Culture Sector Platforms - Call for Expressions of Interest
(2008 03 26 14:04)
This call is published by EUROPEAN COMMISSION, Education and Culture, Culture, Multilingualism and Communication. The aim of the call is to give organisations from the culture civil society the opportunity
to express their interest in participating in the structured dialogue with the European Commission.
Last November, the Culture Ministers of the EU Member States approved the European Agenda for Culture on the basis of the Communication presented by the Commission in May 2007. The success of the Agenda is very much dependent on the active involvement of the cultural sector. The First Cultural Forum for Europe held under the Portuguese Presidency on 27-28 September 2007 in Lisbon gathered many cultural NGOs from all over Europe and gave its support to the Agenda. Consequently, the Commission intends to implement an on-going structured dialogue with the cultural sector through three thematic Platforms: intercultural dialogue, access to culture and cultural and creative industries.
As far as intercultural dialogue is concerned, there is already a well-functioning civil society platform set up jointly by the European Forum for the Arts and Heritage and the European Cultural Foundation, which meets regularly and produces concrete, policy oriented results, such as the Rainbow Paper process. The Commission proposes therefore that civil society sets up two new complementary platforms on the other two topics i.e. access to culture and cultural and creative industries.
Platforms will be open to cultural organisations with a trans-national or European-wide dimension and but only those representing civil society. Public authorities, whether national, regional or local, are not invited to participate.
Each platform will be responsible for defining its work schedule during a constitutive meeting, planned to take place in Brussels in early June.
Timetable
15 April 2008: Deadline for expression of interest for organisations wishing to participate in the first
constitutive meeting
June 2008: First constitutive meeting of the platforms in Brussels
More information can be found here.