ENCATC applauds the new EU guidelines for the cultural sector
On the
29th June 2021, the Commission Vice-President in charge of promoting
the European Way of Life, Margaritis Schinas together with the Commissioner for
Culture, Mariya Gabriel presented the Commission guidelines for
the safe re-opening of the cultural sector.
The European network on cultural management and policy, ENCATC, welcomes this new important initiative of the European Commission that arrives at a time when the epidemiological situation is improving and COVID-19 vaccination campaigns are speeding up, Member States are gradually reopening cultural venues and activities.
ENCATC congratulates the Commissioner Mariya Gabriel both for her recognition of the crucial role of culture and of the CCSI for the EU’s sustainable recovery and for her call to the Members States and the CCIs actors to ensure stronger connection between culture, education, and well-being. The aim of the Commission is to push these two key players in the cultural ecosystem to invest into skills, digital training, and digital capacity-building and thus to promote new training models, peer learning and upskilling.
In this respect, ENCATC is proud to have already applied to join the Pact for skills initiative and thus to bring this contribution to the Commission’s wish to give cultural workers and professionals the new skills that are needed for the digital recovery, to continue supporting professionals in equipping them with the needed skills to fully embrace the opportunities offered by digital technologies, both for creative and business purposes.
ENCATC recognises the importance and is committed to support the creation of synergies across digital managers and strengthen digital capacity building as well as of supporting the exchange of information across the CCSI, and, as appropriate, with the scientific community.
The Commission guidelines also stress the importance to collect and analyse data to better understand the post Covid scenario and build sound policies for the sector. ENCATC strongly believes in the urgent need to define new policy scenarios build on research. It is exactly for this reason that ENCATC launched last 26th of May 2020 a Think Tank made up of a diverse group of professionals, academics, researchers, and representatives of EU cultural networks. The aim of this new ENCATC initiative is both to share with the members of the Think Tank curated information about the latest news on the impact of the pandemia for the cultural sector and in the same time gather, analyse, and come away with robust findings for evidence-based policy recommendations that could allow the cultural sector to better navigate during the current and future turbulent times.
By recognising that these new guidelines are extremely important for the cultural ecosystem recovery, ENCATC President, Francesca Imperiale, has commented: “There is no question the COVID-19 crisis has severely impacted cultural and creative sectors (CCS) throughout the different waves Europe and the world have experienced to date. While different episodes in these recent developments have brought about different consequences for the specific impact of great lockdown and post-lockdown measures on CCS –, the whole crisis has brought (back) to the fore serious challenges for the CCS, some of which are new, but most of which have been only emphasized by the current crisis. Among the latter, the debates about the role and status of the artist are all but new. I am proud that ENCATC is offering next 19-22 of October a platform for discussion at a global scale about this issue and is inviting policy makers from international, European and Regional institutions to join a round table organised the 22 of October to define together with the sector new policy scenarios in the field of education, culture and research”.
By commenting the new guidelines, the ENCATC Secretary General, Giannalia Cogliandro Beyens, said: “ENCATC is ready to disseminate and promote this new important initiative inside its network of universities, research centres and cultural professionals and outside to its community of knowledge. I truly believe, as underlined in the document, that strong connections between universities, research, and innovation institutions and the entire cultural ecosystem are key to success in this recovery phase.
Brussels, 2.07.2021
ENCATC is the leading European network on cultural management and policy. It is an independent membership organisation gathering over 100 higher education institutions and cultural organisations in over 40 countries. ENCATC was founded in 1992 to represent, advocate and promote cultural management and cultural policy education, professionalise the cultural sector to make it sustainable, and to create a platform of discussion and exchange at the European and international level. ENCATC holds the status of an NGO in official partnership with UNESCO, of observer to the Steering Committee for Culture of the Council of Europe, and is co-funded by the Creative Europe programme of the European Union.