The European Cultural Parliament (ECP) was founded in the premises of the Council of Europe, Strasbourg, in 2001, upon the initiative of the Swedish Ambassador Karl-Erik Norrman (KEN). The objective was – and is – to strengthen the role of cultural and artistic ideas and initiatives in Europe. In addition, the founders of the ECP wished to strengthen the dialogue between citizens in Eastern and Western Europe and between the various arts sectors.
The ECP-FG was created within the ECP in 2017.
To finalise our campaign on 'Art and Sustainability', Karl-Erik Norrman answered questions about the role and challenges of culture and the arts in Europe, as well as the perspective of including sustainability within the organisation.
1. Is the organization an NGO ? How old is the organization?
KEN: Yes, it is a German-based NGO. The legal basis of the European Cultural Parliament is “Verein für ein Europäisches Kulturparlament”, Klett-Haus, Stuttgart.
The first session was held in 2002. We will be celebrating twenty years next year.
2. Is it a small or large sized organisation ?
KEN: It is small in terms of administration as we are living without any core budget. It is run by a small group of senior Europeans personalities and myself, which makes up what we call the senate. It is where we are discuss strategies and the next steps to take. However, the membership is relatively big, we have 160 members from 43 European countries.
3. How is the organisation contributing to the strengthening of an European sentiment, i.e. affection to EU values, traditions, common language and heritage ?
KEN: That is one of our main missions. When we started, we felt that the idea of Europe was mainly promoted in a political or economical way and less through the use of its soft power. We feel very much that the strength of Europe resides in its soft power: a democratic tradition, a human rights tradition and a long-standing tradition around the arts and culture. Hence, we thought of creating a forum for artists, musicians, philosophers, historians, authors, architects, who come not discuss their own art forms but to discuss Europe from their perspective. In this sense, we are adding another dimension to Europe.
4. Facing greater diversity with the flux of migrants and on the other side the surge of populist parties, how challenging is it today to create an attachment to an European identity ?
KEN: There are many challenges at the moment. I can safely say that during these last twenty years the situation for Europe and the support from pro-Europeans has degraded. It was different fifteen years ago, when we were rather euphoric. Twelve years ago came the financial crisis, followed by the conflict in Ukraine that dig a gap between Russia and the rest of Europe. In 2015, we had the immigration influx to manage and now in 2020 we have the Corona crisis. You can see there are too many crises for Europe to be faring well. Still, I remain optimistic and believe that Europe can go through with a reasonable fashion, but the challenges are big.
Elsewhere, there are also differences which we did not have fifteen years ago. We have a rather clear economical division between Northern Europe and Southern Europe, as well as a divide between Eastern Europe and Western Europe regarding migration issues. One of our big challenges is to bridge these gaps.
Coming along with the Corona crisis, we saw a surge of neo-nationalism as an additional problem, where each one tries to get as many vaccines as possible for oneself, whilst neglecting the European totality. Nobody was prepared for this crisis, so the reactions from the nations states were quicker than the decisions from Brussels to implement. This is due to the slower democratic process when voting for measures as a union and to other bureaucratic reasons.
5. Would you say some European states are better in facilitating access to culture and artistic activities ?
KEN: In France, Germany, Scandinavia, and to some extent in the Netherlands and in Belgium, there is an enduring tradition of public subsidies to artistic training and to the cultural sector as a whole. There is a self-evident responsibility for the states, for the regions or for the local communities to support arts and culture. It is from taxpayers’ money and they are willing to do so because they feel that arts and culture are an important aspect of their lifestyle. It should be encouraged that children learn music or art in schools, and that cultural institutions and individuals are cared for their activities.
This is a strength of the European states, it is quite different in other parts of the world like the United States of America where arts and culture are very much dependent on private sponsorship and philanthropists.
Within Europe, there may be some differences as well. We need to show a lot of patience to the Eastern states because of their special history. They have been independent for only thirty years from the Soviet block. During that regime, every aspect of life was public and state-financed. People felt the pressure to go to the museums, to attend concerts and so on. When the state control of these countries dissolved, the pendulum swing to the opposite and to a total privatisation. The commercial aspects took over to a very large extent. As far as the European commitment to the arts and culture is concerned, we probably will have to wait another generation before the pendulum has reached some balance, when the people's desire to perform or consume arts and culture is initiated by themselves. This is an interesting process in which the Eastern countries are currently in. In Western Europe, we had more or less the same kind of policies throughout the ages, so we had the time to build up a tradition of public support combined to a spontaneous interest among the population.
6. What past or current project and agenda are pointing towards sustainable development ?
KEN: I will be able to tell you more about it after our meeting in September. We have planned it a few times already but I am afraid that other issues, such as the theme around 'values' or migration were higher up in priority. Five years ago, I had planned to put sustainability as our main theme but it did not happen then. I am quite confident it will happen, as most of us are very much aware of it. Not the least our large number of excellent architects who in their daily lives work on sustainability issues, like on making our cities greener. A Danish member of ours, Helle Juul, presented in Armenia a project on the sustainable city parts. Unfortunately, we do not have the resources to embark on projects ourselves but still we can encourage such initiatives.
7. Does the ECP reward grants ?
KEN: We planned to do so however some five years ago the climate for sponsoring the arts and culture from organisations such as ours has become tougher. We used to have a budget for smaller events some ten years back in time.
8. How is this cultural organisation a source of social value ? How is it engaging with civil society?
KEN: We had eighteen sessions so far and have been each time in different cities of Europe, from Liverpool, or Lisboa in the West to Yerevan in Armenia in the East. In all these different cities we had representatives from cultural fields and civil society, where we exchanged point of views and spread messages about the role of culture in society. Moreover, each member back home stands as an ambassador for our main visions in their respective civil societies.
9. What place holds the cultural parliament, between private parties and the government ?
KEN: We want to have good relations with both. Some of us even had government functions, but not at the same time as their membership to the ECP. Also, we are reporting our declarations to both the Council of Europe in Strasbourg and to the President of the European Commission in Brussels. Moreover, each member when coming back home reports to his/her respective government. So governments, European Institutions are aware of our work and civil society to the extent that it is reached through our meetings. We are also building more and more contacts outside of Europe, as some of our networks are dealing with Latin America, Africa and Asia.
Elsewhere, we are building bridges with other sectors, for example we are connecting culture with peace activities and human rights activities.
10. Are there artists playing an active role in the organization ? If yes, how close is the audience to the artist ?
KEN: Yes, we had it several times musicians and theatre actors performing. Also some visual artists came to present their work. As a matter of fact it is a big part of our sessions, which are usually open to the public, so non-members, local observers and the media can take part of them.
To know more about the ECP: http://www.kulturparlament.com/