Based on a global political landscape characterized by overarching transnational challenges, UNESCO and the Nordic Culture Fund are conducting the study ‘Culture as a public good for achieving sustainable development and promoting human rights and fundamental freedom rights’. The concept of ‘culture as a global public good’ was at the heart of UNESCO’s MONDIACULT world conference on cultural policy in Mexico in September and resulted in the essential decision that culture should be an independent goal in the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals.
At the MONDIACULT world conference on 28-30 September 2022, it was decided that culture is a global public good. The concept was profiled as a forward-looking term, ensuring that culture is further being put on the international policy agenda and demonstrating its transformative impact on sustainable development.
In a final statement issued after the conference, nation states therefore called for culture to be included “as a specific goal in its own right” among the next UN Sustainable Development Goals. The final statement also defined a series of cultural rights that must be taken into account in public policies, ranging from the social and economic rights of artists to artistic freedom, the right of indigenous peoples to protect and transmit the knowledge of their ancestors, and the protection and promotion of cultural and natural heritage.
Global public goods are those resources belonging to humanity that cannot be adequately provided by individual states or non-state actors, and must therefore be managed, provided and protected by all countries working together. Global public goods include health, shared digital resources, biodiversity and the global financial system.
UNESCO and the Nordic Culture Fund are conducting the study ‘Culture as a Public Good’ as part of the follow-up to the MONDICULT conference. The study will be structured around two main phases. The first phase aims to examine the role of culture as a public good and explore all the ways and areas in which culture can actively contribute to both social and green sustainable development. The second phase focuses on identifying best practices. Where can culture be seen to have played an essential role as a global public good in relation to sustainable development and what can the future development agenda learn from these examples?
UNESCO is the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization. Through concrete tools and recommendations, it guides states in promoting conditions that ensure that fundamental rights and freedoms also apply to artists, journalists, researchers and educators.