Page 134 - JOURNAL OF LIBRARY SCIENCE IN CHINA 2018 Vol. 44

FU Caiwu & YUE Nan / Restrictions on incremental financial investment in the construction of 133
modern public cultural service system: Based on investigations of county public libraries

(readers’ initiative) and institutional (incentive mechanism) perspectives.

3.2.1 Subjective reason: the formation and realization of intention of cultural consumption in itself
is a process of comprehensive effect by multiple factors; increasing public investment can only
play a limited role
Foreign experience can be used as the reference. Residents’ initiative to involve themselves in
culture and arts and efficiency of use of public cultural venues have long been important issues
that developed nations in Europe and America have paid attention to. Since the 1980s, some
European and American developed nations have launched a series of surveys about factors
affecting the public’s initiative to involve themselves in culture and arts. The United States carried
out the “Survey on Public Involvement in Arts” for five times since 1982. Follow-up surveys
were carried out in order to learn about participation in art events and non-art leisure events by
adults above the age of 18. The UK launched the “UK Survey on Involvement in Culture” in
2005. This household survey is aimed at gathering data about the participation of adults above
the age of 16 and children aged between 5 and 15 years old in arts, museums and art museums,
archives, libraries, historic sites and sports. Items surveyed include participation frequency,
participation reason, participation barrier and attitude (recognition) toward participation in these
events . In Germany, Bonn Cultural Research Center also launched a survey entitled “Cultural
〇a ①
Barometer” from 1990. The survey focused on trends of cultural involvement and development of
various cultural sectors. In Belgium, the Flanders Government launched the “Survey of Flanders
Involvement” in 2004 and 2009 respectively, examining behaviors, restraints, attitudes and
contents with respect to cultural involvement, with the aim of eliminating restrictions as many as
possible that may prevent residents from participating in cultural and arts events and raising the
rate of participation.
All these survey results show that thresholds for residents of developed Western nations to
participate in culture and arts include cultural capital (determining their interest), socio-economic
cost and time cost, if setting aside factors concerning supply of art and cultural content, such as
matching degree between supplied content and demand, market preference of residents, selectivity
of quality and types of content products, and location accessibility (because these factors represent
an issue on a different dimension). Let us assume that when all other conditions remain unchanged,
whether improving these restraints can increase the number of participants. However, while the
government has made every effort to increase investment, lower access qualification, enhance
availability of public cultural events and products by building more cultural infrastructure,
and reducing economic cost or saving time cost, it seems that all these measures have not had
significant impact on resident’s participation in cultural and arts events. Survey results show

① In 2015, the Ministry of Culture and the Ministry of Finance launched the pilot projects of expanding cultural consumption of
urban and rural residents and the National Institute of Cultural Development of Wuhan University undertook the task of policy
design and experience summary for the two pilot areas in Hefei and Wuchang and developed several research reports (see Zhang
Fenghua: Report on Theories and Experiences of Foreign Cultural Consumption. December 2016).