Local arts agencies—arts councils, arts commissions, cultural affairs departments—are an essential tool for community leaders as they rebuild their economies and promote social cohesion. The nation’s 4,500 local arts agencies (LAAs) support, present, and promote the dynamic value of the arts. Through their partnerships and leadership, LAAs are building healthier communities through the arts.

The arts are fundamental to our humanity. They ennoble and inspire us—fostering creativity, goodness, and beauty. The arts bring us joy, help us express our values, and build bridges between cultures. The arts are also a fundamental component of a healthy community—strengthening them socially, educationally, and economically—benefits that persist even in difficult social and economic times.

In this paper the authors document regional differences in the approaches taken by 55 major U.S. LAAs to the dual mission of pursuing cultural equity and civic engagement and assess the policy implications of the globalization thesis. In making this assessment, they present a university-community partnership (UCP) model for augmenting LAA pursuits of the dual equity-engagement mission.

The shift to an era of man-made brain-power industries is creating the technologies that are creating a global economy.

This report resulted from the 100th American Assembly entitled Art, Technology, and Intellectual Property.

This paper explores and discusses the fairly recent phenomenon of cultural clustering
strategies in the Netherlands.