Social Impact of the Arts Project

The Social Impact of the Arts Project (SIAP) is a research group at the University of Pennsylvania, School of Social Policy & Practice, in Philadelphia, PA (USA). We began in 1994 to ask questions and develop methods to explore the impact of the arts and culture on urban communities. Our research focuses on the relationship of the arts to community change with a particular interest in strategies for neighborhood revitalization, social inclusion, and community wellbeing.

Cultural engagement represents an important dimension of community wellbeing by building social connections within groups and across social divides. The arts provide a resource that people can use to make sense of the world as it is, to connect with collective memory, and to imagine the future. Neighborhoods with a vital cultural life also enjoy “spillover effects”—including stronger community and civic engagement; better health, schooling, and personal security; and economic revitalization. SIAP’s mission is to understand and document these connections—what we call community cultural ecology—and the role that public policy and philanthropy can play in encouraging them. To learn more about SIAP’s approach, methods, and research team, go to: About SIAP.

Since start-up in the mid-1990s, SIAP has been committed to open data and open access as both a research methodology and a dissemination strategy. Thanks to ScholarlyCommons, the open access institutional repository at Penn Libraries, SIAP archives—including methods and work-in-progress—are accessible to research, policy, and practice communities across the globe and free to all. We invite visitors to browse the Social Impact of the Arts Project Collections, listed below in reverse chronological order. The link to each SIAP Collection will access reports, working papers, and other materials produced by that project. All documents are downloadable in PDF format for public use with full citation requested. For a listing of additional SIAP publications under copyright, go to: About SIAP.

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Culture and Social Wellbeing in New York City (A SIAP Collection, 2017)

The Social Wellbeing of New York City’s Neighborhoods: The Contribution of Culture and the Arts, Mark J. Stern and Susan C. Seifert (SIAP Report, March 2017). This research report presents the conceptual framework, data and methodology, findings and implications of a three-year study of the relationship of cultural ecology to social wellbeing across New York City neighborhoods. The project was undertaken in collaboration with Reinvestment Fund, a community development financial institution, with support by the Surdna Foundation, the NYC Cultural Agenda Fund in the New York Community Trust, and the University of Pennsylvania.

 

Culture and Social Wellbeing in New York City, SIAP and Reinvestment Fund (Research Brief, February 2017). This research brief provides a summary of the data, methods, and findings documented in the March 2017 report.

 

Culture’s Contribution to Social Wellbeing & Neighborhood Vitality, SIAP and Reinvestment Fund (Policy Brief, February 2016). This policy brief is a summary of project rationale—why and how to measure social wellbeing—and its potential to guide policy toward more equitable and livable communities.

 

Social Networks and Inequality in New York City’s Cultural Sector, Mark J. Stern (A SIAP Working Paper, October 2017). This paper presents an analysis of the geography of program sites served by City grant recipients based on a dataset maintained by the NYC Department of Cultural Affairs and its interaction with the inequality of cultural opportunities within the city.

 

Understanding neighborhood change: An approach to assessing displacement risk among NYC residents, Ira Goldstein, Emily Dowdall, and Colin Weidig, (Reinvestment Fund, October 2017). Reinvestment Fund has used its displacement risk ratio (DRR) in several cities to gauge the gap between neighborhood residents’ incomes and housing costs. This paper applies the same approach to New York City but also considers its applicability to renter-occupied housing.

 

Using PUMS to Calculate Geographic Mobility in New York City, Mark J. Stern (A SIAP Working Paper, October 2017). In this paper SIAP uses census data drawn from the annual American Community Survey to identify patterns of geographic mobility common in New York City neighborhoods between 2007 and 2015.

 

Divergent Paths—Rapid Neighborhood Change and the Cultural Ecosystem, Susan C. Seifert and Mark J. Stern (A SIAP Working Paper, December 2017). This paper considers the impact of rapid neighborhood change on the cultural ecology of Fort Greene and surrounding Brooklyn neighborhoods based on qualitative study undertaken during 2016.

 

 

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  • Publication
    Culture and Community Revitalization: A Framework for the Emerging Field of Culture-Based Neighborhood Revitalization
    (2011-08-01) Stern, Mark J; Seifert, Susan C
    This summary flyer provides an overview of the publications produced as part of the Culture and Community Revitalization project. The SIAP - Reinvestment Fund collaboration was undertaken from 2006 to 2008 with support by the Rockefeller Foundation. http://repository.upenn.edu/siap_revitalization/
  • Publication
    “Natural” Cultural Districts and Neighborhood Revitalization
    (2009-06-01) Stern, Mark J
    In this presentation, Stern argues for a policy approach that recognizes creativity as deeply embedded in urban social structure and the importance of diversity (economic, ethnic, and household) to the social production of the arts and culture. Only then can we come up with strategies that stimulate a creative society, not just a creative economy.
  • Publication
    What do the Arts & Culture Contribute to Urban Life?
    (2013-10-25) Stern, Mark J
    For a panel discussion on "Arts, Culture, and Vibrant Cities: Innovative Roles for Arts and Culture in Growing Inner Cities,” Stern’s talk uses Philadelphia research to highlight the sector’s drive to demonstrate economic vs. social benefits of “creative placemaking” and the consequences for disadvantaged urban neighborhoods. The event was part of “Reimagining Cities: Building Resiliency"—A Full-Day Symposium on Challenges Facing American Cities—held at the Lyndon B. Johnson School of Public Affairs and Center for Politics and Governance, University of Texas at Austin, on Friday, October 25, 2013.
  • Publication
    Institutional Networks Serving Artists: A Look at Philadelphia
    (2003-06-01) Seifert, Susan C; Fairbanks, Robert P.
    This paper is a preliminary sketch of institutional networks serving artists in metropolitan Philadelphia based on interviews with 13 organizations from June to August 2002. The approach was to develop a “cognitive map” of the network of institutions that support artists based in the region. That is, what are the nodes and functions in an artist-centered network? What types of links connect these nodes or functions? What nodes and links are the most important? The study found that Philadelphia’s institutional network appears to operate, by and large, on a market model with artists functioning as individual “buyers” in an environment of limited resources and imperfect information. Some parts of the network, however, operate more on a service model for categories of artists—including many low-income groups— who because of race, immigration status, or location are cut off from the mainstream cultural system.
  • Publication
    Individual Participation and Community Arts Groups: A Quantitative Analysis of Philadelphia
    (1994-10-01) Stern, Mark J; Seifert, Susan C
    This paper presents SIAP's first attempt to develop methods to measure the non-economic impact of the arts. The best data available on individual participation--periodic surveys of public participation in the arts by the National Endowment for the Arts--provided a wealth of data on individual behavior and attitude, but the few attempts to link these data to larger social contexts focused on the economics of arts consumption. This paper uses the public participation data for one city--Philadelphia. Information on the arts and cultural behavior of a sample of 600 adults in 1992 was linked with databases on cultural groups in the city to examine the role of community context on arts behavior. The findings were startling. Simple information on the cultural environment in which individuals live was more powerful than traditional socio-economic variables like income and education in predicting participation in the arts. These findings, by challenging the narrow economistic perspectives that have dominated the debate on arts and culture in the city, suggest that we need a broader and more fine-grained appreciation of the role of urban arts and their social impact.
  • Publication
    Art and Social Change: AIDS Activism in Philadelphia
    (1997-02-01) Petty, Mary Stuart
    This study examines the social and political aspects of the AIDS epidemic through the lens of local arts and culture in the city of Philadelphia, asking these questions: What are the social roles of arts production and cultural activities arising in response to the AIDS epidemic? Are the categories of AIDS politics, such as treatment activism and prevention activism, or distinctions among infected populations reflected in cultural production? Is the concept of a “day without art” relevant only to those who count as artists and to their affluent patrons? How have the changing demographics of the epidemic affected AIDS related arts and culture? Does art work to communicate to the public information about the AIDS epidemic? Can art mobilize people and institutions for social change? As the study site, Philadelphia provides an opportunity to extend a social and cultural analysis of the AIDS epidemic to an urban area other than New York or San Francisco. And, while Philadelphia’s proximity to New York City affects all aspects of its relation to the AIDS epidemic (and to its entire arts and cultural scene), AIDS-related activism and culture are embedded in the city’s own history and politics and are certainly worthy of study on their own terms.
  • Publication
    Arts Resources for Children and Youth in Philadelphia
    (1997-04-01) Stern, Mark J; Seifert, Susan C
    This report, commissioned in 1995 by The Pew Charitable Trusts, presents findings of a study of arts and cultural resources for children and youth in Philadelphia. The purpose of the project was to examine access to and opportunities in the arts for young people and assess the strengths and weaknesses of the citywide system. The project used two perspectives to assess resources. First, the research team developed a geographic data base of existing nonprofit youth arts providers and arts in the public schools. This was combined with US census data to examine the geography and socio-economic context of existing services. Second, the team conducted over 40 interviews with cultural organizations and city agencies to understand relationships among different providers as a network of children’s arts resources. Appendix A lists the 229 nonprofit youth-serving cultural organizations in Philadelphia and identifies the 47 providers that participated in the qualitative phase of the study.
  • Publication
    “Natural” Cultural Districts: A Three-City Study
    (2013-02-01) Stern, Mark J; Seifert, Susan C
    From 2010 to 2012, SIAP undertook a study of “natural” cultural districts in three cities—Baltimore, Philadelphia, and Seattle. This report presents findings of two sets of analyses: a citywide analysis of the social geography and cultural ecology of each city and a set of case studies of cultural clusters within the three cities. For each case study, in the following seven neighborhoods, a statistical overview was fleshed out by qualitative study: Baltimore—Highlandtown-Patterson Park and Station North; Philadelphia—Callowhill/Chinatown North and South Philadelphia; and Seattle—Capitol Hill, the Central District, and Chinatown-International District. The citywide analyses examined the relationship of cultural engagement to social and economic change in the three cities. The case studies focused on the character and evolution of “natural” cultural districts and the challenges posed to their sustainability, including the role of cultural space. The broader goal of the project was to understand the dynamics of the community cultural ecosystem, connections between cultural ecology and community wellbeing, and implications for policy and planning.
  • Publication
    Understanding neighborhood change: An approach to assessing displacement risk among NYC residents
    (2017-10-01) Goldstein, Ira; Dowdall, Emily; Weidig, Colin
    The SIAP research team has sought to develop methods to assess the complexity of rapid neighborhood change in New York and other U.S. cities. Reinvestment Fund developed an approach to identify locations in New York City where the housing market has changed in a way that residents who have been in a community for several years cannot likely be replaced by people of similar economic means. This paper discusses their method—called Displacement Risk Ratio (DRR)—for identifying areas at risk of displacement (or the inability to replace a resident population over time) based on the gap between housing costs and household income. The paper identifies six patterns in neighborhoods with significant DRR Sales increases as a preliminary typology of change: 1) transitioned from majority black or Hispanic to racially/ethnically diverse; 2) remained predominantly black or Hispanic; 3) remained predominantly white; 4) Asian immigrant neighborhoods; 5) remained diverse; and 6) high residential development areas. The conclusion reviews the potential for use of the DRR method to assess neighborhood change in New York City.
  • Publication
    Philadelphia-Camden Cultural Participation Benchmarking Project: Presentation of Neighborhood Survey Results
    (2005-06-01) Brown, Alan S
    This presentation provides a summary of findings of a 2004 neighborhood survey of North Philadelphia and Camden, NJ conducted for the Benchmark Project. The slides summarize data on a range of activities, venues, and social context among adult residents of these predominantly low-income neighborhoods. Brown also outlines a framework for thinking about cultural participation based on "level of creative control."