Networking the Arts – Social Network Theory As Appropriate Theory for Studying the Liquid Organization of Arts

Social Network Theory, together with semantic network analysis, is the most promising way to advance theory about the social organization of arts. The reason for this claim is twofold. First, the production of arts and culture is a bundle of various changing activities and thus a fluid process, as captured by the metaphor of liquidity (Bauman 2000). Many arts organizations are now understood as temporary entities that are neither strongly established in a hierarchical or bureaucratic sense, nor pursuing orderliness as a sign of efficiency. Especially, when they are in their emerging and most creative phase, they organize in a liquid manner. Social networks are prone to depict such dynamic organizations.

Second, the network principle is not only the epitome for a general “new spirit of capitalism” (Boltanski & Chiapello 2005) but this spirit has been prototypically developed out of the fluid, short-term, and project-oriented nature of artistic work. In the “gig economy” (Crouch 2019), artists are overwhelmingly not permanent employees. Creative, arts-producing organizations such as experimental theatre groups and music bands, or visual arts collectives, are projects with changing creative personnel and limited existence. Most arts organizations in late capitalism are not established institutions, although this is still a common view.

The presentation will present the theoretical foundations of arts organizations as such liquid social networks. Through a comparative view on already published empirical studies, it will also connect quantitative relational network analysis with qualitative semantic network analysis. This quantitative and qualitative hybrid theory of arts networks is a promising way of advancing the study of dynamics in organizing the arts.