As demonstrated above, there are a number of prominent trends in the arts and education that have taken an instrumentalist approach to the relationship between education and democracy, and particularly to the role of art in this relationship. In terms of art, the social and economic inclusion agenda of recent government policy has been an important vehicle for arguments about the utility of art for achieving political ends. The connection with democracy here has often been implicit, with policies and practices being aimed at fostering social cohesion, economic productivity and community involvement. A discourse of empowerment and transformation in the arts – and art education – has also
been important in the presentation of art as a useful tool for achieving social and political ends. Because this discourse has often focused on the civilizing effects of the arts – and or its contribution to ends such as equality, justice, citizenship, and critical thought – it has also implicitly involved the promotion of democracy. Finally, the justification of art education via external goals has been significant, both in terms of contributing to a discourse which privileges the extrinsic value of art generally, but also in specific claims made about the usefulness of art for promoting democratic citizenship.
In terms of education, the most significant trends via which instrumentalist arguments in the field have been promoted are the citizenship agenda – and particularly the introduction of citizenship education as a compulsory element of state education in England – and the growth in student voice practices, which build on an older tradition of democratic schooling. The influence of the citizenship agenda in education has been felt via an emphasis on the preparation of children and young people for their future participation in democracy by equipping them with the relevant skills, knowledge and dispositions for democratic citizenship. The influence of student voice work has been more diffuse, and has emphasised democratic participation in the running of schools to a greater degree. However, the idea that such participation is also worthwhile because of what it teaches young people about their future democratic citizenship has been given significant weight within student voice practice.
While the above trends tend to fall into two categories – involving the view that either art or education can be instrumental in the promotion of democracy - arguments from each of these perspectives often overlap in the specific claims to be found in the literature. One example of this is the focus on both education and art within the social and economic inclusion agenda. In this case, arts participation in schools (and educational activities in arts institutions) have been seen as important contexts for the promotion of political ends consistent with the creation and maintenance of democratic society. Similarly, literature concerned with citizenship education has sometimes referred to the arts as vehicles through which the objectives of citizenship education can also be pursued. Within art education, the tradition of education through art, in which
arguments about the civilising effects of art in general have been put to use in the educational sphere. Equally, the impact of the citizenship agenda can be detected in claims that art education can help to promote active and responsible citizenship. An instrumentalist logic has therefore been prominent in the ways in which the connections amongst democracy, art and education have recently been conceived and implemented in arts and educational practice.
The value of instrumentalist approaches in education can be argued in various ways. Some have claimed that there is a case to be made for such arguments on the basis of economic and societal value of education. Carr (2003) has claimed that instrumentalist conceptions of education are justifiable insofar as they pertain to schooling, arguing that schools must be answerable to the social and political concerns of the public bodies that fund them, as well as serving the more intrinsic educational goal of human development (2003, p. 16). Similar arguments have also been made in relation to the arts, with the case being made that art has to demonstrate its value to society in order to justify the portion of public spending it receives. By extension, the provision of activities involving both education and art could be seen as justifiably subject to demands concerning their value to society and the economy. While it could be argued that this approach involves a narrow interpretation of their value, it nevertheless represents one way of making sense of the way in which art and education relate to wider societal concerns including democracy.
It is also worth noting that the prominence of instrumentalist arguments has contributed to the increased provision of opportunities for arts participation in formal and informal educational settings in recent years. Accompanying the promotion of the arts for reasons of social and economic inclusion – mixed with ideas about their capacity to change people's lives and the life of society – there have been increased opportunities for people to become involved in the arts in educational and other settings. The wealth of partnership schemes between schools and artists, and the proliferation of projects aimed at social inclusion within arts institutions are testament to this. Such activities often also involve a commitment to pursuing political equality and broadening access to the arts. While the interpretation of equality that such approaches imply could be
questioned, this commitment can nevertheless be viewed as a positive aspect of instrumentalist arguments in the field.
Despite their positive contributions, however, a number of authors have also pointed to problems with instrumentalist approaches in this area. Some, for example, have expressed concern over exaggerated claims about the power of art to address complex social and political problems and have cautioned against the risk of characterising art as a 'magic bullet' in this respect (Buckingham and Jones, 2001; Houston, 2005). Implicit in Buckingham and Jones' critique is also the suggestion that an emphasis on the social and economic utility of art tends to depoliticise artistic and cultural activity. This concern is expressed explicitly in Scullion's critique of the emphasis on more participatory aspects of citizenship (such as social and personal capital) rather than its political dimension, in recent arts and education policy in Scotland (2008). Similarly, the Cultural Policy Collective (2004) have argued that by focusing on participation and inclusion, the social and economic inclusion agenda in the arts has ignored important questions such as economic inequality, and therefore has involved an apolitical approach to the cultural sphere.
Another significant problem identified with the way in which the relevance of art for politics and democracy has often been conceived is an emphasis on the extrinsic, rather than intrinsic, value of art. The work of Sanderson (2008), Scullion (2008) and Koopman (2005) all express concern over this problem. These arguments centre less on whether art can be relevant to social and political concerns at all, but rather to what extent this dimension of art should be privileged in policy and practice, and how the nature of the relationship between art and such wider concerns should be understood. Koopman's argument represents an extreme approach to this question, in that he advocates a solely intrinsic justification of the arts in education. Sanderson and Scullion, on the other hand, argue for an appreciation of the intrinsic qualities of the arts alongside their instrumental value, and for a more complex and subtle understanding of the ways in which art can be relevant to political and social questions. Brighton (2002; 2003) also argues for a more nuanced and sophisticated approach to this issue.
Problems have also been identified with prominent arguments about education and democracy. Here too, inflated claims about the capacity of education to achieve democratic ends have caused concern. Faulks (2006) and Gillborn (2006) have both expressed such concern in relation to citizenship education, as well as arguing that the official discourse of citizenship education is sometimes at odds with less democratic elements of government policy and educational practice. Biesta and Lawy (Biesta & Lawy, 2006; Lawy & Biesta, 2006; Biesta, 2007) have argued that the instrumentalist and individualist logic of citizenship education depoliticises citizenship, because this is seen in terms of individuals' achievement of knowledge, skills and attitudes and is therefore divorced from the wider social, political, economic and cultural factors that affect the actual condition of young people's citizenship. Their argument also suggests that education for citizenship depoliticises education because, by limiting citizenship education to schools, and precluding democratic discussion over the meaning of citizenship within this setting, education is seen as an apolitical sphere for teaching citizenship rather than facilitating democracy and supporting democratic learning. Meanwhile, Taylor (2007, p. 7) has argued that support for student voice often emphasises the instrumental value of such practice in that it can help contribute to the creation of democratic citizens. In doing so, she has echoed the concerns of Biesta and Lawy that such an approach does not take into account the actual conditions under which democratic citizenship is practised (Taylor, 2007, p. 2).