Far away from capitals: assessment criteria for cultural projects in public cultural policies

Abstract

The cultural sector is understood as a specific field (BOURDIEU, 1983), characterised by complexity, diversity and multiplicity of manifestations. In the Brazilian case, the labour of male and female cultural workers is associated with informality and intermittency (SILVA e ZIVIANI, 2021), not to mention precariousness and disorganisation of the sector (PRADO, 2017). In parallel to these realities, Brazilian cultural policy has, since the period of political re-democratisation, confused ‘cultural management’ with ‘funding projects’ (FERNANDES, 2019), leaving considerable gaps in the public policy structure. With the support of Reflexive Sociology by Pierre Bourdieu (1930-2002) on his approach to the 'field of cultural production' as a 'reversed economy', the aim is to understand the tensions evidenced during the assessment process of the Prêmio Trajetórias Culturais [Cultural Trajectories Award], related to the Cultural Emergency Law 14017/2020, popularised as the Aldir Blanc Law. In addition, a brief comparison is made with other instances of cultural projects and policies, such as the Lei de Incentivo à Cultura (LIC-RS) [Culture Incentive Law], the Edital FAC Artes de Espetáculo [Public Notice for Spectacles] and Edital Banrisul Virtual [Public Notice Banrisul] for Music. Challenges arising from the lack of conceptual clarity persist, especially to characterise cultural and professional trajectories, especially in the compatibility between the law and the evaluation of works, agents, trajectories and productions. Based on doctoral research involving the articulation of the categories ‘field’, ‘capital’ and ‘habitus’ (BOURDIEU, 1977; 1993), indicators are proposed to identify mechanisms for positioning, legitimising, reputation and consecration of cultural trajectories in the context of structural racism, with a view to new paradigms that contemplate, the specificities of artistic work and its interface with affirmative actions and social policies that include the diversity of cultural practices, agents, manifestations and expressions of the Brazilian cultural mosaic.