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Civil dialogue – a framework of engagement for cultural civil society at European level Print

The European political process is complex, and often perceived as far away from the citizens. Arts and culture practitioners, if convinced of the role they have to play in society, do not necessarily know how to engage with European policy-makers at times of political negotiations. How to bridge this gap? Culture Action Europe has a unique insight on the way civil society can influence cultural policy-making at European level.


In 2006 the Civil Society Contact Group published an important report entitled ‘Civil dialogue: making it work better’. In this detailed study, the concept of civil dialogue is explored, its history retraced and examples of its implementation highlighted. Key concepts are also examined such as organised civil society, participative democracy or institutions’ accountability and transparency. This study is an essential read for civil society actors wanting to enter the European policy-making environment, and we warmly recommend you have a look at it. This article is based on this study, and will highlight some of its main recommendations. Along the way, we will reflect upon the specificity of the cultural sector, and the ways to optimise our actions, in advocacy terms, on the European policy-making scene. 

The first element to underline is the general lack of awareness among civil society actors – particularly at national level, but also to some extent in Brussels – of the consultative frameworks already in place to allow civil society input into European policy processes.

The cultural sector is especially affected by this lack of awareness. Not only is European cultural civil society very diverse and still in the process of structuring itself; but its advocacy objectives, beyond specific interest of the industries sector for example, are not always easy to translate in concrete policy demands. Those are some of the reasons that explain the relative timid engagement of European cultural actors in civil dialogue so far.

Now that we have seen the horizon for European cultural policies’ developments open with the adoption of the European Agenda for Culture, there is more than ever an opportunity for European cultural platforms and their members to not only take part in existing consultation processes, but also to engage in a deeper reflection on participatory democracy, and the fundamental values it carries.  What can the arts bring to the European project? What do we expect from European-policy makers? What kind of dialogue do we want, and are we capable of nurturing, with them? 

Representative democracy is based on electoral systems of a cyclical nature, in which elected representatives are mandated to represent their constituency. Elections, which validate or sanction their achievements, are subsequently organised on a regular basis. At the European level, the Members of the European Parliament play this role of direct citizens’ representation and, indeed, have seen their power increase significantly in the last years (compared to the powers traditionally held by the Council based on an intergovernmental model). At European level however the shortcomings of representative democracy have been recognised even more sharply than at national level. In the last decade, the European Union has suffered a crisis of legitimacy, which both underlined how far it stands from the European citizens, as well as its inefficiency to communicate with them. In this context civil dialogue appears as a mean to bring back citizens in the policy decision process.

Following a number of experiments in the 1990’s, the European Union began to formally recognise the role of organised civil society in policy-making in the White paper on European Governance published in 2001, and continued reflecting upon the way to establish a constructive dialogue with civil society actors in 2002 with the General principles and minimum standards for consultation. As none of those documents have a binding force, dialogue and consultation processes have subsequently developed in rather uneven forms in the different EU policy areas. In the youth, trade, social or public health fields, for example, the European Commission has already put in place relatively sophisticated consultation frameworks. In the cultural policy field on the other hand, structured dialogue tools are still in their infancy, even if some actors, such as Culture Action Europe, have already been interlocutors of the institutions for many years, and participated in a number of formal and informal consultation processes up to this day.

EU policies will be of higher quality, will be better understood by citizens, and will be more likely to reflect citizens’ wishes and interests when processes of consultation with civil society are in place and efficient. We also believe that some operating principles should be the drivers of such participatory models. They concern both the way civil society is structured, and how seriously policy-makers engage in civil dialogue.

For civil society organizations the legitimacy of their voice is a key factor. This legitimacy is built on a number of actions such as: the mobilisation of a large variety of actors (including the ‘hard to reach’), a dynamic exchange of information and dialogue within the sector, the development of a specific expertise about the actors, the state of play and the needs of the field. At European level, structuring the representation of the cultural sector is still a work in progress. If a number of European platforms already exist, regional and national self-organisation still has to be developed in many EU countries. The fact that civil dialogue has been recognized at European level (and so by representatives of the Member States) could be used as a lever to ask for more dialogue between public authorities and cultural stakeholders at national and sub-national levels. European policies only make sense if understood and translated in local, regional or national contexts.

For the European institutions, what is mainly needed is a change of culture. Policy-makers have to engage in a real form of dialogue with civil society and think through this dialogue. Consultation and participation processes should have as end goal better public policy-making, and not exist only to legitimize decisions already taken. Efficient forms of cooperation between stakeholders and policy-makers also have to be based on openness, transparency and on the commitment to engage with the sector at all stages of the policy process (from conception to implementation and evaluation). 

As a model of democratic governance, participatory democracy seems to have real potential of development at European level. The future Treaty of Lisbon includes, as did the draft Constitutional treaty before, an article on civil dialogue. If adopted by all Member States (possibly by the end of this year following a new Irish referendum), this Treaty in its article 11 will recognise dialogue with civil society as a fundamental principal of European Union’s governance, covering practically all EU policies and sphere of activities. It will also create a legal obligation for the three main European institutions (the European Commission, Parliament and Council) to consult civil society (up till now civil dialogue has mainly been a Commission concern). Independently of civil society actors’ general opinions on the new Treaty, this clause reinforcing civil dialogue has been strongly supported by all European platforms and NGOs. The European Parliament appears ready to endorse and implement this engagement as it adopted by a large majority on 13 January 2009 a report ‘on the perspectives for developing civil dialogue under the Treaty of Lisbon’.

If we draw the conclusions from the above discussion, it seems clear that our sector his presented with a real opportunity to participate more actively in European policy-making.
For the cultural field, this general trend affecting European governance models is coupled by a new energy and commitment of the European institutions to develop the European Agenda for Culture in partnership with civil society organisations. The quality of our input into the new consultation and dialogue models recently set up (click here for more information on the structured dialogue platforms) but also through a variety of instruments of influence, formal and informal, still at our disposal (public debates at national levels, campaigns, etc.) should be based on the respect of a number of basic principles:
  • We have to continue developing our political vision for Europe.
  • We have to give meaning to our European actions by connecting to the national and regional political spheres, to the grassroots, and to the daily preoccupations of the artists and practitioners.
  • We have to respect and implement fundamental principles such as openness, transparency, and cooperation.
  • We have to make sure our political counterparts put those values at the core of their endeavour with civil society as well.
To engage with Europe we have not only to understand and position ourselves in multilayered political processes, but we also have to identify the overarching political trends that condition the success of our advocacy actions. Civil dialogue is one of those trends that concern us directly.

So let’s work together to make sure all actors of the European cultural sectors have the opportunity to take part in European debates. Let’s coordinate our actions to capitalize on our specific expertise and to enhance our political weight.

European platforms, such as Culture Action Europe, have the keys to enter the European policy-making field. But this discussion should not only happen within the ‘Brussels bubble’.  It has to happen all across Europe. Only then will the European project be given is full meaning. Only then will we, the cultural civil society actors, manage to make a difference on the European political scene.