Rethinking the social impacts of the arts

The paper presents a critical discussion of the current debate over the social impacts of the arts in the UK. It argues that the accepted understanding of the terms of the debate is rooted in a number of assumptions and beliefs that are rarely questioned. The paper goes on to present the interim findings of a three‐year research project, which aims to rethink the social impact of the arts, with a view to determining how these impacts might be better understood. The desirability of a historical approach is articulated, and a classification of the claims made within the Western intellectual tradition for what the arts “do” to people is presented and discussed

The unacknowledged legacy

This paper presents a critical discussion of the treatment of mimetic art, and particularly poetry and the theatre, in the work of the Athenian philosopher Plato (427-347 BC). It centres on Plato's discussion of the corrupting powers of the arts in the Republic, and the implications that his fierce attack on poetry and theatre have for his construction of the ideal polity. The legacy of Platonic ideas in later elaborations of the corrupting power of the arts is discussed. Furthermore, the paper investigates the relationship between current debates on cultural policy and the Platonic idea that the transformative powers of the arts ought to be harnessed by the state to promote a just society. The conclusion thus reached is that “instrumental cultural policy”, rather then being a modern invention, was in fact first theorized precisely in Plato's Republic