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In Praise of Commercial Culture

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What is quite extraordinary about Tyler Cowen's book is not his sohphisticated understanding of economics (one expects that), or even his ability to put across difficult problems clearly, but the breadth of his knowledge about art and music. The book is indispensable to anyone who claims an interest in arts policies.

Tyler Cowen has done an outstanding job of making the case for free competition in cultural pursuits. Culture and commerce are revealed not as antagonists, but as complementary. The tension between them enriches both. Stands the Marxist cultural critique on its head. Must reading for anyone seriously interested in what has come to be called the "culture war."

In this original and scholarly -- though never stuffy -- work, Tyler Cowen reveals not only a deep understanding of economics, but also a breathtaking knowledge of visual art, music (both classical and pop), and literature. His opening chapters show clearly how economics usefully sheds light on cultural issues. Subsequent chapters test his economics in various fields of art. Both Cowen and economics pass these tests impressively.

Cowen's voice is a welcome addition to those of scholars (including that of Virginia Postrel) who praise cultural dynamism and who appreciate the enormous creative powers of a people free of political and bureaucratic burdens.

I absolutely love this book, because it's so rare for a book written by an economist to be readable, understandable, convincing, and uplifiting (Cowen just might destroy economics' reputation as "the dismal science"). However I assigned this in a class on Art and Politics at the University of Oregon some years ago, and my students hated it. Why? Because Cowen is harshly critical of some of their ideals--that government has a responsibility to support the arts, that such support is crucial for a thriving cultural world, and that free markets are a soulless, dehumanizing, anti-creative force.

In a nutshell, here is Cowen's argument. Free markets increase wealth, which increases purchasing power. As people's wealth increases to the point where their basic needs are satisfied, they begin to seek out aesthetic goods. The larger number of potential customers present in a market society creates "niche markets," thus expanding the variety of artistic styles and expressions that are sought out, hence the more (and more diverse) artists that can achieve success. Even radical non-conformists can find support. In contrast, in a non-market system where government (or some other patron, such as the church or the very limited number of elite) is the primary purchaser of art, artists must conform to the tastes of that limited number of purchasers, creating an incentive to not be too creative.

As examples, he points out that the Dutch Masters worked during the Netherlands' rapid economic growth (indeed, their art is astoundingly "businesslike" in its focus), the official Academy in France opposed new styles, and its annual Salon excluded such now-recognized geniuses as Gauguin, Monet, Renoir and Pissarro, and how independent record labels in the U.S. have been the primary outlet for new musical styles.

He also tackles the more philosophical issue of cultural pessimism. He notes that cultural pessimism is an elitist concept, leading those very people who desire creativity in the arts to disdain creativity that satisfies the aesthetics of non-elites. This elitism also provides intellectual support for censorship.

The only reason I don't give it 5 stars is that my students found it a little repetitive (I don't, but I respect their collective voice).

This book enables me to enjoy two of my interests at the same time-arts and economics. This is the first book I know that connects arts and economics.

In deftly describing the organic connection between economic well-being and the production of culture, Cowen essentially affirms the need and the justification for being optimistic about our present state of culture, at least as far as creative output is concerned. He argues against and explains the origin of cultural pessimists and their rhetoric, which the author sees as understandable but not necesssarily correct. That is, not as correct as these pessimists would have you believe. The section on the visual arts is particularly rich with historical vignettes of artists and their way of doing business to get the work out and at the same time try to make some money. This book would be particulary good reading for artists -- in whatever medium -- who are often, too often, trained to see their work and that of others as critics would, rather than as artists and creators, who have bills to pay, not just inspiration to concretize. Cowen does a great job of condensing amusing anecdotes culled from dozens of art history books (most of which, let's face it, can be pretty tedious for the most part). Cowen makes a convincing argument that today, as an artist, one can be as esoteric as s/he likes and still find an audience, BECAUSE the economic structure of commercialism is in place to the extent that it is. In citing examples of artists who managed to become millionaires in their time (Michaelangelo, Leonardo da Vinci, Mozart, Monet, etc), the author argues that being successful does not have to mean "selling out". Of course, in the process, he also implicitly argues against the ingrained prejudice people have against the idea of "selling out". Let the market and humanity's better judgement do their job of sorting it all out in the end : Only the excellent survives, and what is excellent in an artwork operates independently of the magnitude of popularity. Thus, the author lays out his reasons for the need to be more embracing of new genres of art by accepting the possibility that new stuff may one day be "classics", just as much of what we call "classics" today acquired their present status although they did not start out that way when they were born. By profession, the author is an economist, who apparently takes a great interest in the arts, and is concerned enough about seeing them flourish in diversity to say: Thanks to the market driven economy we have in an economic structure (for better or worse) that goes by the name of capitalism, more than ever before, artists can be as good as they wanna be doing their "thang", and still have a shot at being handsomely remunerated. Art is about pleasure, Cowen says. The pleasure of perception, sensation, feeling, provocation, inspiration, ideas, regardless of the kind. Even cultural whiners whine, with learned diction, because it gives them pleasure, much pleasure, to complain about how things are nowadays.

Any discussion about "culture" starts with the potential for great confusion. Culture has multiple meanings- most often it is either used in a broad sense- culture as an assortment of believes, customs and shared assumptions that bind a community together in time and space. Or a narrow sense- to refer to Arts. This narrow term is summarized in Cowen's In Praise of Commerical Culture:

I use the terms culture and art interchangeably to cover man-made artifacts or performances that move us and expand our awareness of the world and of ourselves. I have in mind painting, sculpture, music, film architecture, photography, theater, literature and dance.

The broad usage is defined in Eric Jones, Cultures Merging: A Historical and Economic Critique of Culture as, "the pattern of beliefs, habits, and expectations, of values, ideals and preferences, shared by groups of people, large and small."

Much confusion results when writers attempt to talk about both meanings in the same article or how both meanings are manifested in a specific individual. The broad meaning is more methodologically controversial, the narrow meaning is a widely accepted synonym with a 300 year traditions of philosophical debate. The network of concepts that lattices the broader meaning of Culture is essentially specialist only territory, whereas the usage as a synonym for the arts was/is/always will be a topic of great interest to specialists, and non-specialists alike.

In Praise of Commercial Culture- written by a professor of Economics from the United States, is a good example of just how the discussion of culture as arts continues to generate ample debate well into the present. day. Unfortunately, the great majority of this discussion- the nature and quality of culture as arts, is the equivalent of cave dwellers making cave paintings: possessed of their own beauty, certainly, but not particularly technically sophisticated.

That is because even as the Arts themselves develop a larger audience over time, the average interest level of that audience declines. This observation, at the dilution of the attentiveness of the audience as it expands, is itself at the heart of Cowen's great distinction, Cultural Optimists vs. Cultural Pessimists.

This distinction spans time, space and ideology to embrace practically the entire history of ideas that surrounds the Arts. The main school is that of Cultural Pessimism, "Cultural pessimism comes from various points along the political spectrum and transcends traditional left wing/right-wing distinctions. Its roots, in intellectual history, include Plato, Augustine, Rousseau, Pop, Schopenhauer, Nietzsche, and Spengler.
Cultural Pessimism has modern advocates, including Harold Bloom, Neil Postman and a legion of arts critics in every country of the world. For people who actually think about a subject like "the meaning" of the Arts, or a specific Art, this is the "default mode." In other words, if you are reading this and you have an opinion on the subject "Is a specific Art or Art generally getting better or worse over time?" you are likely to answer, "Worse."

Although Cowen does an excellent job in detailing the specific views embodied by the modern advocates of Cultural Pessimism towards the Arts, he doesn't do a very good job of explaining, "Why Cultural Pessimism?" as he purports to do at the end of this book. His answers are illuminating: Old people don't like new things! Artists are alienated by capitalism! Parents don't like new things! Religion is jealous of the power of the Arts! but pretty shallow.

I think a better understanding is reached by looking at the maintenance and generation of ideas about art over time as constituting a cultural(broader sense) system, and thus subject to systemic analysis. Shared ideas have their own force, which tends to grow or diminish over time. The shared idea of Cultural (narrower sense) Pessimism is clearly a winner. Just how strong the playing field favors Cultural Pessimism is demonstrated by the weak, hesitant nature of Cowen's argument, which largely takes the form of a rather timid argument that market capitalism supports, rather then hinders a Culturally Optimistic view point. I agree with what Cowen is arguing, but he doesn't go far enough- and that's by decision.

An Economist, Cowen isn't interested in engaging Plato and T.S. Eliot on their own terms, he is simply summarizing and cataloging their viewpoints. Personally, I think In Praise of Commercial Culture would have been better received. (700k rank in Amazon.com book sales.) Considering that he is specifically seeking to invalidate the ideas of writers of Harold Bloom and Neil Postman, you'd think he would steal some of their better ideas in terms of popularizing an unpopular idea (Cultural Optimism.)

The position of advocating for Cultural Optimism is clearly vacant at the present moment- really, it's not even a debate that exists outside of this book, but personally I think the Cultural Pessimists are simply wrong for a lot of reasons- a lot of the same reasons that caused me to start writing by own book on what is essentially the same subject (former title: False Consciousness: How Intellectuals Misunderstood the Importance of Art) but minus the Cultural Pessimist schematic and the hoary analysis of Cultural Pessimism and its causes.