Instroduction: "Arts Management: A Sociological Inquiry"

The Journal of Arts Management, Law, and Societyis, as its name clearly indicates,a multidisciplinary journal that offers an open stage for various perspectives anddisciplinary approaches. This manifest pluralism is not only rooted in skepticismtowards dogmatic developments within particular scientific disciplines; the linch-pin of this attitude has been the objective of this journal, i.e., to uncover and reflectupon the principal social characteristics of arts and culture. To use a Latin term,the arts areres publica, and the grounds for this public nature are multiple andnot solely detectable by one discipline. However, sociology is one of the majordisciplines accessing this topic for several reasons:
1. As vital forms of expression and articulation, the arts generate, promote,and communicate interpretations of our social surroundings; they createmeaning, shape representations, and are thus essential social phenomena.
2. The arts constitute individual and collective identities. Identities are sociallyformed and negotiated; this formation and negotiation includes criticism,conflicts, as well as processes of recognition and rejection, appreciation anddepreciation, or even vilification. All of this is reflected in the arts; the artscreate identities, and identities create the arts.
3. Arts and culture are interconnected with manifold everyday practices andprofessional artistic activities such as production, consumption, distribution,mediation, archiving, editing, and all kinds of economic transactions.

All these issues justify the view that sociology pays considerable attention to artsand culture. Extending this sociological interest to arts management is thus notsurprising at all