Sustaining Cultural Development

This book explores the relevance of new sources, dimensions, and characteristics of knowledge for supporting creative and cultural organizations and initiatives. Special emphasis is placed on cultural heritage, participatory approaches, and entrepreneurship in the cultural and creative sector. The role of cultural heritage and contemporary culture as a source of economically effective, socially sustainable development is also discussed. The authors examine new ways of developing and testing new and innovative models of management for cultural heritage assets. In line with the participatory approaches in culture heritage governance promoted by the EU, the authors analyze participatory approaches to cultural and creative initiatives. The role of public and private actors, as well as the way they interact with each other in order to achieve collective outcomes, is of particular interest in this section of the book. With regard to cultural and creative entrepreneurship, the book adds an innovative view of cultural ventures, offering some clues from an entrepreneurial ecosystem perspective.

In Sustaining Cultural Development, Biljana Mickov and James Doyle argue that effective programmes to promote greater participation in cultural life require substantial investment in research and strategic planning. Using studies from contributors throughout Europe, they look at ways to promote cultural life as the centre of the broader sustainable development of society. These studies illustrate how combining cultural identity, cultural diversity and creativity with increased participation of citizens in cultural life improves harmonized cultural development and promotes democracy. They indicate a shift from traditional governance of the cultural sector to a new, more horizontal, approach that links cultural workers at different levels in different sectors and different locations. This book will stimulate debate amongst cultural leaders, city managers and other policy makers, as well as serving as a resource for researchers and those teaching and learning on a range of post-graduate courses and programmes.

The concept of sustainable development is commonly divided into environmental, economic, social and cultural dimensions. While a variety of international actors have declared the importance of culture in sustainable development, jointly articulating this clearly has been difficult. For example, the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) that were adopted by the UN General Assembly in September 2015 contained only the most fleeting mention of culture. None of the SDGs referred directly to the case for integrating culture into sustainable development planning and decision-making. The role of cultural policy has remained unclear. This book contributes to a better understanding of the role of culture in achieving sustainability, focusing on the particular roles for cultural policy in this context. Cultural sustainability is conceptualised as the sustainability of cultural and artistic practices and patterns, and to the role of cultural traits and actions to inform and compose part of the pathways towards more sustainable societies. The links between culture and sustainable development are analysed in ways that articulate and contemplate different roles for cultural policy. The contributors take up the concerns and perspectives of international, national, and local authorities and actors, illuminating ways in which these multi-scale efforts both intersect and diverge. This book was originally published as a special issue of the International Journal of Cultural Policy.

Throughout the South Pacific, notions of ‘culture’ and ‘development’ are very much alive—in political debate, the media, sermons, and endless discussions amongst villagers and the urban élites, even in policy reports. Often the terms are counterposed, and development along with ‘economic rationality’, ‘good governance’ and ‘progress’ is set against culture or ‘custom’, ‘tradition’ and ‘identity’. The decay of custom and impoverishment of culture are often seen as wrought by development, while failures of development are haunted by the notion that they are due, somehow, to the darker, irrational influences of culture. The problem is to resolve the contradictions between them so as to achieve the greater good—access to material goods, welfare and amenities, ‘modern life’—without the sacrifice of the ‘traditional’ values and institutions that provide material security and sustain diverse social identities. Resolution is sought in this book by a number of leading writers from the South Pacific including Langi Kavaliku, Epeli Hau’ofa, Marshall Sahlins, Malama Meleisea, Joeli Veitayaki, and Tarcisius Tara Kabutaulaka. The volume is brought together for UNESCO by Antony Hooper, Professor Emeritus at the University of Auckland. UNESCO experts include Richard Engelhardt, Langi Kavaliku, Russell Marshall, Malama Meleisea, Edna Tait and Mali Voi.

"This current volume is a result of the Seventh and Eighth International Forum on Sustainable Technological Development in a Globalizing World. The Seventh Forum was held June 9-12, 2010 in Berlin. The Karlsruhe Institute of Technology hosted the event, which was organized around culture and sustainability. What we each value as a society, as a country, in our culture, is what we want to protect. What is sustainable is only what we value. This applies all the more to sustainable development which is planned for long time scales and therefore to go beyond individual sustainable technology solutions as well as economic and political cycles. What we hold in high regard is the result of cultural influences. Consequently, we need cultural change in the sense of sustainable development in order to secure sustainability pathways in the long term. The key question arising is whether and how this change can be brought about. The following Introduction leads us into the specific discussion. At the end of the Seventh Forum, participants concluded that more specific case studies would be useful and recommended that the Eighth Forum provide a focus for case studies. Since the remainder of the Eighth Forum, held March 8-10, 2011, in Melbourne, Florida, focused on Alternative Energy with oral papers not really appropriate as written papers, it was decided to include the case studies in combination with those papers from Berlin to provide a holistic discussion of culture and sustainability. That is the concept for this volume."--P.13-14.

The cultural sector plays an important role in sustainable economic development and creates economic activities, opportunities for entrepreneurship and jobs, adding to the attractiveness of cities and contributing to the development of tourism. The Cultural Sector and Sustainable Economic Development: Innovation and the Creative Economy in European Cities offers both a theoretical and practical analysis of the contemporary approach to culture and innovation, with special emphasis on the relationships among culture, innovation and the economy. Sustainable development, itself, balances environmental protection, culture, social progress, the economy and stability today and for the future. The book’s key theme is the role and possibility of culture as a laboratory, with a strong supporting subtext on innovative practice. The text provides an eclectic mix of possibilities that reinforce and underscore the full innovative and complex potentials of culture. It is a cross-disciplinary volume presenting case studies that cover the main theme of cultural ecosystem in a very broad sense, highlighting the relationships that could lead to a sustainable system where economy and culture are the main players. It proposes and maps the European perspective of urban cultural development and suggests that the successes and challenges of European cities under consideration may offer guidance on best practices for urban development in other distant cultural contexts. This book is written in such a way that it can be used as a summary for a cultural professional, a reference text for an academic or for actors in local development and cultural policy at European, national and local levels.

If the political and social benchmarks of sustainability and sustainable development are to be met, ignoring the role of the humanities and social, cultural and ethical values is highly problematic. People’s worldviews, beliefs and principles have an immediate impact on how they act and should be studied as cultural dimensions of sustainability. Collating contributions from internationally renowned theoreticians of culture and leading researchers working in the humanities and social sciences, this volume presents an in-depth, interdisciplinary discussion of the concept of cultural sustainability and the public visibility of such research. Beginning with a discussion of the concept of cultural sustainability, it goes on to explore its interaction with philosophy, theology, sociology, economics, arts and literature. In doing so, the book develops a much needed concept of ‘culture’ that can be adapted to various disciplines and applied to research on sustainability. Addressing an important gap in sustainability research, this book will be of great interest to academics and students of sustainability and sustainable development, as well as those studying sustainability within the humanities and social sciences, such as cultural studies, ethics, theology, sociology, literature and history.

Cultural vitality is an essential to a healthy and sustainable society as social equity, envrinmental responsibilty and economic viability. In order for public planning to be more effective, its methodology should include an integrated framework of cultural evaluation similar to social, environmental and economic assessment.