NOTE: The following entry was researched and written by yours truly. Any corrections, suggestions, general questions, should be directed to this email address > metronomad@lycos.com CULTURAL DIVERSITY, CREATIVITY"Our Creative Diversity" talks about the culture that has a broader sense that encompasses much more than the functional and/or constituent sense. Functional that is divided into arts, cultural products and cultural industries and the constituent, which are the values, customs, beliefs and traditions or identity.
Integrative policy frameworks.It has been discussed extensively in the UNESCO’s report, “Our Creative Diversity” various points that will aid the determination of applicable policy and legal frameworks. To determine the real notion of the concept, it is paramount to broaden the perspective considerably. Cultural policy that is defined by the governments should find a way to address and bind issues concerning various segments of the society’s plural culture. To be able to apply the policies effectively, it is vital to take into account the diversity of the culture and not to “ghettoise” certain groups. It should be the linking force to bind not only multi-ethnic societies but as well as the marginalized culture such as women and underrepresented groups.
Gender Equity. An effective cultural policy seeks means of stimulating creativity in many respects such as in politics, technology, industry and commerce, in education, in the arts as well as in social and community development. The media has a greater role to play in furthering the information flow throughout many segments of the society. Various programs should be designed to facilitate the accessibility of everyone and creating a fairer distribution of resources and of power where marginalized group could actively take part in the developmental pursuit.
Integrative policy implies the notion of setting a different perspective that emulates the younger to lead the role as bearer of future generations, and this entail a fresher and diversified approach to the cultural heritage and finally for a better understanding of different dimension and management of diverse culture.
From arts to creativity. Professional arts and artists are the essential contributor to the aesthetic life of the society, but often, cultural policies are only focused on them. This results to the underdevelopment of the general creativity. The objective must be able to extend and refocus beyond the arts and the heritage. Oftentimes that the policy address a popular support and enhances only the institutional support of the established artists and those who has the so-called “high” art status thus neglecting the popular and amateur art. In turn, it diminishes the participation of the general society and ineligibility for support. Policy in this respect should enhance the creativity in governance and decision-making, community arts, innovation and problem solving. It is debateable which cultural policy is apt to the standards that would support specialized education and trainings that eventually encourage creativity.
Making the Arts Accessible to Everyone Creativity, copyright and the artist. With the new technology at hand, cultural goods and art forms are progressively extending to the far reaches of the world. Distances and borders are crossed and interlinked in considerable time. The distribution has broadened and new horizon has opened up for the artists but it has also jeopardized the protection of their rights. Now, It is paramount to reconsider the mechanisms employed in the recognition due the artists and not only about the legal mechanism but the support system as well. It is the way to balance the culture and the marketplace where various instruments could be employed to deliberate and try to resolve the tension between fair play of commercialism and the need of diverse cultural development.
Training and awareness building. Strategies should include a broader view on the management and employment of cultural policy. The ones being practiced nowadays is short of good understanding and often fail to meet the need of a complex cultural policy and management. A multi-disciplinary strategy is essential to include a broader perspective that touches various disciplines such as arts, administration, business development, tourism, urban and regional planning and heritage among others. The training bases normally do not provide enough room to creatively link various perspectives.
Sustainability: Material and non-material well-being A consideration has to be given to the extension of the idea of sustainability to a wider range that is to discern these values for the long term, a view of the dynamic, evolutionary, inter-temporal and intergenerational aspects of heritage, its supply and demand, its production and consumption. A theoretical framework for such a view is provided by the concept of sustainability. The notion of sustainable development of heritage extends beyond the material attainment by which it provides non-material benefits for now and in the future. Collectively or individually, the heritage can be allowed to deteriorate overtime, or can be maintained or augmented in a way that it suits the purpose. In other words, it can be managed the way it suits the individual or collective purpose.
The flow of goods and services produced from the capital [natural and cultural capital] provide both material and non-material benefits for people as individuals or as a member of the society. Material benefits are those direct and observable contributions to improving standard of living, for example by creating incomes. Non-material benefits refer to the intangible phenomena. The first criterion for judging sustainability can be stated as the production of material benefits in the form of direct utility to consumers, deriving from these economic and cultural value sources. In addition, we can also identify the more general class of nonmaterial benefits flowing from cultural capital, the wider public good benefits accruing to the collective as a result of cultural capital that might be summarised as enhancements to the quality of life to which heritage gives rise. (Throsby, 2003)
Intergenerational equity and dynamic efficiency Probably the second principle of sustainability is the notion of intergenerational equity. This refers to the equal sharing of “goods” or can be referred to as inter-temporal distributive justice. It is used to refer to the fairness in distribution of welfare, utility of resources between generations. The idea is anchored from what this present generation is enjoying with regards to what has been passed on by the generation before. Thus it is applied in terms of cultural goods to mean exactly what was handed in to this generation by its forebears. The issues of inter-temporal equity arise with regards to capability of production based on the resources that is made available at the disposal.
The economics intergenerational equity is defined with reference to the maintenance of equal level of welfare or utility between generations, expressed as per capita consumption, or endowment of resources or capital stock. The problem in this context is the allocation of resources, a choice of present and future consumption.
The intergenerational question as an issue of equity rather than efficiency has the same resonance when to cultural capital as it does to the context of natural resources. It has to do with the moral or ethical obligation that might be assumed by the present generation on behalf of the future.
In other terms, this means ensuring that future generations are not denied access to the resources be it cultural or natural and are not deprived of the cultural underpinnings of their economic, social and cultural life, as a result of the myopic vision or selfish action of those of us alive today.
leeroi1.deviantart.com/journal… Cultural Diversity, Creativity
leeroi1.deviantart.com/journal… Cultural Capital
www.deviantart.com/deviation/3… Taxonomy Of Cultural Products/ Industrial Districts
www.deviantart.com/deviation/3… Relationship of Cultural Resources Value
References:-Santagata, Walter 2003. Cultural Districts, Property Rights and Economic Development (Lecture Notes) Cultural Project for Development ,ITC-ILO/University of Turin, Italy.
-Throsby, David 2003, The Cultural Capital and Theory of Development (Lecture Notes) ITC-ILO/University of Turin, Italy.
