Cultural Policy and Place Promotion: Swansea and Dylan Thomas
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Geoforum 34 (2003) 249–266 www.elsevier.com/locate/geoforum Cultural policy and place promotion: Swansea and Dylan Thomas Helen Watkins a,1, David Herbert b,* a Department of Geography, University of British Columbia, 1984 West Mall, Vancouver, Canada V6T 1Z2 b Department of Geography, University of Wales Swansea, Singleton Park, Swansea SA2 8PP, UK Received 22 January 2001; received in revised form 26 July 2002 Abstract As former industrial cities have experienced radical changes to the bases of their economies, the imperatives of finding new roles and functions has often led to the adoption of cultural policies. These are diverse and partial but have become part of place promotion policies designed to attract visitors and investors. The connection with a literary figure offers one exploitable quality and this paper explores the adoption of Dylan Thomas, poet and writer, as an icon for Swansea. What emerges is the existence of a diversity of interested individuals and groups, who start from different positions but work towards a common goal. The tensions about the life and works of the poet, evident over the 50 years since his death are still there but the key players, including the City and County of Swansea, are finding ways of reconciling their differences in the ÔproductionÕ of Dylan Thomas. This use of a writer and his local connections forms part of the more general process of making a cultural policy for the city. Ó 2003 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved. Keywords: Literary places; Cultural policy; Place promotion; Urban regeneration; Cultural cities; Constructing the city image Preamble the sign marking entry to the city of Swansea. From here you glimpse the curve of Swansea Bay, with Leave the M4 at junction 42. BP Chemicals at the Mumbles lighthouse at the far point, and Llandarcy, which closed a year or two ago, is on see the city hug the bay and spill up into the hills. your right and the Glamorgan Health and Rac- Pass the McDonalds Drive-Thru and a turning to quets Club now occupies part of the site. Behind the docks. The Swansea-Cork ferry sails daily and the hill is the Lower Swansea Valley with its disap- container ships dock here, some bringing coal, iron- pearing scars, testimony to SwanseaÕs place in his- ically, to a port that was a hub of that trade for tory as an industrial city. BP Petrochemicals at much of the nineteenth and early twentieth centu- Baglan is visible on the left. It is being downsized ries. Across the river from the ferry terminal is and the new sign proclaims its transformation into Swansea Marina. The Spontex factory moved a the Baglan Energy Park. Continue along the A483, few years ago following a fire and there is environ- past the golf course, across the roundabout land- mental upgrading on the site, behind the luxury scaped with Welsh Development Agency funding, townhouse development. Approaching the city cen- and past the sign for the Swansea/Neath Environ- tre, a small sign points left to the Dylan Thomas mental Action Area. Further on is the former Ford Centre where, with some modest permanent exhibi- plant, re-named Visteon, and specialising in chassis tions and a calendar of events, the City and County production. Petroleum storage tanks, now semi-re- of Swansea proclaims itself as the birthplace of Dy- dundant, flank the road until you reach the new lan Thomas and the Ôlovely, ugly town of his prose.Õ Swansea Bay sewerage works, which won awards for design and green technology. Then you reach 1. Introduction Dylan Thomas is often described as a product of * Corresponding author. Swansea, formed by the social and geographical context E-mail address: [email protected] (D. Herbert). of his time and his hometown, but the production of 1 Research Assistant at University of Wales Swansea, 1997–1999. Thomas as poet, cultural icon and ÔbrandÕ is ongoing. 0016-7185/03/$ - see front matter Ó 2003 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved. doi:10.1016/S0016-7185(02)00078-7 250 H. Watkins, D. Herbert / Geoforum 34 (2003) 249–266 This paper explores SwanseaÕs use of Dylan Thomas as within a moral concern that such appropriation be done a strand of urban cultural policy and the intersecting Ôappropriately.Õ geographies in which he has become entangled. Our We start by putting Swansea into a wider context by concern lies less with his writings or his places than with considering changing conceptions of the relationships the motivation for and resistance to his use as a pro- between culture and economy. Looking at attempts to motional device. We are interested principally in the remake the cityÕs image following its industrial decline, making of cultural policy and this paper offers a rare we position SwanseaÕs Ôturn to ThomasÕ within broader focus on the front-end of an often meandering decision- patterns of literary tourism, place promotion and in- making process. 2 We consider the evolution of a cul- creasingly culture-led urban redevelopment policies. We tural policy in the City and County of Swansea, 3 how it discuss the emergence of a Dylan Thomas ÔindustryÕ and was conceived, how broader processes inform it and suggest that the CouncilÕs moves to mobilise Thomas as how local circumstances shape it. We ask why a renewed a ÔbrandÕ arose almost incidentally from SwanseaÕs at- interest in Thomas has arisen, what key individuals and tempts to market itself as Ôa city of literature.Õ We close organisations think Thomas can offer Swansea and how with some observations about shifts in decision-making they feel he should be used, whether developments are that have shaped the policy process and comment on the part of a coherent cultural policy and whether tensions progress Swansea is making with its Dylan Thomas emerge around using someone considered a Ôdifficult strategy. figure?Õ The debates encompass a range of groups with 2. Cultural twists and economic turns varying roles and priorities. We interviewed council members and officers, Dylan Thomas Society members, The intertwining of ÔcultureÕ and ÔeconomyÕ and the academics, writers, consultants, representatives of arts role played by culture in economic development is now organisations and the commercial sector, and those in- well recognised (Kong, 2000). The post-war political volved in the 1995 UK Year of Literature and Writing. 4 economy of the arts and changes in government policy Their professional and personal voices often became provide some context for what has happened in Swan- difficult to disentangle as most spoke both for their or- sea. Arts funding and policy planning became a re- ganisation and from a personal perspective, and we sponsibility of the Arts Council of Great Britain draw attention to the extent to which we found policy to (ACGB). 5 The Local Government Act of 1948 allowed be strongly shaped by individual voices and personal authorities to fund arts promotion and over time they perceptions. took on increased service delivery responsibilities for the SwanseaÕs cultural policy has changed in scope and arts. By the 1970s, economic crises in the form of ‘‘de- status over time and opinions remain mixed about how industrialization, a falling tax base and declining public clearly defined it is, but what became evident was that expenditure’’ moved the arts further down the list of the policy was largely unwritten. We also found that priorities (Goodwin, 1993, p. 147). New ways of think- despite their differing positions on Thomas, our inter- ing about the economy and culture emerged with shift- viewees exhibited a remarkable degree of conformity ing political objectives and a repositioning of the with respect to SwanseaÕs adoption of a Dylan Thomas statutory sector away from service provision to an en- promotional strategy. All subscribed to what might be abling role and, Harvey (1989) observes, an increasing called a shared politics of necessity; the issue was not entrepreneurial role. The Thatcher government of 1979 whether it should be done, but how. The debate was produced a radical shift away from the social policy framed within a twin discourse of ÔappropriationÕ and objectives of the 1970s and the arts were expected to Ôappropriateness.Õ Swansea is appropriating both Dylan make their own way in the marketplace and to bring Thomas and models of urban cultural policy judged to economic benefit to the state. This prompted something be successful elsewhere. At the same time, this is situated of an economic turn in language and attitude for arts organisations, now under pressure to justify their 2 This paper is based largely on a series of semi-structured funding with more than a Ôquality of lifeÕ argument: interviews carried out in Swansea during 1998–1999 as part of a project in the Department of Geography, University of Wales I said that we must change the argument to get Swansea, exploring relationships between cultural policy, literature, more funds. We must say that money spent on tourism and place. the Arts was not subsidy but investment. I pro- 3 The City and County of Swansea is a unitary authority which replaced Swansea City Council and parts of West Glamorgan County Council after Local Government Reorganization in Wales in 1996. For simplicity we refer to the local authority as ÔSwansea Council.Õ 4 See Appendix for details. Many individuals Ôwore more than one 5 The ACGB was created by J.M. Keynes in 1945 and replaced the hatÕ at a time, which illustrates the often closely woven social and 1939 Council for the Encouragement of Music and the Arts. It received institutional networks in local politics and the arts. a Royal Charter in 1946. H.