The cultural ecosystem endangered

Many refer to the current crisis as a "turning point" or even as an "apocalypse" (figuratively or not, you choose). But if we want to believe in a future, we should not see this crisis as an end. The American Andrea Jones (Peak Experience Lab) and the Italian Sandro Debono (The Humanist Museum) suggested that these times can be seen as a "rite of passage". And every rite of passage, according to the ethnographer Arnold van Gennep, has three phases: separation, liminality and reassimilation. 

 

We are, as individuals and as a sector, still living the "separation", the phase of distancing the individual or group from an earlier fixed point in the social structure. This is the time when we are forced to cancel long-planned projects and begin to understand that in the coming months and years we must undertake profound changes in our priorities and structures. Many are still in denial, others bewildered. The world pulled the handbrake and we are still rolling over.

 

 

While many believe that the cultural sector has always been familiar with crises, what we are living in is different. The COVID-19 pandemic threatens the sector not only in its way of subsisting, but above all in its way of existing. Collectivity, presence, and conviviality are central to the creation and distribution of most cultural products. For this reason, institutions, events, and artistic programs were the first to be suspended and will probably be the last to fully work again. 

 

In just some weeks of social isolation, the impacts for the sector are already tremendous. According to UNESCO, "the pandemic has impacted the entire creative value chain - creation, production, distribution, and access - and considerably weakened the professional, social and economic status of artists and cultural professionals.” Established institutions as well as entrepreneurs and small- and medium-sized enterprises are being challenged. Artists, freelancers, part-timers, and gig workers are especially vulnerable, left with limited to no access to conventional social protection mechanisms.

 

Several analyses, texts and debates about the culture sector in the midst of the crisis have used the term "culture ecosystem", bringing up again the tendency, which gained strength in the early 2000s, to think about the cultural sector in ecological terms. Amidst the current crisis, it is very pertinent to take up the idea of culture as ecology or as an organism rather than as a mechanism (John Holden (2015), The Ecology of Culture). The ecosystem of culture, which globally already showed signs of imbalance, now seems to be in fact threatened.

 

But will everyone be hit equally? In an interview in March, Brazilian epidemiologist Attila Iamarino used natural disasters as an example to talk about the different ways in which the pandemic will reach developed and developing countries: In early 2010, with an interval of only one month, two strong earthquakes struck Haiti and Chile. Chile's earthquake, of magnitude 8.8 on the Richter scale, was proportionally 500 times stronger than the 7.0-magnitude Haitian earthquake the previous month. However, Haiti recorded about 200.000 deaths, compared to approximately 1.000 in Chile. In addition, Haiti, which already had extreme poverty rates, suffers to this day - ten years later - with the structural, economic and health consequences of that tragedy. If this pandemic is seen as an earthquake, we will have vastly different consequences and recovery processes in different parts of the world. 

 

The same applies to cultural ecosystems. Within the same country and even within the very diverse creative and cultural sector we will have several Chiles and several Haitis. The performing arts will probably suffer more lasting effects than museums, for example. Game developers may have more job opportunities than mediators and art educators. Urban centers will have their cultural offer less impacted than small towns. In any scenario, however, it is likely that the cultural sector in the so-called Global South will take much longer to recover.

 

 

We cannot foresee the scale of an earthquake, but in general, the predictions for the world during and after-COVID-19 are not encouraging. In addition to irreparable human losses, we will have to live with the aftermath of a probable global recession and, in more fragile democracies, with other collateral risks, such as strengthening nationalism, authoritarianism and violence. In a scenario that could take at least 18 months until the creation of a vaccine, the cultural sector in all countries will face a significant reduction and reorganization in its way of functioning. 

 

The crisis will be even more acute in countries with immense challenges. Let´s take Brazil as example. Despite its great cultural diversity and the power of the creative sector, the country was already suffering from the effects of a far-right agenda, with the extinction of federal cultural bodies, investment cuts, censorship of cultural projects and defamation of the artistic class. Even before this political changes, the cultural sector already suffered from older problems, such as extreme dependence and a decline in public funding, a lack of autonomy, a high degree of bureaucracy in cultural organizations, strong concentrations of investments and infrastructure in the main cities and regions of the country, a low degree of internal organization, corruption and a low state of advocacy, among others. Additionally, successful experiences of management innovation and advances in cultural policies have suffered a strong discontinuity in recent years.

 

For this set of characteristics, present on a larger or smaller scale in many other countries, the Brazilian case can be useful to imagine the impact of the pandemic on other "fragile cultural ecosystems" in different countries.

 

Considering the parts of the world that tend to be hit more hardly by this pandemic, it is possible to glimpse some of the consequences for the cultural sector in the following spheres: 

 

 

It is important to highlight that the following projections are mostly imagined based on urban centers and from the point of view of artistic organizations of different sizes. Most of the impacts mentioned are negative, though I also believe that that the crisis can accelerate some necessary transformations (that will be the focus of a next article of this series). But for now, all positive outcomes are still in the realm of hope. 

 

 

The pandemic will have serious medium and long-term impacts for the creation and distribution of arts and culture. According to UNESCO, the diversity of cultural expressions around the world is mostly at stake. With the production chain affected, less developed countries will be increasingly dependent on foreign cultural products. Peripheries and small towns, independent artistic groups and grassroot arts will be further damaged.

 

Among other serious consequences, what we can predict is less cultural products and fewer stages. We face the real risk of bankruptcy and closing of cultural venues, especially theaters, cinemas, concert halls and independent cultural centers of medium and small size, as well as small companies in the creative sector, with emphasis on audiovisual producers, concerts and events. The building of new facilities, as well as renovation projects of cultural heritage, may be interrupted. Without rehearsals and possibilities for public performances and tours, independent theater, dance, and music groups may become extinct. We will also see a drastic reduction in tours, co-productions and international cooperation and artistic residencies by limiting the movement of groups and artists between countries. Museums and galleries will suffer from restrictions to the circulation and loan of works of art internationally.

 

Even after the peak (or peaks) of COVID-19, it is likely that we will have a general fear on the side of the audiences of indoor activities or a high concentration of people. This will result in the impossibility of holding major events and a restriction of the circulation of cultural products, with consequent damage to agents from inside and outside the cultural sector.

 

 

The impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic will strongly affect an irreplaceable part of the cultural chain: people. In addition to the risk of spreading the disease, many cultural professionals will be impacted by lost revenue or unemployment in a sector that will have a slow recovery. As one of the consequences, we can imagine a process of "brain drain”, e.g. a loss of human capital, as artists, technicians and specialized professionals will be forced to abandon the cultural sector. Members of grassroots arts and immaterial heritages groups deserve special attention. We also face risk of an early loss of talents, with dropouts of students from courses related to culture and arts.

 

The need for resource cuts can lead cultural initiatives to accelerate automation processes, with a layoff in service teams (ticket offices, indicators, guides, and mediators) and their replacement by digital solutions. The reduction of teams can also lead to a return to "generalism", with the search for more versatile professionals with more general skills who can perform multiple functions. In countries such as Brazil, which has only been able to train specialized professionals in different artistic languages and in arts management for a few decades, this can mean a huge setback.  

 

Much has been said about a positive side of quarantine: a change in the way many organizations and projects work, with the incorporation of home office and flexibility in workload. The other side of digital work is burnout. Many people report working much harder now than before, creating emergency plans, or finishing projects in reduced deadlines and in conditions that are not ideal. Mental health issues should therefor also be considered by organizations. 

 

 

The news about the unlocking of museums and cultural institutions in some countries, including Germany, although positive, should be taken a closer look. The reopening is still gradual and the required health protocols can be an immense challenge for most cultural institutions, not only in developing countries. The protocols under construction include, for example, reduced visitor´s capacity, strict hygiene standards on site, including recommendation of temperature measurement and supply of masks and gel alcohol in all its spaces. In addition, cultural spaces have an increased cost with outsourced services, especially cleaning, to meet sanitary conditions and ensure public safety.

 

It is important to note that unlocking strategies do not reach all types of institutions. Theaters and cinemas, for example, are not included in the first stages of reopening in most countries. In addition, all organizations face the same question yet unanswered: When will the public feel safe again - or will it again have resources - to visit cultural spaces? Reopen the doors maybe not enough. By now, the high effort is often contrasted by low visitor numbers, as initial experiences from Germany show, so that expenditure far exceeds revenue. Therefore, when cultural events happen again, we may have a growth in event cancellation insurance (both between artists and contractors and between promoters and the public). 

 

As a consequence of the crisis, it is possible to imagine an expressive decline in audiences followed by increased cultural exclusion, both because of the general impoverishment of the population and the limitations that will be imposed for access to museums, cultural spaces and live shows. Depending on the duration of the pandemic, we may also loose future audiences: education and outreach activities - which have never been a priority in most Brazilian institutions - may cease to exist or gain an even more secondary role. At the other end, the older or members of risk groups, even if faithful, will be more afraid to return to cultural spaces.

 

 

The COVID-19 pandemic will have unforeseen economic consequences, with a high risk of a global recession (which may affect developing countries much more severely). Lack of resources is not exactly new to many cultural organizations, but now they will have to face the corrosion of their business models with reduction and possible permanent loss of public funding, sponsors and donors. This is the tsunami that will follow the earthquake.

 

Rightly, funding is the focus of public authorities' actions - those that have acted - and advocacy campaigns in several countries. People and organizations need to survive. In Brazil, we have seen, both at the federal level and in most states and cities, little or no specific action by the government, especially regarding financial measures for companies and cultural professionals (including the wider range of professionals besides artists). In Brazil and other countries where the sector relies heavily on public funding, organizations and cultural spaces are unlikely to cease to exist at all, but they will have to face even greater budget cuts, reduction of teams and projects. Private organizations and community cultural projects though will be deeply affected. Donations of individuals and foundations may also have an expressive decline, as they will feel compelled to donate to more urgent causes. (By the time of this publication, Brazilians were expecting the approval a "Cultural Emergency Law”, unblocking resources from National Cultural Fund. If approved, the strategies and mechanisms for distributing these funds nationally will remain a great challenge.) 

 

 

The confinement of much of the global population has provoked a "digital diaspora of the arts": an unplanned and mass migration of content and cultural experiences to the digital environment. Although this digital impulse is happening in several countries, its extent, effectiveness and legacy will be distributed unequally among different sectors and territories. More monetized sectors and more technologically developed countries will tend to benefit more from digital possibilities. For these, the crisis will serve as an opportunity to accelerate ongoing digital transformations and foster the development of new technologies production and consumption.

 

Among the possible consequences after this initial boom, we can imagine a decrease in the supply and consumption of part of digital cultural products due to the saturation of the audience, difficulty in monetizing digital actions and legal risks that can be brought by a relaxation of copyrights. Social networks will undoubtedly be favored with their consolidation as the main means of advertising and interaction between artists and the public.

 

The bigger cultural organizations will have a greater demand for investments in technology professionals and services. Even when the diaspora passes, it is likely that digital products will cease to be accessories but instead become an integral part of cultural projects. This will leave a lot of organizations with little digital maturity or infrastructure far behind. According to UNESCO, the other side of the "digital push”, will be an even bigger "digital gap", exacerbating the lack of access to culture by vulnerable groups already suffering from unequal access to technology.

 

 

During and after the pandemic, the cultural sector will see the worsening of another type of crisis: a "crisis of relevance", as coined by Brazilian public policy expert Claudia Toni. Although the crisis has by now underlined the importance of art for both distraction or mental health, in a scenario of resource scarcity it will be difficult to convince politicians and the population to invest more money in culture. In addition, the overwhelming majority of cultural organizations in Brazil, due to their management and budget limitations, are paralyzed. Those artistic segments and its products, which are already considered elitist, may be questioned about their relevance and need, shaking markets considered stable and profitable.

 

On the other hand, necessity brought together different segments and agents of culture, in an unprecedented amount of advocacy actions and an increasing pressure for responses from the public authorities. The cultural sector, in Brazil and other countries, pays a high price for not having invested with constancy and seriousness in data and impact research. It is much more difficult to defend arts and culture without proving the size and importance of the sector - and not just economically. 

 

 

If culture is an ecosystem facing this disaster, we must focus first on the most important aspects: survival of people and organizations. After this first phase, we must fight to mitigate the avoidable consequences within an inevitable tragedy. 

 

Considering inequalities between sectors and countries, the greatest risk would be, in the words of Sandro Debono,  a future based on "survival of the fittest" (larger, more established and most profitable institutions or parts of the cultural industries). Therefore, one questions should be: How can sectors and countries that are less affected help others? How can networks of cooperation and solidarity be created that overcome geographical barriers? And from the point of view of public policies, how can we prevent this crisis from further deepening the inequality of access to culture among vulnerable populations? Our actions and attitudes at this time will define the future of the cultural ecosystem.

 

The surviving cultural organizations will face the challenge of not only saving and restoring themselves but participating in the salvation and restoration of the cultural sector and society as a whole, starting with their cities and communities. Many cultural organizations may soon be forced to radically review or change their missions, organizational structures, and operating and financing models without being prepared for it. If the pandemic is a rite of passage, before the ecosystem is renewed, we will enter the phase following separation: liminality. The next article will deal precisely with some of the knowledge, tools and reflections that can be useful for this moment of transformation.