Measuring the quality and impact of arts and culture Trine Bille and Flemming Olsen
Introduction Arts and culture (i.e., theatre, film, music, visual art, literature, cultural heritage, etc. and related institutions and participants) have traditionally not been measured and evaluated in the same way as other sectors. The reason is perhaps that arts and culture cannot be ‘weighed and measured’: it is difficult to assess quality, and it has been difficult to see how, and according to what criteria, the quality, value and impact of arts and culture can be measured.297 There has therefore been a reluctance to conduct such measurements, and ‘evaluations’ in the field have mostly been limited to analysing the content and aesthetics of individual works of art from a humanities perspective. However, when public funds are involved, for example in the form of subsidies for cultural institutions and projects, it can be desirable to investigate the outcomes. The question is whether the public funds are used most effectively in relation to achieving the desired goals, or to put it simply, whether society gets the best and most arts and culture for its money – and thereby the best quality (whatever that might be). Our whole society is saturated with quality and impact measurements. The education sector, for example, has the PISA surveys that enable us to measure the quality and impact of teaching and to compare our education system with other countries’ education systems. The New Public Management trend in the public sector, including the widespread use of
297 A distinction should always be drawn between arts and culture. However, since this article does not deal with particular forms of art or culture, the broad phrase ‘arts and culture’ will be used throughout.
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