¹Ï×ÓTV

Dr Steven Hadley is an award-winning cultural policy scholar. His research asks how discourses are constructed and articulated within the context of enabling democratic access to culture. He is the author of Audience Development and Cultural Policy (2021) as well as numerous academic publications and is Editor of several Routledge books including Cultural Leadership in Practice and Audience Data and Research. He is Co-Editor in Chief of Cultural Trends and sits on the Steering Committee of the Cultural Research Network and the Editorial Board of Arts and the Market. He has given invited talks at the National Portrait Gallery, London, the European Parliament in Brussels, the Ministries of Culture in both Paris and Santiago de Chile, and on numerous global media platforms. Steven has worked in over thirty countries internationally and is an Associate Consultant with Counterculture (UK), The Audience Agency (UK) and the Danish Centre for Arts & Interculture (Denmark).

I am a member of the Institute of Global Challenges and Cultures and Policy Lead.

Authored Books

Hadley, S. 2021. Audience Development and Cultural Policy, Palgrave MacMillan.

Edited Books

Peters, T. and Hadley, S. (eds.) 2025. Decantaciones. Política y democracia cultural: Un diálogo global. Universidad de Chile, Facultad de Comunicación e Imagen. 232pp. ISBN: 978-956-19-1416-2.

Hadley, S., Johanson, K., Walmsley, B. & Torreggiani, A. (eds.) 2024. Audience Data and Research: perspectives from scholarship, policy, management and practice, Routledge. 190pp. ISBN: 9781032632438.

Hadley, S. (ed.) 2024. Audience Development and Cultural Policy: A Reader, Routledge. 358pp. ISBN: 9780367695187.

Hadley, S. (ed.) 2024. Cultural Leadership in Practice: Beyond Arts Management and Cultural Policy, Routledge. 270pp. ISBN: 9781032487724.

Chapters

Hadley, S. 2025. Udvikling af kulturpolitik I Irland: Staten og kunstnerne in Bille. T. and Lindelof, A.M. (eds.) Verdens Bedeste Kultur Politik? Frederiksberg: Samfundslitteratur, pp.199-214. ISBN: 9788759346396

Hadley, S. 2022. Are we the Baddies? Audience Development, Culture as a Vocation and Democratic Cultural Policy in Reason, M., Conner, L., Johanson, K. and Walmsley, B. (eds.) Routledge Companion to Audiences and the Performing Arts, London: Routledge. ISBN: 9780367695842

Hadley, S. , Hield, F. and Larrington, C. 2021. Remediating Intangible Cultural Heritage in Schofield, J. and Maloney, L. (eds.) Music and Heritage: New Perspectives on Place-making and Sonic Identity. London: Taylor and Francis. pp.56-64. ISBN: 9780367741037. 

Carey, D. and Hadley, S. 2021. Ireland's Creative and Cultural Industries. Ireland’s Education Yearbook. Dublin: Irish Research Council. ISBN: 978-0-9956987-5-8.

Hadley, S. 2018. Strategy and Opera Development in Northern Ireland: The Case of Northern Ireland Opera. In Stevenson, D. (ed.) 2018. Managing for Success in Arts and Cultural Organisations. pp.91-106. ISBN: 9781138736764

Hadley, S.  2018. Publikutveckling – en demokratisering av kulturen? In PUBLIK: En antologi om konst, kultur och utveckling. pp.74-83. RePublik/Kultur i Vast Goteborg. 189pp. ISBN: 978-91-87229-22-0.

Articles

Green, A., & Hadley, S. 2026. Understanding cultural value in Germany. Journal for Cultural Research, 1–15. https://doi.org/10.1080/14797585.2026.2619838

Hadley, S., Kaszynska, P. and Torreggiani, A. 2026. Everyday Creativity and Cultural Policy. European Journal of Cultural Studies. https://doi.org/10.1177/13675494251390156

Hadley, S., McDowell, E. and Walmsley, B. 2024. The Mutability of Cultural Value: A Critical Analysis. Cultural Trends, 1–17. 

Hadley, S. and Woodley, S. (2023) The Future of Cross-Border Cooperation in the Arts, Irish Studies in International Affairs, 34(2), 48-77. .

Degn, H-P., Hadley, S. and Hansen, L.E. 2023. Evaluating the European Capital of Culture - A ‘Dilemmas Model’, Arts and the Market. https://doi.org/10.1108/AAM-09-2021-0046.

Belfiore, E., Hadley, S., Heidelberg, B. and Rosenstein, C. 2023. Cultural Democracy, Cultural Equity and Cultural Policy: Perspectives from the UK and USA, Journal of Arts Management, Law and Society, 53(3) pp.157-168. https://doi.org/10.1080/10632921.2023.2223537

Barton, R., Hadley, S. & Murphy, D. 2023. Covid-19, cultural policy and the Irish arts sector: continuum or conjuncture? Irish Studies Review, 31,2 pp.193-210. https://doi.org/10.1080/09670882.2023.2195534

Hadley, S., Heidelberg, B. and Belfiore, E. 2022. Reflexivity and the perpetuation of inequality in the cultural sector: half awake in a fake empire? Journal for Cultural Research, 26(3-4) pp.244-265. https://doi.org/10.1080/14797585.2022.2111220

Falconer, K., Hadley, S. and Moorhouse, J. 2022. Building theatre, making policy: materiality and cultural democracy at Liverpool’s PurpleDoor, Studies in Theatre and Performance. https://doi.org/10.1080/14682761.2022.2121027

Hadley, S. 2021. Artists as cultural intermediaries? Remediating practices of production and consumption, Arts and the Market, Vol. 11 No. 3, pp. 200-216. https://doi.org/10.1108/AAM-01-2021-0001

Hadley, S., Collins, P. and O’Brien, M. 2020. Culture 2025 A National Cultural Policy Framework for Ireland. Cultural Trends 29:2, pp.84-97. https://doi.org/10.1080/09548963.2020.1770576

Hadley, S. and Belfiore. E. 2018. Cultural Democracy and Cultural Policy, Cultural Trends 27(3) pp.218-223. https://doi.org/10.1080/09548963.2018.1474009

Hadley, S. and Gray, C. 2017. Hyperinstrumentalism and Cultural Policy: Means to an End or an End to Meaning? Cultural Trends. 26, No.2, pp.1-12. https://doi.org/10.1080/09548963.2017.1323836.

Cultural Policy; Cultural Democracy; Arts Management; Audience Development

Cultural Policy, Arts Management, Leadership, Tourism & Hospitality, Audience Development, Research Methods (UG and PG).

• PhD
• MBA (Distinction)
• MA (Distinction
• BA (Hons) 

AMAN1012 (Creative Arts Manager); AMAN2201 (Audiences & Communities); AMAN3062/3100 (Dissertation); AMAN5115 (Dissertation); ITHM2001 (Tourism, Society & Culture); ITHM3002 (Tourism & Heritage Products).

• ¹Ï×ÓTV SDG Research Fellow of the Year (Highly commended, 2025)
• Outstanding Paper of 2022 Award: Arts and the Market
• ENCATC European Cultural Policy Research Award (2017)

• Committee Member, Cultural Research Network

‘Audience Development and Cultural Policy: Pathways to Equity’ Cultural Trends Global Dialogue, Lima, Peru (Nov 2025)

‘Sustainable Legacies: From Evidence to Policy Action’ Research Group on Applied Political, Social, and Cultural Research within the Faculty of Society and Culture's Liverpool Centre for Cultural, Social, and Political Research (LCCSPR) (June 2025)

 AHRC Everyday Creativity Research Network: Sandpit 3: Everyday Creativity and Wellbeing Brunel University, London (Jan 2024)

‘Cultural Policy Realism: What is to be done?’ Cultural Trends Global Dialogue, Santiago de Chile (Nov 2023)

‘Cultural Democracy and Cultural Policy’ University of Groningen (Oct 2023)

‘Are we the Baddies? Audience Development, Culture as a Vocation and Democratic Cultural Policy’ Region Skånes kulturförvaltning, Malmö, Sweden (Sept 2023)

‘Storming the citadels: cultural democracy and the death of cultural policy’ Nordic Culture Point, Helsinki (May 2023)

‘Thirty more bastards? The audience, cultural democracy and Arts Council England’s policy shift’ Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich (May 2023) 

‘Cultural Policy Realism’ at The Arts After Capitalism Symposium, National University of Ireland, Dublin (May 2023)

‘Thinking Beyond the Institution: From Management to Policy to Ideology’, National Portrait Gallery, London (Nov 2022)

‘The Future of Cross-Border Cooperation in the Arts – What Next?’ Royal Irish Academy Dublin (Mar 2023)

‘Understanding Cultural Value in Ireland’ Long Room Hub, Trinity College Dublin (Mar 2022)

‘Are we the baddies? Audience development, cultural policy and ideological precarity’ Centre for Spectatorship and Audience Research, Queen’s University Toronto Canada (Mar 2022)

‘Audience Development and Arts Management’ LASALLE College of the Arts, Singapore (Feb 2022)

‘Are we the baddies? Audience development, cultural policy and ideological precarity’ Middlesex University, London (Jan 2022)

‘In Conversation with Steven Hadley’, Wolf Brown, USA (Sept 2021)

‘Are we the baddies? Audience development, cultural policy and ideological precarity’ 14th International Conference on Culture and Creativity, Vilnius University, Lithuania (Dec 2021)

‘Are we the baddies? Audience development, cultural policy and ideological precarity’ Arts and Cultural Management Conference (Jan 2021)

‘Audience Development and Arts Management’ Korean Society of Arts and Cultural Management International Conference, Seoul (June 2021) 

‘Desarrollo de públicos y política cultural’ III Seminario Internacional de Desarrollo de Públicos, Ministry of Culture, Chile (May 2021) 

‘Is the Museum a Democratic Institution?’ Keynote in the European Parliament, Communicating the Museum, Brussels (May 2018)

‘What Next for Audience Development?’ Fondazione Fitzcarraldo and the Cultural Observatory of Piemonte and Compagnia di San Paolo Audience Development Conference, Turin, Italy (June, 2017)

Area of Expertise: Arts and Cultural sector; currently available

Arts Council England: Let’s Create: Opera and Music Theatre Analysis

Royal Irish Academy: The Future of Cross-Border Cooperation in the Arts 

Region Skånes kulturförvaltning: Development of new regional culture strategy for southern Sweden

Arts Council Ireland: development of a Research Framework to manage, corporately align and quality assure Arts Council research activity

The National Lottery Heritage Fund: Nations Lead Evaluator for the Great Places project

Historic Royal Palaces: Development of evaluation framework for multi-annual training programme

Theatre NI (Belfast): Report writing and literature review for sustainability in the arts project

Earagail Arts Festival (Donegal): Development of three-year strategic company development plan 

Sulivan Sweetland Artist Management: Ravi Shankar and Anoushka Shankar European Tour May 2003

Steven Osborne (Pianist): CD release of Vingt Regards sur l’Enfant-Jesus by Oliver Messiaen

Milapfest (South Asian Arts Development Agency): Promotion of various music and dance concerts

First supervisor: 1 student (part-time)

Co-lead on ESRC Transforming the Cultural & Heritage Sector Data Infrastructure project (£349,685, 1/7/24 – 30/09/25).

Co-Investigator on Danish Research Council project: The Future of Cultural Policy with Copenhagen Business School, Roskilde University, University of Aarhus, University of South-Eastern Norway and University of Leeds (DKK 718,479; 02/23-12/25). Trinity College Dublin. 

Principle Investigator on Irish Research Council project: Understanding Cultural Value and Cultural Democracy: Developing a Future Arts Policy (€99,513; 09/22-08/24). Trinity College Dublin.

Principle Investigator on Shared Island project: Audience Data for Cultural Policy: A Shared Island Approach to the Creative Industries funded by Office of the Taoiseach, Govt. of Ireland (€19,916; 01/23-03/24). Trinity College Dublin.

Principle Investigator on National University Ireland Early Career Researcher project: The Potential of a Post-Capitalist Cultural Policy (€4317; 01/23-01/24). Trinity College Dublin.

Principle Investigator on Royal Irish Academy Charlemont project: Cultural Democracy and Cultural Policy: A Comparative Case Study of Ireland and Denmark (€2926; Jan-Dec 2022). Trinity College Dublin.

Visiting Professor, Faculty of Visual Arts, University Mediterranean Podgorica 

Co-Editor-in Chief, Cultural Trends

Academic Practice Officer, Faculty of Technology, Arts & Culture

¹Ï×ÓTV UN SDG Fellow

Editorial Advisory Board, Arts and the Market

Chair, Dumbworld: an international multidisciplinary, creative production company working across performance, digital, installation and film

Visiting Lecturer, MA Arts & Cultural Management, Leuphana Uni of Lüneburg

Associate and Expert Assessor, Centre for Cultural Value, University of Leeds 

Visiting Research Fellow School of Performance and Cultural Industries, Uni. of Leeds

 

https://orcid.org/0000-0003-2240-7808