Cultural policy: Rejuvenate or wither

Abstract

In this professorial lecture Professor O'Regan explores the dual movement of embracing and challenging cultural policy frameworks. Cultural policy development is moving in directions which require cultural policy studies to transform itself in ways which take it beyond cultural and media studies as presently conceived. In response cultural policy studies is opening up to other “disciplines” including intellectual property, administrative and international law, political science, public policy, economics, sociology, art history, strategic management and international relations, gender studies, leisure sport and recreation studies, tourism and town planning. Cultural policy studies is getting as dispersed as the sites cultural policy making is taking place in. With this dispersion comes the imperative for diverse sets of disciplinary engagements. As culture’s web grows this will inevitably imply a greater fragmentation of cultural policy studies. But it is precisely in these diverse disciplinary engagements that cultural policy studies will be productively rejuvenated.