Paper presented at the Fifth International Conference on Cultural Economics held at the Canada Council, Ottawa, Canada, September 27-30, 1988.

The author examines cultural planning based on field experience in Amherst, Lawrence, Northampton, and the Northern Berkshire region of Massachusetts which includes Williamstown, North Adams and Adams. The author concludes:

We see community arts in Massachusetts moving in the shadows of environmental awareness and historic preservation. Cultural planning is a process to facilitate and hasten that movement. Art will be created with or without cultural planning. The value of cultural planning lies in the opportunity for dialogue and education that it presents, and in the political posturing that it demands. (p. 176)

The author examines cultural planning based on field experience in Amherst, Lawrence, Northampton, and the Northern Berkshire region of Massachusetts which includes Williamstown, North Adams and Adams.