Reviews

Age of Culture
by
D. Paul Schafer

D. Paul Schafer’s THE AGE OF CULTURE is undoubtedly the climax of his numerous works on culture.

Paul is a brilliant scholar with perseverance in seeking the truth. I came to know him nearly 20 years ago as co-contributors to the Croatia-based UNESCO journal CULTURELINK. We shared a common understanding concerning the holistic nature of culture. I appreciated his efforts in creating and leading the World Culture Project and was very much impressed with his endless energy in stressing the importance of culture in world development. His papers and books on culture often strike an alarming note for development studies. With the translation and publication of his two books CULTURE: BEACON OF THE FUTURE and REVOLUTION OR RENAISSANCE: MAKING THE TRANSITION FROM AN ECONOMIC AGE TO A CULTURE AGE in China, his outstanding ideas and clear-cut stand on culture are getting more and more response among scholars and readers in China.

I believe THE AGE OF CULTURE will be a continuation and summarization of his valuable ideas and discourses on culture. The theorization is profound, the analysis is comprehensive, and what is most significant and convincing is the fact that much of the contents of the book are closely related to and connected with the author’s own personal experiences in life. The conclusion is naturally inevitable.

An important meeting just ended in Beijing which called for deepening of reform and re-orientation of development in China. At the core of this re-orientation is a shift from GDP-driven economic growth to balanced development serving the needs of people, with more attention to cultural, social, ecological, and human development. This trend is inevitable not only for China, but also for the whole world. I think THE AGE OF CULTURE has provided a detailed description of what is required in this regard.

The Age of Culture is essential reading for those striving to live in a world shaped by spiritual, intellectual, moral, and aesthetic values. D. Paul Schafer believes that we are standing at the threshold of a new era of global development and human affairs that should be driven by a holistic cultural perspective. I am convinced by his argument that we must now move beyond our current failed systems for dealing with global challenges and shift from an economic to a cultural age that redefines and links together the powerful forces of culture, the arts, creativity, and the natural environment to embrace new notions of wealth, education, democracy, citizenship, and well-being.

Paul Schafer’s vision of the centrality of culture to our lives, to societal development, and to the future of civilization has shaped policy development at the local, national, and international level over the last four decades. His contribution to Canadian cultural policy has been an important influence in shaping all that is right about our policies today. Paul’s writing is inspirational; his message cannot be ignored.

In this important book, Paul Schafer brings together the wisdom gained from four decades of reflection and intellectual leadership on the topic of the importance of culture and cultural resources to building a sustainable future. The book is a tremendously significant contribution to the field and an essential read for anyone interested in understanding the complexities of this important topic. The strength of the book is rooted in its strong intellectual foundation linked to a deep understanding of how these ideas must be manifested in practice in communities and in governance at all levels - from local to global. I recommend the book highly.

It is indeed imperative for cultural policy - as D. Paul Schafer affirms in The Age of Culture - to monitor the human environment and global landscape. This book incites us to rethink new ways of cultural policy in our time of rapid challenges. This is an engaging book, showing why the age of culture is necessary and how it can be achieved. Deepening the knowledge and understanding of culture, it provides a rich perspective of a world in which culture will play a central role. Schafer pays special attention to arts education, stressing its importance in making the world a better and safer place for all its diverse peoples and countries, thus giving cultural diversity a key role in our present and our future. This visionary book is invaluable not only for researchers, teachers, students, and cultural workers, but also for anyone concerned with our sustainable development.

I had the pleasure of reading this book The Age of Culture. It is my view that through this book measures to develop a broad array of capabilities - ranging from political, economic, and social freedom to individual opportunities for being healthy, educated, productive, creative, and enjoying self-respect and human rights - shall be put into effect by all who have the opportunity to read this book.

It is also one of the most dependable instruments for this. Its good judgment and mature outlook ensure a logical and practical approach to these endeavours. The Age of Culture would be an asset to any organization, institution, or community, and I am happy to give it my wholehearted endorsement.

Because of the author’s ambition, professionalism, and great commitment to the development of cultural knowledge, I appreciate him and recommend his work highly.

In The Age of Culture, D. Paul Schafer shows the tremendous possibilities of tomorrow, if we start making the necessary changes today. He demonstrates clearly and convincingly why we need to transition from an Economic Age to an Age of Culture. It is a groundbreaking book which lets us know without a doubt that it is culture that connects everything. Rich in details and clear in big line thinking, this book of Schafer’s creates a fine balance between information and vision. You get a deeper understanding of the many and diverse sides of culture in our current lives and how it might evolve in the future. With his book The Age of Culture, Schafer has given us the most powerful gift there is, knowledge and imagination. So take your time in reading this book. My conclusion after reading The Age of Culture is that we live in interesting and exciting times and that we really can make a difference.

Paul Schafer’s The Age of Culture should be a standard text in our high schools. Let’s also put it in the hands of university students and professionals in economics, community development, ecology, spirituality, human relations, and not just the arts, humanities, and cultural field.

This thoughtful and beautifully-written book ushers us into our world – this very world in which we live right now – that vibrates and radiates with varied shapes, sounds, textures, and colours. Schafer brilliantly positions the raw and pure nature of the arts and culture, their beauty and transcendence, alongside their significance as a driving force for building prosperity and better places to live.

I’m grateful for the depth of The Age of Culture. Schafer strikes the right balance of scholarly reference with his own progressive theories. He invites us to consider the value of looking through a more holistic lens grounded in the arts and culture, not only at our world at present, but also in building a better world in the future.

Schafer's highly personal testimony reminds us that culture is incarnate, real, tangible, sculpted by our multiple narratives. He envisions a panorama we can artfully portray together as we map, share, and draw inspiration from each others' diverse culturescapes.

Following up on the insights of his most recent book, Revolution or Renaissance, Paul Schafer has written a personal manifesto where he reflects on his long engagement with the arts and culture and his vision of what he believes to be a coming transformation, the arrival of a new world order. While the book abundantly cites experts in the field of economics and culture, it is the integration of these in the author's own life story that makes it most compelling. We might also observe that the use of one's personal story is one of the building blocks of the new cultural age that he goes on to describe.

Before coming to the world of culture, the author worked extensively as a professor of economics, which qualifies him to comment on how the world is currently shaped by economic theory and practice. The trick was to bring forth the richness of his cultural upbringing, with significant familial emphasis on the arts, and his abiding interest in them and interface this with the mechanics of capital. His economic savvy enables him to identify the problematical thinking and implementation of economic policy that has led the world to a very dangerous state, dominated by a philosophy of consumerism that bodes disaster by gutting our inner and outer ecology, both the energies of the human spirit as well as the resources of the earth on which we walk.

Is Schafer's vision too utopian? Even admitting this, one might add, “of course, but isn't this what utopias are for, namely to make us reflect on the current state of our society, its direction, and the roles we play that may influence it.” We are faced with the juggernaut of integrated economic power and political posturing that has us swallowing their story, hook, line, and sinker. This means that insight must come by raising new perspectives and pointing out where the well-placed insertion of a lever may move the world we know. Leonard Cohen once sang, “There is a crack in everything, that's how the light gets in.” The trick, of course, is to identify where the cracks are and discover where and how to widen them to focus the spotlight on human happiness and creativity.

A great deal of this book has to do with why this transformation of society needs to take place. It tries to connect on a variety of levels from everyday insights to both contemporary and perennial spirituality that enable us to see the world and our illusions about it for what they are.

How does one move from the dominating world order we know towards a radically different future? How do we shift from the positivistic values system underwriting the current economy of markets and minds to a “literary, intellectual, (artistic, humanistic) value system”? To let the light in, Schafer provides us with a model of the monopoly exercised by the “Present World Order and Dominant Value System”, which deals with the arts either by seducing them into its service or by marginalizing them. He compares this to “The Future World Order and Emerging Value System.”

It is of the nature of art to produce the maximum effect with the minimum of resources. This points toward the attitude and practice desperately needed by our faltering ecology. Art has a unique capacity to speak directly to our whole being and tie our past, present, and future together in a way that enhances our belonging and our solidarity. It's hard to argue with the holistic power of a drama, a poem, or a symphony that we share. Culture has many tangible manifestations that make up the context, the “container” in which we live together. It helps us create an understanding of the world and take the steps we need to change it in a benevolent fashion.

A change in world orders is quite an elephant to ingest, so where do we take the first bite. So as not to leave us in wishful thinking, the author proposes a concrete agenda, namely the creation and cultivation of a “culturescape,” a landscape, as it were, a map of the cultural realities of the streets where we live. In introducing this concept, Schafer compares our human community to a shattered mirror where each person has a piece large enough only to see his or her own reflection. For him the culturescape is a way of putting these pieces back together again, allowing us to make a cultural inventory that supports this community awareness.

Superimposing the diverse visions of individuals and groups we make visible what tends to be buried in the current world order, and we can see different potentials for human development. It is not science and surplus that provide the raw material for artistic endeavour, but the evolution of the human spirit’s aspiration for a higher form of life and our search for meaning. It is the conservation of the products of this aspiration, in all their diversity, that grounds us and urges us forward, not a global melding. Ars gratia humanitatis.

The unique power of Paul Schafer’s book The Age of Culture is its comprehensive investigation of the problem of the fundamentals of human life, such as culture, the arts, arts education, and spirituality. The global problem of human survival is analyzed on the basis of affirmation of humanity’s highest universal values - ideals of Love, Good, and Beauty. This book is focused on a future age that will make it possible to develop “the Person” with a human face.