An Orc’s Plan and a Plague: Protest Against Hedy D’Ancona’s Kunstenplan in 1992 and Halbe Zijlstra’s Cuts in 2010-2011
Summary
In 1992, Minster of Public Health, Welfare and Culture Hedy D’Ancona advocated for the implementation of more market mechanisms in the arts sector, in 2010, Secretary of Education and Culture Halbe Zijlstra proposed cutting 200 million euros on the available budget for the arts. The arts sector protested heavily against these two proposals, but used very different arguments both times. In 1992, the arts sector agreed with D’Ancona’s legitimation of arts policy, maintaining artistic quality, but disagreed with the concrete measures she proposed. The arguments then focused mainly on those measures and why they were inefficient or unnecessary. In 2010-2011, the arts sector also disagreed with the concrete measures that were proposed, but objected even more strongly to the tone and the lack of legitimation and perspective. Quality was no longer sufficient as a legitimation of arts policy to the government and Zijlstra did not formulate a new perspective on why the government should fund the arts. Combined with the harsh and disdainful tone that was used, and the, according to the sector, disproportionally severe cuts, this lack of perspective suggested that the arts were an unnecessary expense. The arts sector reacted with more emotion than in 1992 and used ideological arguments to reclaim and reframe the debate about the arts by focussing on their meaning and importance.