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Building the Dream in a Theatre of Peace: Community Arts Management and the Position of the Practitioner in Northern Ireland

This article was requested by “Journal of Arts & Communities” Associate Editor Stephanie Knight for their special issue on community arts management, co-edited by Martin Beirne, Professor of Management at University of Glasgow. Knight and Beirne made the request following Jennings’ 60-minute multi-media seminar, ‘“No Conflict, No Drama”: Community performance and reconciliation in Northern Ireland before and after the Good Friday Agreement’ at the ‘Knowing Ways: Critical Learning in Art Practice’ conference event, North Edinburgh Arts Centre, 5-7 September 2011. The ‘Knowing Ways’ event was an interdisciplinary exchange, with a specific focus on human rights issues, which brought together international artists, researchers, commissioning bodies, community organisations, human rights agencies and practitioners of arts for social change. Amnesty International and Creative Scotland were two of the sponsor organisations. Knight and Beirne requested a rigorous analysis of the management issues identified in this seminar that would further engage the interest expressed on the day by an international group of arts practitioners, policy-makers and community development managers. Practitioners and managers found the issues of training and development, staff burnout, social context, funding agendas and bureaucratisation particularly relevant to their own experience of practice, policy and organisational culture.