Nonetheless, as Cunningham (2006: 17) notes, Florida ‘has highlighted the wider economic significance of creative human capital [by correlating] population diversity, high-tech output, innovation and human capital’. According to Florida’s index, ‘Global Sydney’, ‘Melbourne Inner’ and the Australian Capital Territory are the most creative and internationally competitive locales in Australia. For his own part, Cunningham has developed a ‘creative trident’ measure of:

On this basis, the number of creative practitioners and the calculation of the contribution of creative activity to the Australian economy is far greater that official figures show, suggesting that there is greater potential for creative work to be recognised as part of the overall economy than is currently the case.

Detailed studies, such as these, need to be replicated in other countries and cities in order to test many of the assumptions underpinning contemporary arts and cultural policy. At a macro level, there is a need to interrogate levels of government spending on arts and culture via international comparisons and to examine the emerging forms of support for art and culture (cf. Florida 2005). Despite difficulties in making international comparisons (Madden 2004), McCaughey (2005) has attempted to compare Canada with other countries in terms of arts funding. Despite Mark Schuster’s cautionary note that ‘countries with smaller populations will have higher per capita expenditures because of their difference in size, not their difference in policy’ (quoted by McCaughey 2005: 3), figures show that in the Northern European states and Britain, expenditure per capita is much higher than in British settler states (Australia, New Zealand, Canada and Singapore) and that all are much higher that the United States. Countries with small populations seem more likely to commit to cultural funding than those with large populations.

It is also interesting to examine the operation and performance of different funding models. Countries with direct government funding, as opposed to arms’ length funding (via arts councils), tend to spend considerably more on culture. This suggests that countries (and governments) who adopt an ‘architect’ or ‘engineer’ approach to arts and culture have made the arts and culture a higher policy priority than governments who have adopted more ‘hands off’ nurturer or facilitator approaches. Where mixed policy models are adopted, such as elite nurturer or parameter-shaping models, higher relative expenditure on arts and culture can be shown.

Overall, McCaughey’s study reveals a gulf between governments who regard arts and culture as a core priority for government policy and expenditure (e.g. Germany, Netherlands, Austria, France and Scandinavia) and those for whom it is a footnote or marginal responsibility (Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Singapore and Switzerland). There is clearly an historical element here. Countries with a long tradition of supporting arts and culture have maintained support at substantially higher levels. However, even in countries with long traditions of generous government support, there is an emerging crisis as governments pull out of longstanding commitments. The arts and cultural sectors have been pushed to seek alternate sources of funding, such as sponsorships and partnerships, even in countries like Germany (Hausmann 2006), Italy (Comunian 2006), Austria (Hunjet 2006), Scandinavia (Lindqvist 2006), the Netherlands (Segers 2006) and Japan (Kobayashi 2006). Countries in the former eastern block are similarly affected (Obuljen 2006).

Although there is evidence that these strategies have produced the sought-after responses, there appear to be limits to the potential for an expansion of private support and the kinds of cultural organisations or activities sponsors will invest in. There also appears to be a clear relationship between the economic prosperity of a nation and the likelihood of securing sponsorship (Segers 2006; Lindqvist 2006). Concomitantly, there is less evaluation of the efficacy of expenditure in the higher-funding countries than in those where cultural support is regarded as a budgetary footnote or extravagance.

What does this mean for current trends internationally in arts and cultural support and likely futures? While traditional forms of arts and cultural support have persisted, they have been required to adapt to new conditions of governance, globalisation and changing patterns of cultural consumption which has, in turn, created acute challenges for arts and cultural policy making.