Eight European capital cities – Amsterdam, Dublin, Lisbon, London, Riga, Sofia, Tallinn and Vilnius – collaborate on inclusive cultural policies to open up culture to all citizens. The aim is to bring about a real shift in cultural policymaking and as a result ensure access to culture for all citizens.
Diversity both a strength and challenge
The varied social, economic and ethnic backgrounds in cities, as well as different religions and lifestyles, provide an ideal breeding ground for innovation. However, cities are also facing growing social, economic and geographic inequalities. Isolation and political polarization, often caused by a lack of understanding between different groups, are major societal problems. The ACCESS network believes culture has the ability to facilitate greater understanding of individuals and their lives, increase empathy towards others and develop an appreciation of the diversity of human experience and cultures.
Cities as a driving force
The ambition of using culture as a driving force for a more diverse, tolerant and integrated city is not new, but it has never been elevated to an international partnership of urban authorities of this caliber. The eight partner cities represent a wide variety of sizes, views, histories and political structures, but also share a fundamental commonality on a national level. As capital cities, we face similar responsibilities and challenges concerning our central roles as national economic drivers; in creating social and cultural identities; as the most populous cities of our countries and through our anchor positions in (inter)national urban networks.
The importance of cultural policy
Current local cultural policies and strategies fail to reach or provide benefits to everyone and as a result, there is unequal access to the cultural offer of our cities. The aim of this collaboration is to gain a better understanding of our communities so that we can develop effective inclusive engagement in culture throughout our cities by focusing on the following three main policy challenges: gathering knowledge, data and information; spreading cultural activity across the city and widening participation.
The approach / method
The Network is developed in two phases:
Phase I – 6 months: September 2019 – March 2020
Phase II – 24 months (application approved): June 2020 – June 2022
On international level the ACCESS cities will share knowledge and best practices and learn from eachother.
An important part of the project is the so-called URBACT Local Group. This is a group of local stakeholders who jointly think about the main challenge of ACCESS. This ultimately leads to the drafting of an Integrated Local Action Plan, from which concrete actions follow. Each ACCESS city forms a Local Group and works with this group closely over the course of the project.