Event Management In Australia: Impact On Society, Economics, Politics, And Philosophy Essay.

The Importance of Art, Music, and Cultural Events in Australia

Question:

Discuss about the Event Management in Australia.

Art, music and other cultural events are of very importance in the modern day society as it touches the emotional world and illuminate the inner self of human with the improvement of economy, wellbeing, society and education. Australia has a rich history of art and cultural events (McRobbie 2013). However, the way of organization of these cultural events have been changed tremendously. A range of newer events such as international film festivals, writer’s festivals, music festivals, new age festivals have occupied the slots of cultural events and people are attending the events irrespective of their socio-economic status or age (Mair and Whitford 2013). The Prime purpose of this assignment is to relate these new age events as a part of Australian traditional events. Further, the way these events affects the Australian economics, political, philosophical, social and historical aspects will be discussed. Finally, the way these events stands out in relation to operation, management, sustainability, technology and management practices will be discussed properly.

Art, music and cultural events are deeply embedded in the Australian history and it can be understood from the research study by the Australian government. This research states that, 83% of Australian population believes that art and cultural events are important for the development of society and they want to be a part of it (Art Nation 2015). Currently Australia hosts several music and film events that is famous worldwide such as Melbourne and Adelaide international film festivals, Splendour in the grass, lost paradise, harbor life, stereosonic, subsonic and many more. These events are not very new in the Australian culture and according to The Sydney Morning Herald (2010), the first music concert organized in Australia was Maleny folk festival in 1987 and since then there is a huge number of events that has been organized and financially became successful. Other than these, there is a number of different festivals such as Melbourne food and wine festival, Tropfest (the largest short film festival), Sydney mardi gras (the LGBT community festival) and Vivid festival (the largest light, music and ideological festival in the world) has been organized and became big success in the event industry (Newstead 2013).

Social

These music and art related events have broader impact on the Australian society.The most important effect of these events on the Australian society is the multiculturalism. According to the Australian government council, the government is keen to develop multiculturalism in Australian society as it helps to sprout talent and ability within individuals and arts and music concerts are helping them to achieve this target. The success of these vents to promote social harmony and peace is such that from 2013 to 2015, 76% of population of major cities and 67% population of remote and very remote areas have attended such events every year (Art Nation 2015).

New Age Events: A Part of Australian Traditional Events

Political

The Australian govern is always been supportive for the art and music concerts in Australia. There are a number of music organizations such as the national opera, Opera Australia, the concert orchestras that are supported by the national government and from funding to land, allotment and transporting artists.The government bear all the cost of these events. Furthermore, the local government takes responsibility to help these events with physical facilities and employs event officers to encourage local art and craft activities (Tonkin 2012). However, there are different governmental policies that should comply with the event organization process such as environmental pollution level, public disturbance policies, noise pollution levels and staging policies.On the other hand, these concerts helps to display the political drawbacks and loopholes to the society through their music. For example, Warumpi band (1985), that used to highlight the indigenous issues of Australian government through their concerts (Tonkin 2012).

Philosophical

The philosophical aspect of music and art events in Australia is evident from the fact that despite of failure of big Australian events related to music, the attendance of people in such music concerts has increased from the last decade. These events has acquired a place in viewer’s heart. Hundreds of smaller events have been organized that offer better experience with appreciation to culturally rich artists. Therefore, philosophical impact of these events has made the Australian society competent to cultural richness (Newstead 2013).

Economic

Nearly entire Australian population has been visited art galleries, attended live concerts or attended film or food festivals in 2013 (94%), which describes the economical aspect of these public events in Australia (Australian Leisure Management 2016). Despite the fact that the urban Australia has improved infrastructure for art and music concerts, the attendance of rural population in such concerts proves the involvement of such events in Australian lifestyle. People have spent more than $200,000 and 11% f their household income in such concerts in year 2012 (Australian Leisure Management 2016). The importance can also be understood from the data given by the Australian Council for the Arts (2015) that determined that 40%of international visitor were involved in art related concerts in Australia and over 2.4 million artists have visited Australia in 2013-14. Furthermore, the statistical data shows that Australian cultural sector contributes $50 billion in the Australian GDP and within that, $4.2 billion comes from these arts related events (Australian Council for The Arts 2017).

Impact of Events on Australian Society

Operations

This section is the most important factor for event management as it is responsible for co-ordination, integration and implementationsof all the planned practices in the vent to make it engaging and successful. This involves adaptation to innovations, flexibility towards methodologies and providing the best service to the viewers and artists within the pre-decided funds. However, the most important factor is viewer engagement (Newstead 2013). The flow of the event should be engaging, otherwise bigger events with proper operational management becomes unsuccessful. One such example is the failure of Bonnaroo and Rebounded, which attracted 38 percent fewer and lowest crowd respectively than their previous attendees (ABC News 2015).

Risk factors

The primary risk factors for success of any art or music related concert is lack of a proper risk management system. These concerts determines gathering of millions of public gather gathering at one place and therefore different risk factors such as alcohol, minors, transportation, physical activities, size of the event, sales and fire, explosives and combustibles should be taken care of (Steffen et al. 2012). The organizers of music concert Stereosonic utilized security tools such as CCTV cameras in every angle of the concert ground, further they recruited 1000 people for the security and volunteering services and collaborated with the local police and armed forces to combat any adverse situation. Therefore, better risk management system and operations skills makes these events stand out from those, that spend all the money in organizations and neglects security factors (Aloini, Dulmin and Mininno 2012).

Sustainability

The relation of sustainability in the success or failure of event can be of three types and according toYeoman et al. (2012), there are three primary pillars of sustainability. These are economic success, social effects and environmental aspects. The way of pertaining to these, factors are different in every event. The economic sustainability factors inhabits local economic progress, growth, innovation, fair trade, profitable business performance, increased market capacity, better return on investments and equal sharing of profit. It is very important for the event to address the economic sustainability by providing the organizer of the event with proper amount of profit.However, if other two pillars of sustainability are not strong, the event becomes a big failure, such as the failure of Bonnaroo and Sasquatch festival in Australia in 2017 (Hall 2012).

Furthermore, the social sustainabilityincorporates social justice, equity, heritage, health and safety norms, and labour standards so that the workers and organizing employee’s rights can be protected (Naiman 2012). Therefore, compliance of these norms determines the success of such event. Finally, the environmental sustainable factor involves proper resource utilization, air, water and sound pollution, energy efficiency, emission reduction and protection of biodiversity. While organization of such events, these factors need to be protected as without these, the government cannot grant the permission. Hence, for the successful completion of the events, compliance to environmental sustainability factors is must (Hall 2012).

Role of the Government in the Success of Art and Music Concerts in Australia

Technology

Technological use in event management has a broader and aspect. This aspect can be utilized in safety and health related purposes in events, fund distribution and planning of the event and distribution of the tickets. Using social, print and digital media in the advertisement and marketing of the events ensures participation that is more public and it ensures more revenue generation than events that sells tickets on the counters. Further, utilizing technologies in safety and security determines proper security of attendees and impose public interest on the event (Hollnagel 2014).

Conclusion

Music concerts, film festivals and art galleries are the modern way to celebrate the richness of art and craft of the different culture. Australia has its own history of rich cultural events and with time, the form of these eventshas been changed. Nowadays, this country celebrate its social competency and multiculturalism with music concerts, food and art festivals, writer’s concerts and film festivals. These events have different effects of the social, political, economic and philosophical factors, which have been discussed in this report. Further, different management factors such as operational activities, sustainability, technology, risk management skill has been discussed, and their role in the success and failure of the events is mentioned thoroughly. Finally, it could be said that cultural competency is important for diversification of human society and these events helps to fulfill this goal.

References

ABC News 2015. Goodbye Soundwave, hello boutique music festivals. [online] ABC News. Available at: https://www.abc.net.au/news/2015-12-16/jones-goodbye-soundwave,-hello-boutique-music-festivals/7033172

Aloini, D., Dulmin, R. and Mininno, V., 2012. Risk assessment in ERP projects. Information Systems, 37(3), pp.183-199.

Art Nation 2015. An Overview of Australian Arts. [online] Australiacouncil.gov.au. Available at: https://www.australiacouncil.gov.au/workspace/uploads/files/arts-nation-final-27-feb-54f5f492882da.pdf

Australian Council For the Arts 2015. The arts matter to Australia, and the data shows it | Australia Council. [online] Australiacouncil.gov.au. Available at: https://www.australiacouncil.gov.au/news/media-centre/media-releases/the-arts-matter-to-australia-and-the-data-shows-it/

Australian Council for The Arts 2017. Arts Nation An Overview of Australian Arts. [online] Australiacouncil.gov.au. Available at: https://www.australiacouncil.gov.au/workspace/uploads/files/the-cultural-economy-fact-shee-54f5fce276550.pdf

Australian Leisure Management 2016. Eventbrite research shows Australians love festivals - Australasian Leisure Management. [online] Ausleisure.com.au. Available at: https://www.ausleisure.com.au/news/eventbrite-research-shows-australians-love-festivals/

Hall, C.M., 2012. Sustainable mega-events: Beyond the myth of balanced approaches to mega-event sustainability. Event Management, 16(2), pp.119-131.

Hollnagel, E., 2014. Safety-I and safety–II: the past and future of safety management, 1^st Edn, pp. 107-125, Ashgate Publishing, Ltd..

Mair, J. and Whitford, M., 2013. An exploration of events research: event topics, themes and emerging trends. International Journal of Event and Festival Management, 4(1), pp.6-30.

McRobbie, A., 2013. In the culture society: Art, fashion and popular music, 1^st Edn, pp. 3-22, Routledge.

Music in Australia 2018. Australian Music Festivals - Music in Australia - Knowledge Base. [online] Musicinaustralia.org.au. Available at: https://musicinaustralia.org.au/index.php?title=Australian_Music_Festivals

Naiman, R.J. ed., 2012. Watershed management: balancing sustainability and environmental change, 1^st Edn, pp. 234-267,  Springer Science & Business Media.

Newstead, A. 2013. Show's Over: A Recent History Of Aussie Music Festival Troubles - Tone Deaf. [online] Tone Deaf. Available at: https://tonedeaf.com.au/shows-over-a-recent-history-of-aussie-music-festival-troubles/

Steffen, R., Bouchama, A., Johansson, A., Dvorak, J., Isla, N., Smallwood, C. and Memish, Z.A., 2012. Non-communicable health risks during mass gatherings. The Lancet infectious diseases, 12(2), pp.142-149.

The Sydney Morning Herald. 2010. Timeline: Australian music festivals. [online] Available at: https://www.smh.com.au/entertainment/music/timeline-australian-music-festivals-20101118-17yht

Tonkin, C. 2012. Australian Music & Politics: Where’s The Power & The Passion?. [online] tonedeaf.com.au. Available at: https://tonedeaf.com.au/australian-music-politics-power-passion/

Yeoman, I., Robertson, M., Ali-Knight, J., Drummond, S. and McMahon-Beattie, U. eds., 2012. Festival and events management, 1^st Edn, 124-167,  Routledge.