Research Roundup: What do liberal and conservative arts audiences think of DEI?

Continuing this week’s Research Roundup, where I’m writing about research I’ve read lately (here’s yesterday’s post on a case study of the transition into and out of Nataki Garrett’s time as artistic director of Oregon Shakespeare Festival), I’m sharing a study that didn’t get nearly the attention I thought it would when it was released earlier this year: results from a large study (22,000 respondents) about IDEA (inclusion, diversity, equity, and access), otherwise known as DEI (diversity, equity and inclusion) in the broader public.

The study by WolfBrown surveyed arts audiences in 2023-24, before the 2024 Presidential Election was in full swing and before the sweeping actions of the Trump Administration against DEI in many areas of American life. WolfBrown shares their results in their newsletter, and provide access to a dashboard of the data itself.

WolfBrown’s newsletter breaks down key points, but I want to give a different spin on some of the numbers they share, focusing on the differences between self-described liberals and conservatives.

Talking about DEI can be zero sum

What I mean by zero sum is that actions that please one group (liberals) may alienate another (conservatives). Think: adding more diverse programming might excite one audience segment and frustrate another.

Upwards of 70% of the liberal audience segments think it’s very important that the organizations take actions related to DEI, but it’s the reverse level of support for conservative audience members. The survey asked questions about the importance of organizations diversifying their staff, board, and artists, specific action that they wish organizations would take, or whether they consider DEI when making donation decisions, and it’s nearly a mirror image. Pleasing one group risks alienating the other, hence the zero sum result.

That said – and this is important – liberals significantly outnumber conservatives in this study. Of 22,000 audience members, there are almost 5 times as many liberal audience members as conservatives. So, all things being equal, turning off conservative members of the audience to the point where they actually stop attending and donating, the consequences would be smaller. (Remember this is combined data; WolfBrown notes that the political values makeup of the organizations participating ranged widely.)

Conservatives don’t see much need for change

Since conservatives don’t think that DEI is very important, they are pretty happy with how things are. Along a range of different aspects of DEI, conservatives rated organizations as doing well – a range of ratings from 3.5-4.5 out of a high score of 5 – as compared with liberals who gave organizations ratings of 2.8 to 4.3. That’s a signal that if you change something, the conservatives might be more unhappy, since they didn’t think it needed to change. 22% of conservatives don’t see the need for the organizations to make any changes, compared to 2-3% of liberals.

Also, it’s interesting to note that fewer conservatives answered “don’t know” to the question rating the current actions of the organization. That means they’re more sure of their answers than liberals. That’s even more evidence that they might resist change. (Again, keep scale in mind: there are many more liberals than conservatives in this overall data set.)

Changing programming is not widely supported

Here’s an unexpected result: even liberal audience members—those most supportive of DEI—aren’t necessarily clamoring for major changes in programming. Only about a third want broader formats or more diverse storytelling.

Only about 34% of liberals want to see the organizations either “broaden program/exhibition formats & styles” or “tell stories that speak to diverse populations”. In other words, even the groups that are most supportive of equity seem hestitant to see it reflected in programming choices. Considering that changing the mix of programming to be more diverse is one of the main areas of effort amongst staffs of arts organizations, it makes me wonder if staffs and programmers are out of step with what audiences want to see – or at least how changes in programming are discussed and presented. More research would be needed to see if audiences are interested in seeing more diverse programming, but just want to get on with it, not have the changes discussed much.

But there are areas of commonalities across liberals and conservatives. As WolfBrown points out in their own summary, there is similar rates of support across audiences with different political values that accessibility in different forms for youth, marginalized people, and accessibility in general is something they’d like to see improved.

How to Respond With Integrity

If you’re at an arts organization, what should you take away from this?

First, it would be worth it to get to know the political values of your own audience. This data is an aggregate of many different audiences across the country, and different organizations had more or less people of different political persuasions. As I wrote about in yesterday’s post, I think that there’s good reason to think that Oregon Shakespeare Festival and Nataki Garrett personally suffered from not knowing their audience’s sentiments and preferences well enough.

Second, combined with other marketing research on the high importance that consumers place on the clarity of an organization’s values when making purchasing decisions (see Americus Reed II and Marcus Collins) this research shows that an organization should feel confident to decide what their values are, act on them, and let the audience fall where they may.

If an audience member doesn’t agree with a decision grounded in your core values, let them go. Especially when thinking about fundraising, giving happens when values are aligned, so seek out audiences that want what you have to offer. Plus, the integrity your organization shows will boost morale and loyalty amongst staff, board members, audiences, and the wider community that share those values, making them work even harder for the success of the organization. (As my mom always told me, you don’t want to be friends with someone that doesn’t want to be friends with you.)

I encourage you do read the original post from WolfBrown (linked above) and also dig into the data dashboard itself. This study confirms what many arts leaders already feel in their bones: you can’t please everyone, and trying to do so often dilutes your impact. The takeaway isn’t to avoid DEI efforts—it’s to pursue them with intentionality, clarity, and alignment. Know your audience, know your values, and don’t be afraid to stand firm. The data is there if you’re willing to look, and so are the people who will support you when you lead with integrity.