the future of
local cultural decision making
An open policy development programme...
Culture Commons is convening a major four-nations research and open policy development programme to explore how devolution and increased local decision making might impact on the creative, cultural and heritage ecosystem in the UK.
This unique programme is taking a radically open and transparent approach to policymaking, bringing stakeholders from right across the ecosystem together to present a series of co-designed policies that will help set our collective strategic response to further devolution in the coming years.
Local Authority Partners
Sector Partners
Research Partners
Funding Partners
"We are delighted to be working with Culture Commons and a superb group of partners to explore an ambitious future for local cultural policy, recognising the huge social and economic benefits of vital cultural space to local people."
Jenny Waldman
Director of Art Fund
Programme
Between October 2023 and October 2024, Culture Commons will:
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convene partners in a series of insight gathering, knowledge exchange and public facing activities
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commission research through strategic partnerships with university and independent research institutes
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analyse findings to unpack risks and opportunities for devolution we unearth along the way
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design a new suite of policies directed towards local and national policymakers
Programme Updates
Rationale
In recent years, major political parties have set out policies that centre the creative, cultural and heritage sectors within their national economic growth strategies. Some have emphasised the need to address the geographic and socio-economic disparities we see between but also within regions across the UK. This comes at the same time as successive UK Governments, opposition parties and devolved governments have committed to giving deeper and wider decision making powers to local leaders and people.
There is an fast growing body of evidence that many of the infrastructures and outcomes associated with the UK’s creative, cultural and heritage ecosystem are unevenly distributed across the regions and nations of the UK and that these are also demonstrably less accessible to certain groups in society. With workforce conditions some of the most precarious in the UK economy, disparities appear to be increasing in a post-Covid-19 and ‘cost of living’ economy, with a risk that they could be further exacerbated without concerted policy intervention.
Given that the need for increased local decision making now broadly accepted as a political and policy imperative, we propose that attention should now turn to how new policies and local governance models might interact with the creative, cultural and heritage sectors to deliver more equitable and sustainable growth for all local communities.
If policies that increase local decision making are not designed strategically with appropriate oversight and engagement mechanisms, we risk several direct and indirect impacts which could, in turn, exacerbate geographical inequalities and further fragment growth between the regions and nations.
We have concluded that a new, inclusive and deliberative policy design programme is now needed to examine the risks and opportunities that increased local decision-making could pose to the UK's creative, cultural and heritage ecosystem.
Themes
"We're extremely pleased to be part of the efforts of Culture Commons, working to develop policies that will create the best possible outcomes for our local creative & cultural sectors."
Alison McKenzie-Folan
Chief Executive of Wigan Council
"With the combined expertise of the brilliant collection of partners Culture Commons have lined up, I know the outcomes of this programme with be bold and disruptive and I encourage decision makers to follow this work carefully."
