Ari Van Assche
Biographic Data
| ID | 381212 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Ari Van Assche |
| GIVEN NAMES | Ari |
| FAMILY NAME | Van Assche |
| SIGNATURE | VAN ASSCHE A |
| AFFILIATIONS | HEC Montréal |
| ORCID | 0000-0003-4992-1743 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 20 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 22 |
| WORKS AS AUTHOR | 20 |
| WORKS AS EDITOR | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2007 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2026 |
| H-INDEX | 2 |
What’s the cost of mastery? Flemish Primitives and the labour behind the myth of Flemish dance
This article examines how Flemish Primitives (2022), by Chokri Ben Chikha and his company Action Zoo Humain, interrogates artistic mastery in contemporary dance from Flanders. Framed as a satirical talent show in which six dancers with migrant and diasporic backgrounds compete to become the next Flemish Master, the performance revisits the legacy of the ‘Flemish (Dance) Wave’ while exposing the labour structures that sustain its myth. Beyond its …
Enabling Effects of Digital Technology on Enterprise Export Product Quality
Irreplaceable, high‐quality exports are strategic imperatives for global supply chain competitiveness in the era of digital transformation. This paper employs an extended model of heterogeneity in firm trade theory to analyse the factors influencing export product quality. And this study empirically assesses the impact and underlying mechanisms of digital technology applications on export product quality, utilising unbalanced panel data from Chin…
Friction and tension at work. On practices of leadership in contemporary dance
This article examines the dynamics of friction and tension in contemporary dance, focusing on the precarious working conditions within the Flemish dance sector. Recent studies have highlighted how such conditions often foster unspoken tensions and perpetuate a culture of silencing. In particular, high-profile cases in the Flemish arts have demonstrated how asymmetrical power relationships in dance environments can disproportionately burden one pa…
(Un)Teaching the Canon. An Approach to Teaching Dance History in Western Europe
This article examines the challenges and possibilities of teaching dance history in Western Europe through a pedagogical approach that both teaches and unteaches the canon. Drawing on my experiences as a dance history lecturer, I explore how such engagement with the canon enables students to develop essential skills in performance analysis. Through discussion of historiographical critiques, contemporary performances, and pedagogical strategies, I…
Presence Rewired
This article examines digital dance, not in opposition to physical bodies but in material continuity with them. By offering an expansive notion of ‘presence’ in dance, we intend to supersede the binarism that condemns the digital as mere traces of the ‘real’ or as a blunt synonym for the ‘virtual’ and the ‘immaterial’. We depart from a historical overview of attempts to capture bodily creativity into mediated forms according to the values of each…
The rise of techno-geopolitical uncertainty
Flexible Performativity
Scholarly work rarely examines the labor of the contemporary dance artist as a performer. Flexible performativity describes the discrete skill set dancers today must be able to deploy in performance. Flexible performativity and its characteristics of negotiating proximity, autodramaturgy, hyperindividualism, and hyperreferentialism mold the dancer prototypical of the movement logics of the early 21st century
The nexus between the cultural and creative industries and the Sustainable Development Goals
Scholars and policymakers have widely claimed that the cultural and creative industries (CCIs) provide positive knowledge externalities that can help address sustainable development challenges, yet questions remain about the pathways through which this occurs. In this study, we hypothesise that several features of knowledge networks in the CCIs relate to a location’s sustainable development outcomes. We use data of ownership networks between 22,4…
Foreign direct investment along the Belt and Road
In 2013, China launched its ambitious Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), a large portfolio of infrastructure projects across 71 countries intended to link Eurasian markets by rail and sea. The state-led nature of the Initiative combined with its transformative geopolitical implications have conditioned the type of engagement that many governments and firms in host and third countries are willing to take in Chinese-funded BRI projects. Building on tw…
Coloured Swan
In my ethnographic fieldwork in the contemporary dance scene in Brussels, I followed closely which struggles Moya Michael had to overcome as a South African maker in the European contemporary dance sector trying to sell her work. As a female artist of color, she cannot escape the fetishistic gaze emphasizing her exoticized body, a body imagined as exotic vis-à-vis institutional whiteness. This article examines how the work environment in the cont…
Living up to a bohemian work ethic. Balancing autonomy and risk in the symbolic economy of the performing arts
Cruel Optimism, Ironic Pessimism, Poetic Terrorism
Meyoucycle (2016) was the eagerly awaited result of a collaboration between choreographer Eleanor Bauer and composer Chris Peck. The characters of this dance and song–cycle have developed tactics to withstand the exploitative demands of neoliberal semiocapitalism; the creative team deployed performative and dramaturgical tactics for the same purpose
Chasing Your Own Tail
In 1996, Maurizio Lazzarato defined the concept of immaterial labour as the kind of labour that produces the informational and cultural content of the commodity. The production cycle of this kind of labour is not defined by the factory walls, but happens in society.1 Building on this idea, I argue that the artist’s production process does not happen between the studio walls alone, but should be considered as a more inclusive notion happening in s…
How do firms in co-located clusters interact? Evidence from Greater Montreal
We developed a theoretical framework to explore how firms agglomerate and develop linkages within and across co-located clusters in a competitive urban economy. We applied our framework to Montreal, where we analyzed relationships among its aerospace, information technology and artificial intelligence firms. Using network community structure analysis, we show that firm linkages largely agglomerate within industrial lines. However, there are impor…
Mayday, Mayday, Mayday! Moving from European Discourses on the Precarious and Art to the Realities of Contemporary Dance
In this article, we encapsulate several key debates in sociology, cultural and arts politics and the media industry on precarious work since its emergence at the turn of the twenty-first century. After setting out the fundamental discourses on precarity, we concentrate on contemporary dance artists as precarious workers and investigate the extent to which different levels of precarity affect them, distinguishing relevant aspects related to socio-…
Global value chains and development
The global value chain (GVC) framework has taken the development policy world by storm. Since its academic origins 25 years ago, the framework has rapidly evolved into a major paradigm that is used by a wide range of international organizations, including the International Labor Organization, the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development, the World Bank and the World Trade Organization. The policy appeal of the framework lies in the deve…
Structure and evolution of global cluster networks
We use a new panel dataset to study the network of formal firm linkages within and across 52 aerospace clusters in North America and Europe. Our theoretical framework, built upon the knowledge-based cluster and global value chains literature, suggests that a reduction in spatial transaction costs has induced clusters to specialize in increasingly fine-grained value chain stages. This should cause the overall network to evolve from a geographicall…
Contracting institutions and ownership structure in international joint ventures
HIV/Aids and time allocation in rural Malawi
AIDS-related morbidity and mortality are expected to have a large economic impact in rural Malawi, because they reduce the time that adults can spend on production for subsistence and on income-generating activities. However, households may compensate for production losses by reallocating tasks among household members. The data demands for measuring these effects are high, limiting the amount of empirical evidence. In this paper, we utilize a uni…
HIV infection does not disproportionately affect the poorer in sub-Saharan Africa
BACKGROUND: Wealthier populations do better than poorer ones on most measures of health status, including nutrition, morbidity and mortality, and healthcare utilization. OBJECTIVES: This study examines the association between household wealth status and HIV serostatus to identify what characteristics and behaviours are associated with HIV infection, and the role of confounding factors such as place of residence and other risk factors. METHODS: Da…
Global value chains and development
The global value chain (GVC) framework has taken the development policy world by storm. Since its academic origins 25 years ago, the framework has rapidly evolved into a major paradigm that is used by a wide range of international organizations, including the International Labor Organization, the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development, the World Bank and the World Trade Organization. The policy appeal of the framework lies in the deve…
How do firms in co-located clusters interact? Evidence from Greater Montreal
We developed a theoretical framework to explore how firms agglomerate and develop linkages within and across co-located clusters in a competitive urban economy. We applied our framework to Montreal, where we analyzed relationships among its aerospace, information technology and artificial intelligence firms. Using network community structure analysis, we show that firm linkages largely agglomerate within industrial lines. However, there are impor…
The nexus between the cultural and creative industries and the Sustainable Development Goals
Scholars and policymakers have widely claimed that the cultural and creative industries (CCIs) provide positive knowledge externalities that can help address sustainable development challenges, yet questions remain about the pathways through which this occurs. In this study, we hypothesise that several features of knowledge networks in the CCIs relate to a location’s sustainable development outcomes. We use data of ownership networks between 22,4…
Living up to a bohemian work ethic. Balancing autonomy and risk in the symbolic economy of the performing arts
Structure and evolution of global cluster networks
We use a new panel dataset to study the network of formal firm linkages within and across 52 aerospace clusters in North America and Europe. Our theoretical framework, built upon the knowledge-based cluster and global value chains literature, suggests that a reduction in spatial transaction costs has induced clusters to specialize in increasingly fine-grained value chain stages. This should cause the overall network to evolve from a geographicall…
Coloured Swan
In my ethnographic fieldwork in the contemporary dance scene in Brussels, I followed closely which struggles Moya Michael had to overcome as a South African maker in the European contemporary dance sector trying to sell her work. As a female artist of color, she cannot escape the fetishistic gaze emphasizing her exoticized body, a body imagined as exotic vis-à-vis institutional whiteness. This article examines how the work environment in the cont…
HIV infection does not disproportionately affect the poorer in sub-Saharan Africa
BACKGROUND: Wealthier populations do better than poorer ones on most measures of health status, including nutrition, morbidity and mortality, and healthcare utilization. OBJECTIVES: This study examines the association between household wealth status and HIV serostatus to identify what characteristics and behaviours are associated with HIV infection, and the role of confounding factors such as place of residence and other risk factors. METHODS: Da…
HIV/Aids and time allocation in rural Malawi
AIDS-related morbidity and mortality are expected to have a large economic impact in rural Malawi, because they reduce the time that adults can spend on production for subsistence and on income-generating activities. However, households may compensate for production losses by reallocating tasks among household members. The data demands for measuring these effects are high, limiting the amount of empirical evidence. In this paper, we utilize a uni…
Contracting institutions and ownership structure in international joint ventures
Structure and evolution of global cluster networks
We use a new panel dataset to study the network of formal firm linkages within and across 52 aerospace clusters in North America and Europe. Our theoretical framework, built upon the knowledge-based cluster and global value chains literature, suggests that a reduction in spatial transaction costs has induced clusters to specialize in increasingly fine-grained value chain stages. This should cause the overall network to evolve from a geographicall…
Mayday, Mayday, Mayday! Moving from European Discourses on the Precarious and Art to the Realities of Contemporary Dance
In this article, we encapsulate several key debates in sociology, cultural and arts politics and the media industry on precarious work since its emergence at the turn of the twenty-first century. After setting out the fundamental discourses on precarity, we concentrate on contemporary dance artists as precarious workers and investigate the extent to which different levels of precarity affect them, distinguishing relevant aspects related to socio-…
Global value chains and development
The global value chain (GVC) framework has taken the development policy world by storm. Since its academic origins 25 years ago, the framework has rapidly evolved into a major paradigm that is used by a wide range of international organizations, including the International Labor Organization, the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development, the World Bank and the World Trade Organization. The policy appeal of the framework lies in the deve…
Chasing Your Own Tail
In 1996, Maurizio Lazzarato defined the concept of immaterial labour as the kind of labour that produces the informational and cultural content of the commodity. The production cycle of this kind of labour is not defined by the factory walls, but happens in society.1 Building on this idea, I argue that the artist’s production process does not happen between the studio walls alone, but should be considered as a more inclusive notion happening in s…
How do firms in co-located clusters interact? Evidence from Greater Montreal
We developed a theoretical framework to explore how firms agglomerate and develop linkages within and across co-located clusters in a competitive urban economy. We applied our framework to Montreal, where we analyzed relationships among its aerospace, information technology and artificial intelligence firms. Using network community structure analysis, we show that firm linkages largely agglomerate within industrial lines. However, there are impor…
Cruel Optimism, Ironic Pessimism, Poetic Terrorism
Meyoucycle (2016) was the eagerly awaited result of a collaboration between choreographer Eleanor Bauer and composer Chris Peck. The characters of this dance and song–cycle have developed tactics to withstand the exploitative demands of neoliberal semiocapitalism; the creative team deployed performative and dramaturgical tactics for the same purpose
Foreign direct investment along the Belt and Road
In 2013, China launched its ambitious Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), a large portfolio of infrastructure projects across 71 countries intended to link Eurasian markets by rail and sea. The state-led nature of the Initiative combined with its transformative geopolitical implications have conditioned the type of engagement that many governments and firms in host and third countries are willing to take in Chinese-funded BRI projects. Building on tw…
Coloured Swan
In my ethnographic fieldwork in the contemporary dance scene in Brussels, I followed closely which struggles Moya Michael had to overcome as a South African maker in the European contemporary dance sector trying to sell her work. As a female artist of color, she cannot escape the fetishistic gaze emphasizing her exoticized body, a body imagined as exotic vis-à-vis institutional whiteness. This article examines how the work environment in the cont…
Living up to a bohemian work ethic. Balancing autonomy and risk in the symbolic economy of the performing arts
The rise of techno-geopolitical uncertainty
Flexible Performativity
Scholarly work rarely examines the labor of the contemporary dance artist as a performer. Flexible performativity describes the discrete skill set dancers today must be able to deploy in performance. Flexible performativity and its characteristics of negotiating proximity, autodramaturgy, hyperindividualism, and hyperreferentialism mold the dancer prototypical of the movement logics of the early 21st century
The nexus between the cultural and creative industries and the Sustainable Development Goals
Scholars and policymakers have widely claimed that the cultural and creative industries (CCIs) provide positive knowledge externalities that can help address sustainable development challenges, yet questions remain about the pathways through which this occurs. In this study, we hypothesise that several features of knowledge networks in the CCIs relate to a location’s sustainable development outcomes. We use data of ownership networks between 22,4…
Friction and tension at work. On practices of leadership in contemporary dance
This article examines the dynamics of friction and tension in contemporary dance, focusing on the precarious working conditions within the Flemish dance sector. Recent studies have highlighted how such conditions often foster unspoken tensions and perpetuate a culture of silencing. In particular, high-profile cases in the Flemish arts have demonstrated how asymmetrical power relationships in dance environments can disproportionately burden one pa…
(Un)Teaching the Canon. An Approach to Teaching Dance History in Western Europe
This article examines the challenges and possibilities of teaching dance history in Western Europe through a pedagogical approach that both teaches and unteaches the canon. Drawing on my experiences as a dance history lecturer, I explore how such engagement with the canon enables students to develop essential skills in performance analysis. Through discussion of historiographical critiques, contemporary performances, and pedagogical strategies, I…
Presence Rewired
This article examines digital dance, not in opposition to physical bodies but in material continuity with them. By offering an expansive notion of ‘presence’ in dance, we intend to supersede the binarism that condemns the digital as mere traces of the ‘real’ or as a blunt synonym for the ‘virtual’ and the ‘immaterial’. We depart from a historical overview of attempts to capture bodily creativity into mediated forms according to the values of each…
What’s the cost of mastery? Flemish Primitives and the labour behind the myth of Flemish dance
This article examines how Flemish Primitives (2022), by Chokri Ben Chikha and his company Action Zoo Humain, interrogates artistic mastery in contemporary dance from Flanders. Framed as a satirical talent show in which six dancers with migrant and diasporic backgrounds compete to become the next Flemish Master, the performance revisits the legacy of the ‘Flemish (Dance) Wave’ while exposing the labour structures that sustain its myth. Beyond its …
Enabling Effects of Digital Technology on Enterprise Export Product Quality
Irreplaceable, high‐quality exports are strategic imperatives for global supply chain competitiveness in the era of digital transformation. This paper employs an extended model of heterogeneity in firm trade theory to analyse the factors influencing export product quality. And this study empirically assesses the impact and underlying mechanisms of digital technology applications on export product quality, utilising unbalanced panel data from Chin…
Sociology (11 works) · Dance (9 works) · Diversity and Impact of Dance (9 works) · Economics (9 works) · Political science (8 works) · Law (7 works) · Theatre and Performance Studies (7 works) · Aesthetics (6 works) · Art (6 works) · Business (6 works)