Under the severe circumstances surrounding cultural facilities such as financial constraints of governments and more emphasis on efficiency, this study aims to clarify the role and the impact on cultural policy of the Agency for Cultural Affairs (ACA) by considering the case of encouraging dissemination and exchange of regional culture by invigorating public cultural facilities. We conducted a questionnaire survey of all cultural institutions which received grants of encouraging dissemination and exchange of regional culture by invigorating public cultural facilities from the ACA. The survey includes such items as financial and management conditions, the main purpose of the operation, effectiveness of the grants, and evaluation. Also we conducted interviews of some of these institutions in order to clarify more details as supplementary research. Based on an analysis of the results obtained by those two surveys, we reached the following conclusions. The operations of cultural institutions vary from region to region but have in common that the expenditures, the attendance and the revenue of the independent productions have decreased. Thus the encouraging dissemination and exchange of regional culture by invigorating public cultural facilities of the ACA is indispensable in funding of original productions and promoting regional cultural creation. At the same time, broadening the market and increasing attendance is one of the most important issues for securing a sound future for the regional institutions.

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The idea, the purpose and the aim concerning cultural policy, arts policy and cultural properties’ protection policy have not been maid clear up to the present. However, these are indicated in the Fundamental Law for the Promotion of Culture and the Arts, the Fundamental Law of Education and the Law for the Protection of Cultural Properties. So, this paper aims to clarify these three Concepts according to interpret these existing laws concerned.

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Miscellaneous intangible cultural properties with different characteristics coexist in the system of protection of intangible properties in South Korea. These varied characteristics not being well considered, the protection and management system is somewhat defective. Further, despite the fact that circumstances surrounding the inheritance of each folk-performing art designated as an important intangible cultural property are different, the current system for protection of intangible properties protect and manage all of them uniformly. Thus, the effectiveness of protection is questionable in some cases. With the question in mind, this study takes up Kut (practices of exorcises), a Korean folk-performing art, as a case. Kut which is considered to be the most folkloric amongst intangible cultural properties is designated as a ceremonial important intangible cultural property and is protected in the same way as other national ceremonies and Confucius ceremonies. However, despite its national protection, Kut is on the verge of extinction due to the changes in the social circumstances. First of all, this paper studies problems concerning the inheritance of Kut, with a focus on the East Coast Kut, an important intangible cultural property. Then, it analyzes problems pertaining to the current South Korean system for protection of intangible properties. Finally, it attempts to elucidate the tasks necessary for future protection policies.

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A majority of Japanese folk performing arts is protected under the cultural properties protection law set in 1950. It must be noted, however, that the current cultural properties protection policies are not always effective in ensuring the succession of the arts, with the gap between successful cases and unsuccessful ones widening. Furthermore, needs to reassess the policies that can be led not only by the government but municipal governments have emerged as these smaller units of governance have increasingly employed their own protection measures in recent years. In this research, the problems surrounding the succession of folk performing arts are studied as a challenge for the cultural properties protection policies as a whole, not as a separate individual case as has been in the conventional discourse. This particular paper examines five succession cases of folk performing arts, including Kowaka-mai of Ohe in the southern Japan of Fukuoka prefecture, to compare and study local communities’ structures aimed at ensuring the succession of the arts. The diversity of these structures is not only deeply connected to either a success or a failure of a succession of the arts but is also an important element that determines the direction of the succession and support system going forward. Trends in local communities’ use of the cultural properties policies in the protection of folk performing arts and the issues and problems regarding the successions will be discussed in the next paper.

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