Tending the Garden: Possibilities and Limitations of Developing Inclusive Environments in the Arts and Culture Sector

Abstract

Diversity, equity, and inclusion are increasingly part of public conversations about social change. With heightened awareness of the pervasive realities of societal systemic racism, organisations are called to reflect on their working practices and representation and engagement with diverse communities, both internally and externally. Our research study, based in two years of fieldwork at a not-for-profit arts and culture festival, investigated organisational structure and how the festival is run, with a particular focus on internal working practices. Our research investigates: what are the possibilities and limitations of shifting towards more inclusive working practices within an organisation with few full-time paid staff, relying on unpaid or honorarium-paid volunteer labour, as is common in the not-for-profit arts and culture sector? We draw on the concepts of organisational inclusion practices (OIP) from management studies and institutional entrepreneurship from institutional theory to assess the possibilities and limitations of shifting towards more inclusive working practices within this field of the cultural industries. Our findings identify three overarching themes that illuminate a series of tensions in fostering inclusion: 1) decision-making authority; 2) internal-facing concerns (IFC) and external-facing concerns (EFC); and 3) task-based organisation (TBO) and engagement-based organisation (EBO). In our study, EFC practiced with TBO by team members with decision-making authority constrained opportunities to develop more inclusive practices for the volunteer team. Realizing the goals and values of diversity and inclusion remains challenging because of the constraints of resources, labour, and output.