“a fascinating, thorough and expertly argued discussion of the modes and practices of cultural policy in an increasingly globalized and neoliberal world.” European Journal of Communication Rethinking Cultural Policy addresses issues concerning culture, economy and power in the age of new-liberal globalization. It examines how public cultural policies have been rationalized in the past and how they are being rethought. Arguing that the study of culture and policy should not be confined to prevailing governmental agendas, the book offers a distinctive and independent analysis of cultural policy. The book examines a wide range of issues in cultural policy and blends a close reading of key theories with case studies. Topics covered include: Branding culture and exploitation The state, market and civil society How visitor attractions such as London's Millennium Dome are used for national aggrandizement and corporate business purposes Cultural development, diversity and ecological tourism in poorer parts of the world This is the ideal introduction to contemporary cultural policy for undergraduate students in culture and media studies, sociology of culture, politics, arts administration and cultural management courses, as well as postgraduates and researchers.

Taking a critical look at the politics of American culture in the wake of the 2001 terrorist attacks, contributors offer a multi-disciplinary approach in their examination of how our existing cultural patterns, have shaped our response to it.

Cultural policy intersects with political, economic, and socio-cultural dynamics at all levels of society, placing high and often contradictory expectations on the capabilities and capacities of the media, the fine, performing, and folk arts, and cultural heritage. These expectations are articulated, mobilised and contested at – and across – a global scale. As a result, the study of cultural policy has firmly established itself as a field that cuts across a range of academic disciplines, including sociology, cultural and media studies, economics, anthropology, area studies, languages, geography, and law. This Routledge Handbook of Global Cultural Policy sets out to broaden the field’s consideration to recognise the necessity for international and global perspectives. The book explores how cultural policy has become a global phenomenon. It brings together a diverse range of researchers whose work reveals how cultural policy expresses and realises common global concerns, dominant narratives, and geopolitical economic and social inequalities. The sections of the book address cultural policy’s relation to core academic disciplines and core questions, of regulations, rights, development, practice, and global issues. With a cross-section of country-by-country case studies, this comprehensive volume is a map for academics and students seeking to become more globally orientated cultural policy scholars.

Bhikhu Parekh argues for a pluralist perspective on cultural diversity. Writing from both within the liberal tradition and outside of it as a critic, he challenges what he calls the "moral monism" of much of traditional moral philosophy, including contemporary liberalism--its tendency to assert that only one way of life or set of values is worthwhile and to dismiss the rest as misguided or false. He defends his pluralist perspective both at the level of theory and in subtle nuanced analyses of recent controversies. Thus, he offers careful and clear accounts of why cultural differences should be respected and publicly affirmed, why the separation of church and state cannot be used to justify the separation of religion and politics, and why the initial critique of Salman Rushdie (before a Fatwa threatened his life) deserved more serious attention than it received. Rejecting naturalism, which posits that humans have a relatively fixed nature and that culture is an incidental, and "culturalism," which posits that they are socially and culturally constructed with only a minimal set of features in common, he argues for a dialogic interplay between human commonalities and cultural differences. This will allow, Parekh argues, genuinely balanced and thoughtful compromises on even the most controversial cultural issues in the new multicultural world in which we live.

This insightful book reappraises how traditional high culture attractions have been supplemented by popular culture events, contemporary creativity and everyday life through inventive styles of tourism. Greg Richards draws on over three decades of research to provide a new approach to the topic, combining practice and interaction ritual theories and developing a model of cultural tourism as a social practice.

Rethinking Popular Culture presents some of the most important current scholarship analyzing popular culture. Drawing upon recent developments in cultural theory and exciting new methods of critical analysis, the essays in this volume break down disciplinary boundaries and offer fresh insight into popular culture.

Experimenting with new ways of looking at the contexts, subjects, processes and multiple political stances that make up life at the margins, this book provides a novel source for a critical rethinking of marginalisation. Drawing on post-colonialism and critical assemblage thinking, the rich ethnographic works presented in the book trace the assemblage of marginality in multiple case-studies encompassing the Global North and South. These works are united by the approach developed in the book, characterised by the refusal of a priori definitions and by a post-human and grounded take on the assemblage of life. The result is a nuanced attention to the potential expressed by everyday articulations and a commitment to produce a processual, vitalist and non-normative cultural politics of the margins. The reader will find in this book unique challenges to accepted and authoritative thinking, and provides new insights into researching life at the margins.