Measuring the diversity of cultural expressions

Heritiana Ranaivoson, Senior Researcher, IBBT-SMIT, Vrije Universiteit Brussel, hranaivo@vub.ac.be

1. Measuring diversity – what for?

What measuring allows to do• “when you can measure what you are speaking about, and

express it in numbers, you know something about it” Lord Kelvin (1883)

• To measure may be necessary to address policies (e.g. Bernier, 2003)

• Article 19 – Exchange, analysis and dissemination of information of the 2005 UNESCO Convention:

“1. Parties agree to exchange information and share expertise concerning data collection and statistics on the diversity of cultural expressions as well as on best practices for its protection and promotion.”

The risks of measuring

• Objectivizing categories

• Getting a purely mechanistic view of diversity

• Goodhardt’s law:Once a statistic is created to address one problem, we tend to address the statistic in the simplest way, which does not necessarily solve the problem

• But there are other examples of qualitative / subjective concepts being assessed, e.g. innovation, biodiversity

2. What has been done so far?

A challenge addressed through various means• In different fields:

• Academic Vs Institutional (national or international)

• Different aims:• Research Vs Market study Vs Policy-driven

• Different time frames• One-shot Vs regular

• Different uses• Building Vs analyzing

A tradition of assessing diversity in the academic literatureSource: Ranaivoson, 2007

• A huge amount of research on diversity in the creative industries

• Hardly comparable• Different sectors &

methodologies• Issue of definition

         

     

General approaches: Sectorial approaches:

Baxter, 1974 ; Cowen, 2000 ; Caplan et Cowen, 2004 ; Seo, 2004 ; Van der Wurff,

2004 ; Paris, 2005 ; Flores, 2006.       

   

Sectors: Theoretical Models: Empirical Models:

     

RecordingBaker, 1991 ; Allain and Waelbroeck,

2006.

Peterson and Berger, 1975 ; Anderson et al., 1980 ; Rothenbuhler and Dimmick, 1982 ; Lopes, 1992 ; Chung and Cox,

1994 ; Alexander, 1996 ; Peterson and Berger, 1996 ; Dowd, 2001.

       

Video    Hellman and Soramäki, 1985 ; Elberse

and Oberholzer-Gee, 2006.

       

Movie     Moreau et Peltier, 2004.

       

Publishing    van Kranenbourg et al., 2004 ; Benhamou

and Peltier, 2006.

       

NewspapersGabszewicz et al., 2001 ; Gabszewicz et al.,

2002.   

       

Radio Steiner, 1952.    

       

Television Spence and Owen, 1977.Blank, 1966 ; Levin, 1971 ; Greenberg and Barnett, 1971 ; McDonald and Lin,

2004 ; Van der Wurff, 2005.

   

OthersRosen, 1981 ; Adler, 1985 ; MacDonald, 1988 ; Schulze, 2003 ; Moureau, 2006 ;

Adler, 2006.

Institutional assessment: The Case of the French Observatory of Music Diversity…

Source: „Mapping Cultural Diversity – Good Practices from Around the Globe. A Contribution to the Debate on the Implementation of the UNESCO Convention on the Diversity of Cultural Expressions”

To learn from the Observatory of MusicSource: Mapping Cultural Diversity…

• Its self-professed key principles:• Regularity• Neutrality• Free access to information• Coordination

• Other interesting features• Plurality of views• Exhaustive approach

• Missing and unclear• Definition of diversity• The means (budget and people)

3. How to define diversity?

Why is the question (of defining) important?

• A common basis is necessary for discussion

• A prerequisite of assessment

• Crucial to build and evaluate policies

=> A three-dimensional definition of cultural diversity

e.g. programmingby one channelover a period

: element, i.e. program (e.g. Ghostbusters, Stade 2)

: Category of program (e.g. Cinema movie, News Programme)

a. Diversity as a mix of variety, balance and disparity (Stirling, 2007)

Building a typology

Variety corresponds to the number of categories

A B

In terms of Variety B is more diverse than A

a. Diversity as a mix of variety, balance and disparity (Stirling, 2007)

The three components of diversity

Balance corresponds to the way the elements are spread among categories

A C

In terms of Balance C is more diverse than A

a. Diversity as a mix of variety, balance and disparity (Stirling, 2007)

The three components of diversity (2)

Disparity corresponds to the degree of difference between the categories

A D

In terms of Disparity D is more diverse than A

a. Diversity as a mix of variety, balance and disparity (Stirling, 2007)

The three components of diversity (3)

b. Supplied and consumed diversities (Van der Wurff

et Van Cuilenburg, 2001)

• Supplied diversity : which kind of diversity is proposed by the producers? What level? Are there diverse producers? Etc.

• Consumed diversity: taking into account the supplied diversity (and the audience’s tastes) is consumption diverse?

c. Diversity of producers/products/audience

Product, e.g. Content (or part of content)

Set of contents

Producer, e.g. Artist

Producer

Distributor

Selling point

Audience, e.g. Individual

Group of individuals

hranaivo@ensmp.fr

4. How to measure diversity?

• A diversity index Vs a set of indexes on diversity• A single index is more easy to use and facilitates comparisons• A set of indexes facilitates the use of incomplete data and allows to keep

more information

• Completeness and consistency (relative to the definition)

• Parsimony (i.e. simplicity of use)

• Transparency of the assumptions

• Robustness relative to the value of the parameters

• Not too demanding as for the necessary data

Properties of a good (set of) index(es)

Examples of indexes (Farchy and Ranaivoson, 2010)

Conclusion

• Cultural diversity as a consensual motto. Its definition and measurement should:• prevent misuses• give it some substance (a common basis for discussion)

• A need for empirical (and international) studies• Too few international reflections about the regular

measurement of diversity (e.g. KUL et al., 2009)

• The main debate is on the diversity of what

=> Importance of categorization

hranaivo@vub.ac.be

Thanks for your attention