NACA is being reborn.  Creatively and politically, the time is right for an alliance of organisations and individuals involved in broadening the scope and processes of art-making, especially in, for, and with communities.  There is a new political vibe in the land --- in many lands, now --- given the failure of neo-conservative individualism and the rise of an awareness of the value of community, collaboration and collectivity.  Creatively, there is a new hunger for a revaluation of the past, for an evaluation of the present and a broader vision of the future.

NACA will a policy development and advocacy body.  It will not be involved in any projects other than those directly related to that raison d’etre.  Similarly, NACA cannot be an advocate for any one organisation or any one sector within the community -engaged arts. It’s purpose is to be a creative think-tank refining and developing the theory and practice of what is currently called “the community arts”, “community cultural development”, “community partnerships”, etc. It will also be intent on working with a range of allies in educating and lobbying for the sector as a whole.

NACA has FOUR broad goals:

1. Promote, advocate and lobby for the sector nationally
2. Strengthen the sector through networking, debate, research and consultation
3. Engage practitioners, organisations and the non-arts sector through effective communication & marketing strategies
4. Build a sustainable organisation based on grass-roots principles and effective governance structures

NACA will indeed be a grass-roots organisation without the attempted dictum or fiats that a top-down approach enshrines.  However, eternal deliberations can mean eternal indecisiveness.  A wide range of leaders within the community-engaged arts and/or cultural sector will be approached and asked to contribute their expertise at different times in different ways.  Some have already been approached. All have agreed. 

NACA cannot be all things at all people. There will be, and should always be, differences of opinion about how a body like NACA should function.  But is time for NACA to be resurrected, and this is well underway.  Separate sections on this website give a potted history of NACA, NACA’s manifesto, and an outline of the key trends and issues NACA presently sees within the sector.

We welcome --- no, ask for --- comments on the matters contained within these documents, from both Australia and overseas. 

We also call for responses to the changes and decisions within, and by, the Australia Council as the result of the Community Partnerships Scoping Study, subsequent changes and, more recently, the decisions by the Community Partnerships Committee.  In doing so, we acknowledge Australia Council funding for NACA but “arms length” remains “arms-length’ and we are, historically and always, independent of The Australia Council.

Responses might address such questions: what have the developments or upheavals of the past two years achieved? What vision of the future can be inferred from the decisions made?  How will they affect the field, both in theory and in practice? What effect will they have on State-based and local decision-making?  What should our future be?

Material should be submitted to the email addresses on this website or, specifically, to

Finally, please watch this space over the coming weeks.  NACA’s resurrection is well underway and is gathering more and more pace.  Stay wired, connected, tuned in --- things are happening.

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The National Arts and Cultural Alliance (NACA) is a national alliance of organisations and individuals representing and advancing the interests of the Australian community arts and cultural sector. We believe cultural activities play a key role in promoting national innovation, resilience and harmony, and underpin the development of our society, culture and national identity.

Since its establishment in 2005, NACA has been a powerful force in advocating policy and legislative change to encourage the growth, development and expression of community-based arts and culture.

NACA is committed to: -

1. Advocating the right of all Australians to: access and actively participate in communities of interest through art-making and cultural practices as part of their everyday life; and to express and communicate their dynamic identity as a basic and universal human right.
2. Upholding, promoting and advocating the principles of community consultation, collaboration and participation in community arts and culture in order to ensure community self-determination and societal inclusiveness.
3. Supporting diverse communities to advance their arts and cultural expression in order to improve their active participation in civil society. 
4. Advancing the principles, knowledge and skills of artsworkers in the field of community arts and cultural expression, and promoting the value and contribution of the sector to government, industry and the public.
5. Fostering a learning environment based on research and critical analysis of community-centred cultural activity, broadly disseminating a body of knowledge about community-based cultural practices, and monitoring the growth of the practice over time.
6. Facilitating and advocating for a whole-of-government approach to support community-based arts and cultural practices as a means of addressing social and economic issues of concern.
7. Linking and engaging with all sectors of the community, governments and industry to develop mutual goals and alliances, and where possible to join in collaborative cultural actions aimed at maximizing social understanding and community resilience.
8. Promoting creative ways to improve community well-being through balancing the interdependency of social, cultural, environmental and economic activity, and upholding this as a fundamental principle of sustainability.
9. Collaborating and participating in mutual actions with other relevant individuals and agencies who actively support these ideals
10. Educating government and non-government entities in the need to ensure equitable civic participation by all sectors of the community through adequate and appropriate levels of resourcing of community arts and culture.

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The coalition that become “The National Arts and Culture Alliance” (NACA) was originally formed in November 2004 as a mean of organising and voicing opposition within the community cultural development (CCD) sector to The Australia Council’s “Arts Catalyst” restructure in December 2004. The range and extent of opposition surprised many people. Most individuals and organisations were closely involved in State-based or local CCD but were more or less unaware of the sector’s exponential national growth during the 1990s and early 2000’s. 

NACA achieved its goal vis-vis The Australia Council in March 2005, including the instigation of a consultative “Community Partnerships Scoping Study Report proposing directions for the support and development of creative communities”. On 1st. June 2006, The Australia Council accepted many of the Scoping Study’s Recommendations including Recommendation Section 5.6.5, “Sector Leadership” of the Scoping Study: i.e., “ … a service agreement should be negotiated with The National Arts and Culture Alliance (NACA) to deliver specific leadership outcomes that will assist in the initial implementation of the Creative Communities Strategy.”

This agreement was not signed until March 2006 but since the very beginning of NACA several critical needs in the community arts and culture sector have been evident: These needs, especially evident in the Scoping Study itself and sector meetings in the major States are for:

• a national group or alliance with a leadership role in advocacy of the community arts and culture in everyday life;
  
• a national think-tank on practice and policy, encouraging and supporting theory/practice development and helping to provide vision and direction;
• a means by which funding bodies, not least the Australia Council, could avoid becoming the sole organised drivers of change.
  

NACA is presently being re-formed and re-structured to satisfy these needs. Extensive meetings and consultations have made it clear that this will succeed only with “grass-roots” and State-based support within a field dedicated to the ideology of consultation and group debate. It is also evident however that the times call for exactly such an organisation to form, grow, and flourish. 

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Growth of sector through partnerships:  The growth of community arts and culture sector has been exponential during the 1990s and early 2000s.  This has been largely due to the increasing number of non-cultural partnership organisations and entities that have realised the ability and further potential for the practice to build bridges to and within communities. 

Intergenerational change:  Many younger artists are entering the sector as one amongst several areas of artistic engagement and creative endeavour.  There is a strong need for senior artists, specialists in the sector, to mentor such new and emerging artists. 

Vision and direction:  The growth of the sector has been accompanied by concern about short-term pragmatism having succeeded over the long-term vision.  There is an increasingly strong call for a “ten year plan”, a vision of where the sector wishes to go, accompanied by directions on how it might achieve its undoubtedly significant future.

Change anxiety:  The demise of the Australia Council’s Community Arts Board and the changes as a consequence of the National Scoping Study have unsettled a field that despite its rhetoric is in many ways conservative.  There is also the ever-present fear that support for community arts and cultural practice could wither (the community arts has had to fight for survival at key points in its history and is perennially suspicious that “change” is code for “destruction”. 

Potential for over-zealous advocacy:  The concern is often stated that in advocating or “selling” community arts and cultural practices to non-arts partnership organisations, more might be promised than is realistically possible. 

Artistic merit:  This is an inherently controversial issue often perceived to depend on individual criteria of “artistic merit”.  Nonetheless, there is concern amongst artists and managers that the artistic value of a range of cultural outcomes within the sector is less than satisfactory.  The trend towards a large number and variety of properly trained artists becoming at times involved in community-based work is, hopefully, a counter-balance to what critics say is the mediocrity of a significant amount of “community arts”.

Lack of publicity and promotion:  The sector has been slow to promote and publicise its outcomes and achievements.  It can argued that because of its democratic and consultative ideology, the sector is biased against the celebration and promotion of individuals --- the very stuff the “celebrity” press feeds upon --- but the consequences of a lack of mainstream media recognition have to be confronted.

Time and cash poor sector: The arts industry in general has become increasingly professionalised on the one hand, with greater demand for detailed and sophisticated advice and information on current trends and practices. On the other there are increasing numbers of trained, emerging artists and mid-career artists desperate for information and resources to run their practices and businesses. Established organisations have become more sophisticated in both their approach to arts management and their needs are greater. Across the sector, organisations are under-resourced in both human and financial terms. People are having to do more with less in less time.

Increased demand for reporting, governance and management:  All tiers of government and Boards of organisations are demanding greater compliance with complex management & legal issues. These demands include a stronger trend towards written contracts, increasing requirements for Public Liability Insurance, risk management and a host of other issues. This is affecting individual artists as much as organisations. Business savvy and entrepreneurship is increasing across the sector.

Receptive policy and funding context: With an international trend toward the “Fourth Pillar” approach to culture, there is a receptive policy and funding context for arts activity. This is coupled with a focus on sustainability for communities and organisations, which directly meets with NACA’s service priorities.

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