Excellent post and great responses. We had a similiar debate over this kind of story on my nonprofit fundraising blog. Several responses and back and forth from other bloggers:

http://donttellthedonor.blogspot.com/2006/10/i-could-not-disagree-more-donor-insite.html

Becoming MORE like a business does not necessarily mean BECOMING a business. I understand fully the reservations arts professionals have about swimming in shark infested waters. What it does mean, however, is delivering on increasing connections between the arts and their public through more than rhetoric. In my view, the adoption of a Project Management framework would greatly improve the operation of the sector as a whole, including funders, managers, artists. Project Management focuses on delivery and balanced evidence for evaluation. It makes explicit the value of the arts in a format that leads to sustained public commitment. Balanced evidence and accountability - quality and numbers - are understood by paymaster and public alike. Christopher Gordon's comments indicate that, sadly, within the profession we are some way from recognising that politician and public, in a mature democracy, actually stand for similar priorities. If nothing else, Thatcher's legacy shows that politicians can sense the public mood all too well. Blair is not doing too badly either: could it be that his 'social value policy obsession' rests on an increasing public outcry for access?

After years of experience on the administration side of the arts I appreciate all of your points. I wish however, that there was one more. Artists and administrators alike need to consider their audience and how they want to relate to that audience. What does this art form mean to the viewer/listener? Do we intend that the audience participate with this art? Do we want to distance ourselves from the audience or bring the audience in? There are many more questions and issues. At least you didn't reduce the audience to "bums in seats."

We are still making transitions from what arts creativity was and how the arts were paid for in a monarchy to how this works in a modern capitalist democracy. I do not believe there was more mass social acceptance of the importance of "the arts" from the twelfth century on up to the modern era. In fact art used to be made for patrons, not for the general public as a rule, and not via the patron's money for the good of the general public which is our present route. If anything, art for the public was meant to educate, not entertain, as a regular joe/sephine had no schooling at all. Patrons were rich. The Catholic Church as patron was rich. Arts patrons had the power not only to employ but to kill. The money to do and to make art came from a very few powerful and wealthy people whose self-interest it was to purchase great buildings, good church or dinner music, great portraits and interior decor, rich jewellery, and enjoyable entertainment.

I wonder what portion of all that activity we still call good art today? The point is, I don't think art was chosen and driven forward by arts managers -- creative or otherwise -- who knew how to manage "the arts" in society creatively or otherwise, or how to turn artists into business people, or how to write interesting project proposals on how the art would benefit the community, or how to pursuade the masses that they ought to like the statues in the town square or the King's latest entertainment.

The "masses" appreciation of art -- or lack of it -- was never a factor for the choice about how to give "support to the arts". The masses didn't count politically till the 18th century.

Somehow I see us now as still upholding the pre-democratic vision of what the arts are and do, without making the appropriate adjustments given that our power structures and political ideals are so very different. Managers are now separated from the money source, from the self-interest of the patron, and from the work of the artist, and therein lies one of the rubs. The other shift is the recent removal of the arts and the creative life from public education. As arts education of the people disappears, their ability to recognize and empathize with an art form when they meet it, disappears.

If we worry about the bottom line in arts management, we should recognize that it exists in social education, not in business practice, and pour every ounce of creative energy and funding we can into our schools to allow every single child in each of our countries to sing, put on a play, write poetry, play an instrument, paint and draw live bodies (no one will ever be able to blow up a body if they have spent hours painting a living naked person: this should be a core curriculum). Then we would have both democracy, general arts creativity, and great audience attendance.

Further agreement from this side of the pond in the UK. Points 4 and 6 in your alternatives list are crucially important. Under the influence of 18 long years of Thatcherism the arts in Britain were forced to value themselves primarily in terms of economics or regeneration. Blair's agents since 1997 have not abandoned this, but overlaid it with a 'social value' policy obession. Although the Secretary of State for Culture talks up 'artistic value' per se in her speeches, government actions and directives tell another story. The Arts Councils have broadly gone along with the government rhetoric, and thereby lost much credibility with the professional cultural sector. Other European countries are currently grappling with the same dilemma. Where the State is still the major contributor (particularly in relation to heritage) you can't ignore it, and you therefore have to add 'government' to your list of targets for clarification of purpose. Not easy, when they are also the paymasters!

I agree with Robert. Too many organizations think the term "nonprofit" is an umbrella that protects them from the world of finance. A for-profit business aims to have the input greater than the output every year. It makes sense if they want to grow. Yet so many nonprofits make it their goal to "break even". There is at times a mindset that says if they budget a surplus it makes them "dirty".

I forget the name of the speaker who mentioned this in one of Andrew's art admin seminars (if you're out there please take the credit), but perhaps the use of the term "nonprofit" instead of "not-for-profit" sends a subliminal message about finance. The terms do not appear that different, but take a close look and what do they actually say to you? (This use of verbiage was one of the favorite debates among the 2006 Bolz graduates.)

Bravo!

Too many artists feel that money is "filthy lucre" and take steps to avoid it, some perhaps unconsciously. In my view, money is not emotional. It's merely stored up energy, time, and influence. By having more of it, we're better able to marshal resources and accomplish our goals. To ignore the money side of the arts business is as foolish and narrow-minded as ignoring the creative side.

Anyone can make money by prostituting oneself. And anyone can refuse to make money by ignoring the business side of the arts. What's difficult is to maintain artistic integrity while generating enough income to pay one's bills.