The study dispelled the myth: regions allocate more funds to culture

Cultural policy researcher and Vilnius University researcher Kristina Mažeikaitė compiled the Municipal Culture Index this year. It allows you to see the cultural situation throughout the country, identify problems, and compare the funding allocated in different municipalities. A study commissioned by the Lithuanian Council of Culture revealed that Neringa is at the top of the ranking, followed by Vilnius city and Zarasai district. Kazlų Rūda, Alytus and Visaginas are at the bottom of the ranking. However, not a single municipality scored the maximum 100 points.

Kristina Mažeikaitė will tell you more about the Municipal Culture Index on April 27. in Kaunas. And this time, the researcher tells why this situation happened? What should be done to increase the cultural index and improve the general cultural situation?

There is no shortage of different municipal indices in Lithuania – Municipalities Quality of Life, Municipal Welfare Index, Lithuanian Municipalities Index. Who needed another study on municipalities? How can the culture index study be useful for the municipalities themselves?

Each index created has its own purpose. The mentioned indices assess the general situation of the municipality or its favorability to business, excluding the cultural component, or including it to a very limited extent. It is precisely in the quality of life index of municipalities compiled by the Ministry of Finance that several cultural indicators are included: the number of participants in cultural centers, the number of museums, municipal public libraries, and cultural centers. These indicators might have represented the cultural processes in Lithuania ten or more years ago, but they certainly do not represent the modern cultural process, which is much more diverse and complex. In addition, the field of culture constantly faces the fact that it seems to be stated that there is a lack of data about it, so it cannot be evaluated and measured. In the long run, the area suffers, because without carrying out measurements of the area, there is a lack of tangible arguments why the area is important, why the state should invest in it, what kind of investment should be made. In addition, a regional cultural policy is being implemented (with the help of the Balanced Cultural Development model), but there is very little organized and easily accessible data at the level of self-government. This again complicates the evaluation of the achieved results of cultural policy. Well, and finally, there was no tool that would allow municipalities to compare with each other according to a unified list of indicators broadly describing cultural processes. By seeing each other’s achievements, we can also adopt good experiences and achieve a breakthrough, so the opportunity to compare ourselves with others is an important component of development. As we can see, there are quite a few arguments why the municipal culture index is relevant.

The purpose of the municipal culture index is to objectively and comprehensively represent the cultural situation in each municipality, to compare the situation between municipalities and over time, and to provide opportunities to identify the most problematic aspects that policy makers could address in each municipality. Therefore, policy makers, based on the values ​​of the municipal culture index, will be able to predict priority investment areas or self-assess the areas in which they are already leaders, compared to other municipalities. In addition, all index indicators are recalculated according to their share per capita. This is also an important aspect, because it may give the impression that, for example, there are many cultural organizations in the municipality, but if we recalculate the share per capita, we can see that in reality there are relatively too few of those organizations.

What kind of cultural situation did he reveal in different municipalities? What strengths and weaknesses would you identify?

The Municipal Culture Index combines 41 different indicators into 7 groups of indicators – sub-indices that represent cultural organizations, creators, financial results of cultural enterprises, funding for culture, participation in culture and social capital, cultural heritage and ongoing cultural changes in municipalities. Analyzing each of them, we can see the achievements and weaknesses of individual municipalities.

However, first of all, we would like to point out that the maximum value of the municipal culture index is one hundred points and no municipality has reached it. What’s more, Neringa sav. is even in first place according to the municipal culture index. scored only slightly more than half of the possible points (57 points). This means that all municipalities still have room to “stretch”, thinking about the current cultural situation in each of them. This is also shown by the overall average of the municipal culture index, which is quite low – 21 points. Less than half of the municipalities scored values ​​higher than the average. Therefore, there is also a significant gap in the cultural environment between several leading municipalities and the rest of Lithuania.

Are the regions really “culturally distant” from Vilnius, Kaunas and Klaipėda? Do big cities really respond better to the cultural demand of the population and ensure attention to cultural activities?

In fact, even the three big cities have very different cultural situations. The city of Vilnius ranks second in the municipal culture index ranking, the city of Kaunas – 11th, and the city of Klaipėda. – in the 44th position. Vilnius is overtaken by Neringa municipality, Kaunas is overtaken by resort municipalities, such as Širvintos district, Panevėžys district. weekly Therefore, in some aspects, large cities do not always provide such a cultural offer that adequately reflects the size of the city and the number of inhabitants. In other words, although in absolute terms it seems that there was a lot of cultural organizations or funding for culture, when recalculating the share per capita, we get the opposite situation. In addition, there is a tendency in large cities that municipal spending on cultural services is generally low. For example, one resident of Vilnius has only 26 EUR, a resident of Klaipėda – 42 EUR, and a resident of Kaunas – 47 EUR of municipal expenses for cultural services. These are the lowest values ​​compared to other municipalities. It turns out that the municipalities allocate more funds for the cultural needs of the residents of the district municipalities, for example, in Širvintos r. weekly residents have 73 EUR/cap., Rietava sv. – 91 EUR / inhabitant, Pasvalio district. – 129 Eur/capita, while Neringa, which is in the first position of the rating, residents were allocated 1,100 EUR each.

This means that in the case of culture, big cities underestimate the existing ecosystem (both in terms of the audience, city residents, and in terms of creators, organizations) and support it insufficiently. On the other hand, the fact that there are significant national investments in culture in big cities is used, but in order to create a more attractive cultural environment for local residents, municipalities should also contribute more strongly, supplementing national funding.

In your research, you repeatedly mention the concept of “developing municipalities”. How can they become like this?

When I use the concept of “creative municipality”, I am not only thinking about the number of cultural events or the number of artists in the municipality. With this concept, I want to point out that a richer cultural environment can encourage further steps in the success of the municipality. A culturally attractive municipality can encourage local residents to stay there or new ones to come, it can encourage stronger community ties, trust in the environment, decisions made by politicians (in other words, it can strengthen the municipality’s social capital). It can encourage the feeling that the local resident is not just an indifferent observer of the processes, but is an active participant in society, whose decisions and actions can contribute to the creation of the quality of life in his municipality. At the same time, a culturally active municipality can attract larger tourist flows and thus contribute to the municipality’s economic results. Therefore, creative municipalities are creative, caring for their environment, happy and active residents.

The municipal culture index revealed that not only the mayor and his team or cultural organizations are responsible for the cultural situation in each municipality, but also cultural creators and local residents. What would you recommend so that the cultural index in municipalities increases and the general cultural situation improves?

From the very beginning, when I started compiling the municipal culture index, it was important to emphasize that culture is not only the concern of one mayor, or only the concern of one artist. The cultural index of municipalities evaluates the cultural situation from different perspectives: the created cultural offer or the potential for cultural offer is evaluated: how many cultural organizations are there, how many are professional art creators, how many are amateur art collectives. The cultural and creative industries sector and its achieved results, such as turnover and added value, are also evaluated. Another important component is funding for culture. But attention is paid not only to how much the municipalities spent on cultural services or how much it was in the general municipal budget, but also to how much the cultural organizations themselves received funding for their projects or creators for their creative ideas from the Lithuanian Council of Culture. The demand side is also evaluated – the desire of the population to get involved in culture and the available social capital. The situation of cultural heritage is also assessed – not only the creation of new cultural activities, but also the preservation and actualization of cultural heritage. Finally, attention is paid to whether there is a change in the municipality, for example, whether funding for culture has grown over the past year, or whether it was a one-time investment without any continuity.

As can be seen from the variety of indicators, and what we want to emphasize with this index, all entities are responsible for the cultural situation in each municipality: the mayor of the municipality with his team, cultural organizations, cultural creators, local residents. Therefore, when thinking about the cultural situation in each municipality, we invite you to evaluate it precisely from the perspective of this full-fledged ecosystem: cultural organizations must strive to create a relevant cultural offer for local residents, creators must strive for professionalism and present works of the highest quality, residents must have opportunities to participate in cultural activities, implement participation skills for children and young people in culture, the municipality and creators, cultural organizations must promote the population’s participation in culture, make it accessible to all age groups, the municipality must promote the offer of cultural activities created by organizations and artists, etc.

It is the relatively complete cultural ecosystem that led to Neringa municipality. leadership in the municipal culture index ranking. Neringa week in this case, not only high values ​​of the number of cultural organizations per 1 resident were obtained, but also intensive involvement of the municipality was observed, so the overall cultural ecosystem of Neringa municipality. was more balanced than in other municipalities.