Conflictual cultural politics: unpacking local tensions in three Austrian cities

ABSTRACT

In this exploratory paper, we discuss local cultural political tensions in Austria’s three largest cities (Vienna, Graz, and Linz). Against the backdrop of COVID-19, which hampered, yet also created new opportunities to host cultural events in public space, we analyze large-scale cultural events (Vienna and Graz), and a newly emerging cultural policy theme (Linz). Drawing on 30 qualitative interviews with cultural politicians, administrators, cultural producers, and artists (2020–2022), situational mapping, and the analysis of media coverage, we unpack (1) agential conflicts that manifest in unequal access to funding and decision-making; (2) symbolic conflicts that variously instrumentalize culture; (3) procedural conflicts that problematize lack of transparency and collaboration; and (4) spatial conflicts that materialize in diverging views about safety, cleanliness, and ownership of public space between state and self-organized cultural actors. Ultimately, we argue for a conflict-oriented approach to cultural policy to grasp the interrelations between power, agency, and space in cultural politics.

KEYWORDS:

• Conflict
• cultural policy
• Austria
• agonism
• political difference

Acknowledgments

We would like to thank interviewees and background informants for their support.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Funding

The work was supported by the Österreichische Nationalbank OENB [18453].

Notes on contributors

Friederike Landau-Donnelly

Friederike Landau-Donnelly is a political theorist and urban sociologist and Assistant Professor of Cultural Geography, Radboud Universiteit, Nijmegen. Her dissertation focused on the political organization and representational practices of freelance artists in Berlin and local cultural policy collaborations. She designed the research project 'Agonistic Cultural Politics (AGONART)' and has been accompanying its practical implementation.

Anke Schad-Spindler

Anke Schad-Spindler is a post-doc researcher on the 'AGONART' project at the Department of Political Science at the University of Vienna. Her dissertation (2013–2017) dealt with cultural governance. She has been researching cultural policy, cultural management, and cultural education since 2006. Since 2017, she has also worked as an independent researcher, evaluator, and process facilitator.

Stefanie Fridrik

Stefanie Fridrik is a research assistant (Prae Doc) in the project 'AGONART' and a doctoral student at HFBK Hamburg, Department for Art Education. She studied art history and comparative literature at the Leopold-Franzens-University Innsbruck and the University of Vienna. In her dissertation project, she investigates mediation and exhibition formats of graffiti and street art in Austrian and German cities.

Oliver Marchart

Oliver Marchart leads the project 'AGONART'. He is Professor of Political Theory at the Department of Political Science at the University of Vienna.