lecturers, but by building local capacity. Dutch museum staff and local Indonesian professors collaborate over five years, with Indonesians taking increasing ownership of the program over time. The strength of this model is its potential to add value to cultural institutions across Indonesia. The Tropenmuseum’s extended engagement allows its staff to build long-term relationships in Indonesia and tailor its support to local needs.  

Considerations

We all feel we’re better musicians as a result of the Silk Road Project. We were taken to musical areas we didn’t know well, and have widened our own musical worlds. We have more tools with which to express ourselves. Most importantly, I feel more human, more connected to others. – Yo-Yo Ma

These examples offer entry points for even small organizations to mobilize themselves toward international work or think more globally in the creation of programs. In moving forward, arts organizations should keep a number of things in mind:

• Design exchanges with an eye toward mutual success. In order for exchanges to work, both parties must be able to clearly articulate how they benefit from the arrangement.
• Exchange requires resources. Any articulation of benefit requires a realistic picture of the level of engagement appropriate for each organization. Existing available time and capacity must be taken into account for fear of compromising quality.
• The impact of the exchange may not be uniform. Because partner communities and organizations start at different point from which “progress” is measured, each side may define impact differently.
• No matter how sexy the opportunity, exchange must align with mission. Underestimating the importance of institutional fit can derail even the most interesting programs.

The kinds of exchanges possible today extend far beyond the goodwill-building for conflict resolution and avoidance imagined post-World War II. As noted in the Rapporteur’s report on the 2012 Salzburg Global Seminar on public and private cultural exchange-based diplomacy,

 The more autonomous and intertwined global cultural discourse of our day [is one in which] exchanges are not a corollary of state power, however soft and benign, but where transnational cultural interactions can constitute a “third space” of vibrant creativity—a realm of curiosity, meaning, collaboration, enterprise, and learning that is not directly beholden to either political or commercial interests.