Applying Policentricity to Arts Organizations

Abstract

Polycentric governance attracts a great deal of interest in especially issues of collective action and ways to better manage common pool resources. Comparatively little research has looked at the viability of applying such models to arts organizations as a means to improve the sustainability of both the organizations and the art forms themselves. This paper will look at attempts by several arts organizations to employ at least some key principles of polycentric governance, and apply frameworks developed by the Ostrom Workshop to evaluate those efforts. Through this assessment, we learn how arts organizations can employ to their advantage characteristics of polycentric governance to improve on, decentralize, and engage in a broader stakeholder base for sounder decision-making, as well as broaden their engagement with the arts community itself. We also see how these case studies provide important lessons on the potential pitfalls inherent in managing systems of self-governance and challenges with oversight and cooperation that can result. Finally, these learnings are then employed to evaluate a recent effort by an Opera Camp at Indiana University Bloomington to create a more sustainable model for opera organizations through the application of principles of polycentric governance.