Over the past decade it has become clear that the governance of complex societal problems such as climate change, biodiversity loss, increasing inequality, and polarization are suffering from a lack of imaginative capacity. Arts-based methods are upcoming in political science because they can disrupt dominant modes of thinking and open collective imagination through alternative ways of seeing, sensing, knowing, and engaging. In this transdisciplinary workshop we take two steps: we unweave the potential, risks and challenges of art-research collaborations in political science; and we collectively reconstruct new approaches to thinking about complex societal problems and visioning alternative futures.
The governance of complex societal problems such as climate change, biodiversity loss, increasing inequality, and polarization are suffering from a lack of imaginative capacity (Mulgan 2020; Ghosh 2021). Voters are disillusioned with a rationalized politics (Mouffe 2005; Dorren and Wolf 2023) that fails to offer shared and compelling visions of the future (Stacey 2022), or involve people in the process (Flinders 2012). In this context, there is a rising interest among academics, politicians and policymakers in ideas and practices that can provide new avenues for imagining alternative futures (Koole 2022; McManus 2005; Eskelinen 2020; Monticelli & Escobar 2022).
In this context, scholars increasingly argue that artistic practice and arts-based methods can disrupt dominant modes of thinking and provide alternative ways of seeing, sensing, knowing, and engaging with politics and word-making (Bloch 1988; Ranciere 2013). Art, it is held, can empower voices of marginalized groups (Leavy 2022; Mand 2012); challenge deeply held assumptions and power relations (Brennan 2018; Chambers et al. 2021; Sachs Olsen 2022); contribute to democratic development (Eisner 1995; Vervoort et al. 2023); and, as a result, transform social conflicts and power dynamics (Latar et al. 2019).
But there is a risk: art and artists risk being co-opted by and assimilated into incumbent modes of governance and understandings of knowledge. In this transdisciplinary workshop, we take two steps: we unweave the potential, risks and challenges of art-research collaborations in political science; and we collectively reconstruct new approaches to thinking about complex societal problems and visioning alternative futures.
1: What forms of imaginative and artistic engagement are missing from contemporary political spaces?
2: What rationalities for art-research collaborations exist and how do we make sense of their heterogeneity?
3: What is the potential of art-research collaborations to enable different forms of politics and governance?
4: How can art-research collaborations be institutionalized in academic and artistic practices and institutions?
5: What might be the spill-over effects of art-research collaborations for artists as well as researchers
1: Empirical experiences with art-science collaboration in the context of complex societal problems
2: Dealing with methodological opportunities and/or challenges involved in art-research collaborations
3: Novel methodologies in art-research collaborations that go beyond ‘traditional’ ways of doing research/arts.
4: Theorizing different expectations of what research might bring to the arts and vice versa
5: Reflections on the role of power, such as dealing with instrumentalization of art or instrumentalization of research
6: Reflections on privilege when it comes to the publics that become engaged through art-science collaborations
7: Opportunities and challenges involved in the institutionalization of art-research collaborations
