Nonprofits, including cultural organizations, are increasingly relying upon fees for service as part of their operating budgets. Arts organizations have taken an increasingly prominent role in arts education starting with federal budget cuts in the 1960s and 1970s. There is a lack of data on the effects of partnering with schools on nonprofit arts organizations as well as the effects of government contracting on nonprofits.This study consists of an email/internet survey to determine how contracting with schools to provide arts activities affects nonprofit arts agency independence, vendorism, bureaucratization, costs, and artistic quality. The survey was pilot tested with 22 leaders of arts organizations. The survey was emailed to a random sample of 680 leaders of American nonprofit arts organizations identified as art museums; ballet; dance; music; music groups, bands and ensembles; opera; singing choral; symphony orchestras; theaters; and visual arts organizations. Responses were gathered from 280 respondents for a 41% response rate. The researcher analyzed the data using frequencies, cross tabulations, logistic regression, and linear regression.This study reveals limited negative effects on arts organizations of partnering with schools. The major findings of this study support Lester Salamon's (1995) theory that bureaucratization is among the most likely effects of government contracting on nonprofits, and a study of nonprofits by Patricia Hughes and William Luksetich (2004) indicating that greater reliance on private funding does not divert funding fiom program service delivery. Organizations that partner with schools have greater odds of being affected by rules and regulations compared to those that do not partner with schools, but these rules seem to fall within acceptable limits for arts organizations of the types studied.Earning higher levels of income from school partnerships does not make arts organizations less likely to advocate for arts education, change artistic direction or offer significantly different programs, or impose unreimbursed costs.This study does not support Bruno Frey's (2003) Crowding Theory of the effect of external rewards on creativity. More collaborative types of school activity had no effect on organizational creativity in this study. However, enhanced artistic growth appears to be an important positive effect of school partnerships.

Syfte: Att undersöka huruvida scenkonstkompanier bildar industrispecifika kluster som ger upphov till gemensamma fördelar och därmed kan höja den konstnärliga kvaliteten.  Metod: En kvantitativ enkätundersökning bland aktiva svenska scenkonstkompanier som analyserats genom principalkomponentanalys. Slutsatser: Det tycks finnas ett kluster av scenkonstverksamhet i Stockholm. Klustret inkluderar dock inte alla kompanier som finns på platsen, vilket indikerar att scenkonst inte är ett bra begrepp för att avgränsa kluster. Genre, professionalitetsgrad och närvaron av en konstnärlig ledare som inte också ingår i ensemblen tycks vara viktiga faktorer för att förstå vilka verksamheter som bildar gemensamma kluster. / Purpose: To determine whether the Performing Arts form industry specific clusters that share positive externalities and improve artistic quality. Method: A quantitative study based on a survey among active Swedish performing arts companies, analyzed by means of a Principal Components’ Analysis. Results: A cluster of Performing Arts’ companies seems to exist in Stockholm. However, the cluster does not include all Performing Arts’ activities present in the area, indicating that Performing Arts is not a good delineator of the specific activities prone to form a common cluster. Genre, professionality and the presence of an Artistic Director who doesn’t take part in the ensemble seem to be important factors to predict liability to form local clusters.