This book tells the story of how a regional Chinese theatrical form, Shanghai Yue Opera, evolved from the all-male ’beggar’s song’ of the early twentieth century to become the largest all-female opera form in the nation, only to face increasing pressure to survive under Chinese political and economic reforms in the new millennium. Previous publications have focused mainly on the historical development of Chinese theatre, with emphasis placed on Beijing opera. This is the first book to take an interdisciplinary approach to the story of the Shanghai Yue Opera, bringing history, arts management, central and regional government policy, urbanisation, gender, media, and theatre artistic development in one. Through the story of the Shanghai Yue Opera House market reform this book facilitates an understanding of the complex Chinese political economic situation in post-socialist China. This book suggests that as state art institutions are key organs of the Communist party gaining legitimacy, the vigorous evolution and struggle of the Shanghai Yue Opera house in fact directly mirrors the Communist Party internal turmoil in the new millennium to gain its own legitimacy and survival.

This book tells the story of how a regional Chinese theatrical form, Shanghai Yue Opera, evolved from the all-male ‘beggar’s song’ of the early twentieth century to become the largest all-female opera form in the nation, only to face increasing pressure to survive under Chinese political and economic reforms in the new millennium. Previous publications have focused mainly on the historical development of Chinese theatre, with emphasis placed on Beijing opera. This is the first book to take an interdisciplinary approach to the story of the Shanghai Yue Opera, bringing history, arts management, central and regional government policy, urbanisation, gender, media, and theatre artistic development in one. Through the story of the Shanghai Yue Opera House market reform this book facilitates an understanding of the complex Chinese political economic situation in post-socialist China. This book suggests that as state art institutions are key organs of the Communist party gaining legitimacy, the vigorous evolution and struggle of the Shanghai Yue Opera house in fact directly mirrors the Communist Party internal turmoil in the new millennium to gain its own legitimacy and survival.

The Politics of Urban Cultural Policy brings together a range of international experts to critically analyze the ways that governmental actors and non-governmental entities attempt to influence the production and implementation of urban policies directed at the arts, culture, and creative activity. Presenting a global set of case studies that span five continents and 22 cities, the essays in this book advance our understanding of how the dynamic interplay between economic and political context, institutional arrangements, and social networks affect urban cultural policy-making and the ways that these policies impact urban development and influence urban governance. The volume comparatively studies urban cultural policy-making in a diverse set of contexts, analyzes the positive and negative outcomes of policy for different constituencies, and identifies the most effective policy directions, emerging political challenges, and most promising opportunities for building effective cultural policy coalitions. The volume provides a comprehensive and in-depth engagement with the political process of urban cultural policy and urban development studies around the world. It will be of interest to students and researchers interested in urban planning, urban studies and cultural studies.

Looking at the globalization, urban regeneration, arts events and cultural spectacles, this book considers a city not until now included in the global city debate. Divided into five parts, each preceded by an editorial introduction, this book is an interdisciplinary study of an iconic city, a city facing conflicting social, political and cultural pressures in its search for a place in Europe and on the world stage in the twenty-first century.

Places, particularly cities, often strive to sell themselves to encourage inward investment. In doing so, the managers of these places seek to manipulate the interwoven cultural and historical attributes of their localities to create attractive images, ambiences and lifestyles. This is a contentious process involving a fierce battle between alternative cultural sensibilities and historical visions. Much of the existing literature on place marketing either provides a practical handbook of how-to-do-it, or an economic analysis of this new facet of urban capitalism. Selling Places focuses more explicitly on the cultural-historical context of what is being sold. Thus it enriches the economic picture whilst drawing upon newer arguments about the complex politics of cultural and historical representation.

Royce Hanson traces the impact of civic culture in Dallas on the city's handling of major crises in education, policing, and management of urban development over the past forty years and shows the reciprocal effect of responses to crises on the development of civic capital."--BOOK JACKET.

This book analyses the cultural politics of urban development in Gwangju, South Korea, and illustrates the implementation of state-led arts-based urban boosterism efforts in the context of political trauma and the desire for economic growth. The book explores urban development that is complicated by the recent history of democratic uprising in Gwangju, and it examines the dichotomy between cities as growth machines and progressive metropolises. Actor-oriented qualitative research methods are used to show how culture and economies can evolve from territorial conflicts. The author argues that the quest for both growth and social justice can coexist in intertwined ways and create urban development. Moreover, recent events in Gwangju, such as the May 18 Democratic Uprising and massacre, are shown to act as a backdrop for state-led urban boosterism and desire for economic growth at the same time as depicting a resistance to state-corporate marketing plans, which culminates in the eventual emergence of relatively coherent places-of-memory. These convergences and divergences are comparable to the urban boosterism characteristic of Western cities. The book contributes to the dialogue surrounding geography, urban studies, and postcolonial urban development, and will be of interest to academics working in these fields as well as human geography, planning, urban politics and East Asian studies.