[LUM#13] It is through what is missing that we see the place culture occupies

[LUM Magazine] - Published on December 7, 2020 in Art & Culture, Science and Society

As a direct result of the health crisis, many festivals were forced to cancel their 2020 editions, causing significant economic and social losses for both the cultural and arts sectors and local communities. A study published last May estimates these losses at between 2.3 and 2.6 billion euros. Political scientist Emmanuel Négrier*, co-director of the study, explains.

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You published this study just two months after the crisis began. How were you able to complete it so quickly?
It’s a topic I know well, since I’ve been working on festivals for about fifteen years. In June 2019, my colleague Aurélien Djakouane—a sociologist—and I launched a new research project called SoFest, which focuses, among other things, on the socioeconomic indicators of festivals. When the crisis hit, the survey was far enough along to allow us to work on estimating the losses caused by the cancellation of the festival season.

How many festivals have been affected by cancellations?
From April through August, the total has already reached 4,000 festivals. You estimate the economic losses to be between 2.3 and 2.6 billion. What does this figure represent, and how did you arrive at it? It is an estimate of the negative economic impact resulting from these cancellations. The direct negative impact refers to all the expenditures that the festivals will not make. We know the budget structures of the festivals in our sample, so we took their usual total expenditures and subtracted the amount of grants, which, in the vast majority of cases, were spent to support the companies and artists on the program. Based on 4,000 canceled festivals, this gives us a range of between 580 and 811 million that should have been spent by the festivals but were not. And what about the indirect negative economic impact? This second indicator concerns the lack of spending by festivalgoers. Thanks to surveys conducted as part of SoFest, we know that a festivalgoer spends an average of 53 euros per day (on drinks, transportation, food, lodging, tickets, etc.), which must be multiplied by the total number of festival attendees—approximately 26 million. This brings us to 925 million that is not spent by festivalgoers. This represents a loss for the cultural sector and the region.

But haven’t we reached the 2 billion loss yet?
Because we still need to measure the ripple effects of festival activity. For example: a festival creates jobs for the local carpenter who builds the railings, who in turn hires people who spend money in the local area.

To measure this impact, we used a multiplier that has already been proven effective in the cultural sector, which led us to this estimate of 2.3 and 2.6 billion in economic losses.

What is the outlook for festivals? Will we see them disappearing en masse?
For heavily subsidized festivals, their strategic uncertainty lies in whether their subsidies will continue, and objectively speaking, I can’t predict what the state of public finances will be in a year, but I suspect there will be some ups and downs.

For those with little or no government funding, the uncertainty lies in ticket sales. People are returning to live performances under normal conditions. Driven by sheer desperation, some will manage to stay afloat next year, but what about after that? I’m worried about 2022.

Does your study also estimate the impact on employment?
Yes, a festival is also a human ecosystem that encompasses social and employment aspects. For this indicator, the study considers all individuals whose paid employment is likely to be at risk: employees, service
s, self-employed workers, and interns. This results in a fairly wide range, from 52,000 to 111,000 jobs.

You also mention the impact on people’s livelihoods. What’s the difference?
This refers to all the people whose livelihoods—whether paid or unpaid—have been completely wiped out by the cancellation of festivals. We’re talking about “festival-related activities,” which include volunteers and the entir
of people whose work begins up to four months before the festival—and we estimate that between 230,000 and 360,000 people are affected.

For festivalgoers, what does a summer without festivals in France mean?
We know from our surveys that festivals have become an experience that goes beyond mere artistic consumption. They’re like little republics because participating in a festival has a civic impact that extends beyond the cultural experience. That’s what we’ll be missing.

Will these festival cancellations have an impact on the 2020–2021 cultural season?
The Printemps de Bourges has been canceled, as have festivals in Avignon, Aurillac, Châlon…These are opportunities for producers, programmers, and artists to meet that are no longer taking place. It is this role as a marketplace—in the broadest sense—that is disappearing. It is through this absence that we see the place culture occupies—and, within culture, the place festivals hold… And we see that it is considerable.