Speech on Cultural Capital of Europe - More Than Just an Event

are employed in the cultural sector, that whilst the number of jobs in theEuropean Union declined overall in 2004 – 5, the number of thoseemployed in the cultural sector in that year actually increased and thatthe cultural sector employs some of Europe’s best educated and mostflexible workers. The facts speak for themselves.The study merits an unequivocal welcome.To those of us who are involved and concerned for the future of Europeanculture the study also however contains within it a certain risk. This is thatat a time when progress is too often defined in purely commercial,material terms, the study might reinforce a tendency to look upon culturalactivity as merely another form of economic activity. This would be amistake. In the long march of history culture has never been a mere oreven primarily an economic activity. Here we must be very careful.Culture is much deeper and wider. That doesn’t mean that economydoesn’t help us to prove the productivity of culture. The point is thatculture is generated by its own power creating its own momentum. This isits perennial strength. Culture has cycles of germination and renewal.It now appears that the power of culture starts to grow again. I believethat it is this moment which will give to the institution of Cultural Capitalof Europe and the networks, the impetus to unite their forces and worktogether for the promotion of this noble idea.But we have to consider that the emerging gap between public opinionand the policy of the centres of power is of a great concern. To bridge it,there is an ever greater need for cultural education not only in the senseof promoting literacy and thereby enhancing participation, but as a formof debate to allow people to shape their own destiny and become acreative force.The selection of Cultural Capitals has now changed. Each Europeancountry has the responsibility to nominate the Cultural Capital City.In Germany, there were 10 candidate cities and Essen was nominated.Essen was selected with the theme “Transformation through Culture –Culture through Transformation”.As stated in their catalogue: “Unemployment is high and the developmentof new economic structures demands creativity, innovation and the abilityto manage change effectively. The 53 towns and cities of the Ruhr willhave to join forces, so that, in the competition of regions, the Ruhr canprevail as a European metropolis and contribute its special competenciesto the Europe of the future”.“The transformation of the industrial city of Essen into a modern energyand service metropolis has been both driven and accompanied by culturaltransformation”.“Its breath-taking development is the result of an approach to the artsthat derives from the conviction that culture offers an all-embracingenergy capable of sustaining a continuously changing society.”2