Subject: Fwd: entrepreneurial cultural worker View Full Header
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From: zana poliakov
Date: Fri, February 22, 2002 12:59 pm
To: Zeljko Blace
Priority: Normal
>Delivered-To: zana@c3.hu
>From: "Frank Hartmann"
>To: "Nettime-l@Bbs. Thing. Net"
>Subject: entrepreneurial cultural worker
>Date: Thu, 21 Feb 2002 21:39:22 +0100
>Sender: nettime-l-request@bbs.thing.net
>Reply-To: "Frank Hartmann"
>
>This is a forwarded abstract of the EU study
>"EXPLOITATION AND DEVELOPMENT OF THE JOB POTENTIAL IN THE
>CULTURAL SECTOR IN THE AGE OF DIGITALISATION"
>
>Commissioned by DG Employment and Social Affairs
>Munich, Cologne, Vienna, Barcelona, 2001.
>
>Exploitation and development of the job potential in the cultural sector
>in the age of digitalisation
>
>Up until recently, the economic and labour market aspects of the arts
>and cultural sector were of secondary significance in the welfare state.
>Culture was seen as part of social policy and was not considered an area
>which could or should be subject to "normal" economic criteria, since
>these criteria were interpreted as incompatible with culture. In the
>last 10 years, the number of commissioned scientific studies and
>political programmes on the broad topical spectrum of "Cultural Economy
>and Employment" has increased dramatically. Both the current discussion
>on the theory of culture and current policy are characterised by two
>processes which are independent and affect each other's further
>development: one speaks of the "economisation" of culture, on the one
>hand, and the "culturalisation" of economy, on the other hand.
>
>The cultural sector is characterised by a high share of freelancers and
>very small companies. A new type of employer is emerging in the form of
>the "entrepreneurial individual" or "entrepreneurial cultural worker",
>who no longer fits into previously typical patterns of full-time
>professions. Despite the unsatisfactory data situation, it was possible
>to carry out a practicable statistical demarcation of the cultural
>sector within the framework of this study. The most important
>quantitative characteristics of the cultural sector were ascertainable
>and were able to provide for an approximate solution. According to the
>broadest definition, there are currently 7.2 million workers in the EU
>cultural sector. This figure is significantly higher that assumed in
>previous studies.
>
>Continued employment growth in the creative occupations of the cultural
>sector is to be expected in the future since the demand for cultural
>products and services is strongly increasing, both from private
>households and from companies. Employment growth in the area of
>distribution will also increase, but not at the same rate as in the
>development of cultural "products". "Content producers" seem to be in
>greater demand than marketing and sales persons. Generally speaking, the
>rapidly increasing digitalisation of cultural products will result in
>"traditional" cultural media, such as books and printed matter, losing
>significance, while new media, such as Internet web sites, will come to
>the fore, also in terms of employment.
>
>The "digital culture" is the result of an interaction between
>"traditional" culture (content), the TIMES sector (technology) and
>services/distribution. The increasingly used term TIMES sector
>(Telecommunication, Internet, Multimedia, E-commerce, Software and
>Security) is used in this study to cover the whole audio-visual sector,
>i.e. the entire multimedia sector, including culture industry areas such
>as TV, publishing, and the music industry. The TIMES sector in the EU is
>characterised by very small companies. Only 13.2 % of the companies have
>more than 50 employees. There is a very high share of freelancers, with
>1.3 freelancers for every regular employee. In contrast, at 30 %, the
>share of women is very low. The percentage of women employed in creative
>occupations is even lower, and when it comes to company start-ups, only
>20 % of new TIMES companies are set up by women.
>
>Digital culture demonstrates enormous employment dynamics, particularly
>in the areas of multimedia and software. These two sub-sectors are those
>with the greatest demand for content and creativity and therefore
>represent the best employment opportunities for creative workers. There
>are currently approximately 1.5 million companies in the EU active in
>the areas of multimedia and software, representing a total of 12.4
>million workers. Assuming a declining annual growth rate over the next
>10 years from 10 percent in 2001 to just 3 percent in 2011, we can
>estimate 22 million jobs in the year 2011. Thus, approximately 9.6
>million new jobs will be created in multimedia and software in the next
>decade.
>
>However, the TIMES sector is currently already experiencing great
>bottlenecks of personnel on an EU-wide level. This shortage of qualified
>personnel represents the number one hindrance to growth in the TIMES
>sector. In digital culture, completely new job profiles and
>qualification content are presently emerging which are extremely
>interesting for cultural workers. The rule of the thumb which can be
>applied to this sector is that the entire technical segment, including
>technology, infrastructure, hardware and printing, will undergo a period
>of relative stagnation or even decline (with regard to both jobs and
>contribution to the value adding process), whereas all content-oriented
>i.e. creative areas of employment will continue to show high growth
>rates (Web design, advertising, publishing, media, education,
>entertainment, etc.)
>
>A large number of good practices in the EU are related to the new job
>profiles within digital culture and offer corresponding qualification
>measures. However, In the light of the enormous need for qualification,
>they are still no where near sufficient in number. As a rule, the
>outstanding good practices are organised as public-private-partnerships.
>Company involvement has proven its worth, but can turn out to be
>problematic, namely if companies place too high a priority on their
>demand for short-term returns.
>
>Digital culture has acted as an employment motor in the past, and will
>continue to do so in the future, primarily based upon the strong demand
>within the TIMES sector for creativity and content. At the same time,
>dramatic personnel bottlenecks can already be observed in this sector
>today. Thus, policy makers must better orient their instruments of
>employment policy toward this area, both on the European and national
>levels. Within the framework of European Employment Policy, there is a
>still a widespread deficit of specific information, communication and
>funding tools, especially in the area of training and further education.
>Thus, within the context of subsidisation policy, the economic sector
>with the best prospects for growth and employment is being extensively
>neglected, is not being sufficiently recorded in employment statistics
>and its needs are not being adequately looked after.
>
>http://europa.eu.int/comm/employment_social/news/2001/jul/digital_en.html
>
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