engleski

Socio-cultural reproduction of economic inequalities in independent cultural sector: fighting for the margins

This paper deals with the reproduction of inequalities in the independent cultural sector focusing on how socio-cultural conditions create economic inequalities and vice versa, how economic relations create socio-cultural differences. This, almost historical interplay of social, cultural and economic realms, structure rather firmly both the individual as well as the institutional laboring practices in the independent cultural sector in Croatia. Despite the continuing economic crisis in Croatia, workers in this sector have found a labor market niche for themselves, with ways to fund their production activities mostly through state- funded subsidies for civil society organizations (CSO) in the field of culture and the arts. Workers in the sector firstly self-define their work as well as the sector and then struggle over scarce financial, material and human resources, all in the attempt of maintaining presence (and their work places) in this marginal reproduction sector. These issues of economic inequality will be addressed on three levels: 1) the issue of regional differences of laboring in this sector that is built on the socio-economic relation between the capital city of Zagreb and other parts of Croatia ; 2) the gender differences among cultural laborers connected to typical work-family balance differences, but also to more refined gender creative labor imbalance ; and 3) the socio-demographic differences that can be interpreted as class differences or differences in social and cultural capital of cultural workers. Authors will show how these inequalities are not only created only within the sector itself, but also how they are juxtaposed with and reproduced from broader societal conditions. This paper is part of an ongoing research analysis of work in civil society organisations in the field of contemporary arts and culture in Croatia, which is based on mixed methods empirical study conducted in 2014 and 2015 and on additional secondary and statistical data. The scope of the primary empirical data entails two questionnaires (one on institutional conditions of labour in civil society organizations in contemporary arts and culture, second on personal labour conditions of employees in those organizations ; and 22 semi-structured interviews with leaders of the longest-running CSOs in arts and culture in nine Croatian cities. The secondary data analyzed came from the database of project applications from foundation that supports these CSOs ; and current statistical data on the socio-demographic of the employed in the researched sector.

cultural civil society organizations, labour conditions, precarity, creative labour, cultural work, gender, economy, demography, inequality

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