The Crisis in the Russian Cultural Management : Western Influences and the Formation of New Professional Identities in the 1990s-2000s

The transition from state socialism to capitalism brought changes to the Russian cultural sector. Previously entirely sponsored and controlled by the patron state, the cultural organizations had to cope with dramatically reduced budgets. While the state remained the principal sponsor and patron of cultural organizations, the new actors—foreign foundations—provided additional possibilities of funding and introduced a new discourse on arts administration. The foreign concept of "cultural management" became an alternative to a Soviet-type "cultural bureaucracy" and found its partisans among the active part of arts administrators who effectively profited from foreign grants and scholarships and tried their best to integrate into the international community. They are now promoting cultural economy and innovation and are striving for further liberalization of the cultural sphere. But the organization of culture inherited from Soviet times persists. This article provides analyses of interviews with Russian cultural managers devoted to their professional trajectories in the 1990s and 2000s.