AHRC Impact of Festivals project 2015-2016

The Impact of Festivals was a 12-month project funded under the AHRC’s Connected Communities Programme, working with research partner organisation the EFG London Jazz Festival. I was the Principal Investigator, and the Research Associate was Dr Emma Webster, co-founder and director of Live Music Exchange. You can read about the project in more detail on its website.

The project’s stated research questions were:

  1. Do festivals contribute to local competitiveness, and if so, how?
  2. What contribution do festivals make to the local region in terms of a ‘cultural offer’?
  3. What contribution do festivals make to regional economic growth?
  4. What impact do festivals have on: i. the formation of a temporary community (i.e. among festival goers)? and  ii. the permanent community which lives at the festival location?
  5. How has impact developed over the history of a festival?
  6. Drawing on the findings to questions 1-5, what are the processes through which arts and humanities research (including practice-based work) has impacted on festivals?

The key outputs included (click on each for further information/open access copy):