What is Measuring the Immeasurable?
Measuring the Immeasurable is a handbook for leaders in culture to help them understand the language of public value.
The language of public value includes a constellation of terms like ‘social impact,’ ‘program evaluation,’ and ‘social return on investment.’ What these terms share is that cultural organisations which receive public (and philanthropic) funding are under increased pressure to not only do their work, but to demonstrate what changes result from their work.
It’s no longer enough to say that you’re changing culture. You have to show how your activities are connected to the world you’re trying to create. This is necessarily a philosophical, ethical, and political question: what changes, for whom, how can we lay claim to this knowledge, and what value does this knowledge have in the political economy?
In the future, those cultural organisations which thrive will be those which are able to lead the conversation on public value. This publication is intended to support those who wish to lead the conversation rather than lag behind it.
This is a project of Aden Date (hello 👋).
