The Social Cohesiveness Of It All
Not even a week ago I wrote an essay doing my best to explain the idea of 'soft power' and did my very best to try persuade anyone silly enough to read it that they should care about it. Especially if they were an artist or arts worker or even someone that frequents and engages with art. Which if I'm being biased should be all of you. That piece already needs a bit of an update, which is this. There will be an eventual follow up where I delve into what the fuck does 'social cohesion' actually mean and where does the idea come from and how there's nothing really cohesive about it at all.
For now though, here's a quick temperature check on where we're heading in response to Creative Australia's recent direction toward supporting social cohesion and the National Cultural policy review. Run don't walk, its exciting stuff I know but you should care or at the very least know about it. Your all need to be Gandalf or Frodo now and no you don't get to be any of the cool characters.
Arts fun and helpful for processing the world plus it makes you think and should 'enrich your life aesthetically' whether its beautiful plein air oil painting of some nostalgic vista you've never visited or a flaming pile of trash accompanied by some semi nude (or nude) performance artist. But then comes along the idea of soft power, and like Bilbo Baggins with the ring those in power begin to wonder why they shouldn't keep a little bit of that for themselves.
And for themselves I mean co-opt 'art' to try mold the world into a place of their liking. Like the snarling little Bilbo's they are. After all it would have been more socially cohesive had Bilbo been allowed to keep the ring. Had Gandalf not convinced Frodo and pals to run it across Middle Earth disrupting all those communities along the way just to get a couple eagles to fly them up to the volcano anyway.
To quote our current fearless leader elect, Anthony Albanese quoted form news.com; Crumbling social cohesion ‘causes me a great deal of distress’,
So, just this week Adrian Collette, the CEO of Creative Australia since 2019, announced that Creative Australia will increasingly look to fund arts practices that foster “social cohesion” and “cultural understanding”.
“We will continue with our in-principle commitment to the freedom of creative expression. We are not able to adjudicate on matters of personal opinions that are expressed but I think more than ever … we need to invest in creative practice that fosters and develops social cohesion in our country, because I think it is very directly being challenged in the circumstances (in which) we find ourselves.” said Adrian Collette.
Creative Australia, formerly Australia Council, isn't afraid of a little shooting itself in the foot style controversy as it tries to curry the favorable eyes of various Sauron's. From successive governments to the Murdoch Presses and various conservative philanthropic bodies and individuals. An endless hot coal dance that even seemingly the least funded of artists can navigate with more integrity and consistency than Creative Australia.
Not to bang on about it, but 'social cohesion' was used as a reason for unceremoniously revoking the selection of artist Khaled Sabsabi and curator Michael Dagostino to represent Australia at the Australia Pavilion at the 2026 Venice Biennale. Who after a massive campaign and pushback by artists was reinstated to the selection and is now currently showing not one but two works at the 2026 Venice Biennale, exhibiting at both the main exhibition and the Australia Pavilion, which is a first for an Australian artist.
I banged on about Sabsabi and Creative Australia's Trump style taco-ing because if social cohesion was used as the pretext for Sabsabi's removal from Venice, what does it now mean when social cohesion becomes the direction of unofficial Federal arts and culture policy?
In March 2025, arts think tank and lobbyist group A New Approach (ANA) released a paper titled 'Rebuilding social cohesion through culture and creativity'. Just weeks after social cohesion was used as the reason for Sabsabi's dismissal. Kate Fielding, CEO of ANA said in the paper the below;
"there is untapped potential in cultural and creative engagement to reconnect communities and rebuild belonging and trust, including within the cultural and creative sector itself."
While this is hard to argue against on face value and sounds wonderfully utopian, where does this leave artists like Sabsabi? Or more specifically artists from diverse backgrounds (see not white cis-het and upper middle class) that don't fit into our current ideas of social cohesion because our current society constantly works to erase or debate the value of those peoples existence in our communities. Let alone support their voices or their ability to freely and equitably express themselves.
Albo and the Australian Labor government, with Tony Burke as Federal arts portfolio minister, is currently in the early stages of developing a new National Cultural Policy, building on the disaster that's been Revive: A place for every story, a story for every place. The Aus Labor govt, referred to the Revive arts policy as a success on their page and I'm unsure by which metric they used to swing that high. The Revive arts policy was announced in January 2023, and has been proceeded by potentially the most tumultuous and fraught years of arts and culture in so called Australia since George Brandis had the reigns.
But don't despair! They are currently reviewing the policy and you can have your say! Now while I wouldn't hold my breath for much change at the very least they can't say they didn't know its been a fucking mess. I think we know where Aus Labor and Tony Burke stand on support for the arts, we know what current CEO of Creative Australia Adrian Collette would like to see and we know how Kate Fielding and the ANA are approaching their lobbying efforts to government in regards to social cohesion as well.
So I'd implore everyone to respond and write in the submissions how the past three years of being in the arts has really felt. Make it clear how Federal arts and culture policy pursing an idea as vague and ominous as 'social cohesion' is a terrible precedent for any government to set on a path to increasing censorship and authoritarianism. You can do so here in 500 words or less.
And to bang on about it one last time, Sabsabi was reinstated because of broad push back by the arts, the current direction of arts policy in so called Australia can also be pushed back on. Responding to this review is one way and increasingly militant and organised responses will no doubt be required in the future, but every opportunity to respond and interject is an opportunity still. So again drop your 500 words here.
LINKS:
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2025-03-01/creative-australia-senate-estimates-khaled-sabsabi/104993614
https://newapproach.org.au/news/rebuilding-social-cohesion-through-culture-and-creativity/
https://www.arts.gov.au/have-your-say/new-national-cultural-policy
