Festivals as platforms for actors’ engagement in a local context

The service ecosystem perspective provides a multi-level approach useful to represent the\r\nheterogeneous actors, the interdependence between them, and resource integration\r\nmechanisms. In the ecosystem, value co-creation is a cooperative, collaborative, and\r\ncomplex process that arises between different and heterogeneous actors (Vargo and Lusch,\r\n2017). Given the dynamicity of the service ecosystem, it should adapt over time to changes\r\nin resource integration, shared worldviews, and outcomes; but in this evolution sometimes\r\ntensions amongst the different actors arise (McColl-Kennedy et al., 2020). The evolution of\r\nthe service ecosystem may be influenced at least partially by the actors’ intended activities\r\nand practices (Vink et al., 2021; Mele et al., 2018) and impacted by the level of actors’\r\nengagement. Actor engagement is defined as “an actor's voluntary resource contributions\r\nthat focus on the engagement object [and] go beyond what is elementary to the exchange\r\n[...]” (Alexander et al., 2018, p. 336): all the actors are involved in exchange (Storbacka,\r\n2019; Jaakkola & Alexander, 2014; Kumar et al., 2010) and the core of the engagement is\r\nresource contribution. Given this, the actors’ engagement is a continuous ongoing process\r\n(Storbacka, 2019). By adopting a service-dominant perspective and considering all the\r\nactors of the ecosystem as resource integrators, this study explores the role of actors’\r\nengagement in cross-sector partnerships in the process of value co-creation towards cultural\r\ninclusion. Specifically, we analyze how these elements interact in a cultural festival that\r\ntakes place in the northern part of Italy. The aim of the paper is threefold: (1) to investigate\r\nhow actors in a specific context interact and integrate resources, (2) to investigate the\r\nevolution of cross-sector collaborations in pursuing inclusion and (social) sustainable\r\nobjectives in a specific context, and (3) to recognize and address tensions arising among\r\nactors with different worldviews and behaviors.\r\nThe study adopted a qualitative approach: we have collected qualitative data in the form of\r\n12 in-depth interviews with key informants, and participatory observations of events taking\r\nplace during the Festival, which took place in Milan in 2022 and 2023. Primary data have\r\nbeen triangulated with secondary data such as press releases and newspaper articles. The\r\nFestival's aim is to create a path of coexistence, closeness and exchange open to citizens\r\nand the community, its driving force is the artists involved and the participatory\r\ndramaturgical processes set in motion. The backbone of the Festival is an artistic mapping\r\nof the city with a specific focus on five periphery neighborhoods, through the local\r\nresidents’ stories, with the aim of returning five performative studies that compose a\r\n2\r\nheterogeneous and multiform look at contemporary Milan. The specific objectives of the\r\nFestival are to connect artists with territorial communities and promote inclusion, trying to\r\nunderstand the different contexts based on listening to needs, criticalities and opportunities,\r\nsoliciting the active cultural participation of local communities, in particular those who are\r\ngenerally excluded from it, promoting the interweaving of dramaturgical languages based\r\non writing, physical action, video/images, music/sound, and strengthening the presence of\r\na new generation of artists with diverse backgrounds.\r\nPreliminary findings show that festivals could be considered as platforms that foster actors’\r\nengagement and resource integration. This platform is dynamic and adapts over time to\r\nchanges in worldviews, outcomes and objectives; however, in this continuous evolution\r\nsometimes tensions amongst the heterogeneous actors arise and should be addressed\r\n(McColl-Kennedy et al., 2020). Indeed, the Festival also enables inter-organizational\r\ncollaborations by offering opportunities and a location (online or offline) for organizing\r\nactor engagement within service ecosystems (Blasco-Arcas et al., 2020; Breidbach et al.,\r\n2014). The Festival could be considered a dynamic interface in which heterogeneous actors\r\nco-create value (Blasco-Arcas et al., 2020), involving participants that were traditionally\r\nexcluded by cultural initiatives. Indeed, preliminary findings also show that the spaces,\r\nvirtual or physical, in which the Festival and its initiatives take place provide an enduring\r\nplatform that allows the various actors to work together toward social and inclusive goals\r\n(Anzivino et al., 2023). Therefore, the Festival staged in a public space represents an\r\ninnovative means to achieve cultural inclusion (Quinn et al., 2021), potentially reducing\r\nsocial tensions in local communities and driving integration.