Social Justice

It started in Fall 2016, when Staten Island Arts — the local arts council for the fifth borough of New York City — was approached by Kerry McCarthy and Michele Kumi Baer of The New York Community Trust, Betsy Dubovsky and Laura Jean Watters of The Staten Island Foundation, and Karen Rosa of the Altman Foundation. This group of concerned funders had observed that Staten Island’s arts programming audiences weren’t racially diverse, and came to us seeking to partner on a program that would thoughtfully address the issue.

In "Organizing Mutual Solidarity Projects as an Act of Resistance in Puerto Rico," Jorge Díaz Ortiz writes in A Blade of Grass Magazine about exercises of autonomous action and organizing in Puerto Rico and how "possibilities for self-governance must be grounded in a culture of mutual solidarity to generate and nurture new and existing structures in society, engaging in a praxis of autonomous action and collective agency."

The National Committee for Responsive Philanthropy's Adam Fishbein discusses disability justice activism and what the philanthropic community can do to center the disability community in efforts to eradicate systemic racism in an interview with Zakiya Mabery, founder of B. Global Diversity & Inclusion Strategic Planning.

The Open Society Foundations announced it was investing $220 million "to build power in Black communities, promote bold new anti-racist policies in U.S. cities, and help first-time activists stay engaged," according to its website.

The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation and Yale Law School’s Justice Collaboratory announced recently an initiative to distribute a curated 500-book collection to 1,000 medium and maximum security prisons, including at least one juvenile detention center, across the United States over the next three and a half years, explains the press release.

Jasmine Wahi, the Holly Block Social Justice Curator at the Bronx Museum, addressed recently in artnet the importance of the role of social justice in museums, specially in the wake of recent Black Lives Matter protests, and why every art institution should have a social justice curator.

It’s a great holiday to be sharing with each of you today, Juneteenth! As we gather – remotely – to honor and celebrate the power and jubilation of this day, liberation for ancestors and elders, we hope to echo the voices and experiences of Black artists who have brought us joy, made us feel seen, challenged, supported, and taught us so much. We come here with deep gratitude and deeper commitment to investing in a future of liberation for Black peoples everywhere.

The full transcript of this podcast is published below.
Explore the full GIA podcast.

This Podcast was recorded on January 22, 2020. The full transcript of this podcast is published below.
Explore the full GIA podcast.

“Every system is perfectly designed to get the result it gets.”
— W. Edwards Deming (possibly apocryphal)

Cultural equity is critical to the arts and culture sector’s long-term viability, as well as to the ability of the arts to contribute to healthy, vibrant, equitable communities for all. At the core of the challenges related to cultural equity are the historically inequitable distribution of resources and the value systems, biases, and systemic barriers associated with that distribution.