The Overlooked Pillar: Making a Case for Cultural Sustainability

by Alisa V. Moldavanova

Overview

Elevates in systematic ways the importance of organizational thinking about sustainability and emphasizes the importance of cultural organizations in facilitating societal sustainability goals.

Offering an original perspective on the sustainable-development discourse by emphasizing the importance of culture and cultural institutions in facilitating societal sustainability goals, The Overlooked Pillar conceptualizes sustainability as an institutional logic that develops in organizations and is enacted by managers of such organizations who make decisions and engage in sustainable thinking on a daily basis, leading them to reconcile current organizational realities and the need to adapt to those realities with considerations of the needs of future generations. Drawing on more than five years of research conducted on a variety of organizations within the domain of the arts and humanities, Alisa V. Moldavanova provides a framework for organizational sustainability based on the dynamic interplay of two narratives-institutional resilience and institutional distinctiveness-and identifies mechanisms and strategies adopted by managers of cultural organizations that maintain and enhance intergenerational sustainability. The broader intellectual implication of the insights offered here encompasses the critical notion that genuine long-term sustainability, the kind that secures the rights of future generations, requires sustainable stewardship today.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781438498935
Publisher:	State University of New York Press
Publication date:	02/02/2025
Pages:	302
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x 0.68(d)
Age Range:	18 Years

About the Author

Alisa V. Moldavanova is Associate Professor at the Joseph R. Biden, Jr. School of Public Policy and Administration at the University of Delaware. She is the coeditor (with David H. Smith and Svitlana Krasynska) of The Nonprofit Sector in Eastern Europe, Russia, and Central Asia: Civil Society Advances and Challenges.

Table of Contents

Foreword
Stefan Toepler

Preface

Acknowledgments

1. Introduction: The Overlooked Pillar

2. Museums: Safeguarding the Interests of Future Generations

3. Literature and Its Institutions: The Moral Language between Generations

4. The Boundaries of Art and Society: Sustainability Lessons from the Performing Arts

5. Sustainable Thinking: Lessons from the Arts and Humanities

Appendix A: Recession Induced Pressures and Common Organizational Responses

Appendix B: Institutional Factors of Resilience

Appendix C: List of Organizations: Data Collection I & II

References
Index

Editorial Reviews

"Moldavanova delivers a timely text on the role of culture and cultural institutions in forging a greater sense of sustainability within society From cover to cover, Moldavanova provides an insightful text chock-full of contextual examples and narrative vignettes. Readers cannot help but be drawn into stories addressing issues such as social connectedness, moral language, institutional adaptations, and social and community relevance, to name a few." — CHOICE

"The Overlooked Pillar is an attempt to synthesize and conceptualize the intersection between culture and sustainability. In contrast to other treatments of this topic, which tend to be case-focused, approaching this intersection in ways that are unsystematic, Moldavanova addresses this issue more systematically, taking into account not only different types of organizations, but also different sectors. This makes The Overlooked Pillar stand apart." — Jonathan Paquette, author of Museum-Making in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia: Cultural Institutions and Policies from Colonial to Post-Colonial Times

From the Publisher