Over the last decades, exchange, interaction and support within the culture sector has been at the heart of a significant number of programmes, resources and meetings between Europe and its Southern Mediterranean neighbours. This has given rise to both a significant amount of debate and some criticism, but it has also provided thousands of citizens on both sides of the sea the opportunity to learn something new.
The fact remains however, that cultural development, dialogue and partnership policies and programmes are generally unwieldy and tend to go in one direction only, from North to South. The fragile nature of political, civic and public spheres in the Southern Mediterranean states is no doubt partly to blame for this situation.
There seems to be consensus, in the South at least, that in spite of the large number of initiatives that have been undertaken, few schemes have been able to create the kind of familiarity and closeness that can arise in certain disciplines and communities out of a genuine sense of curiosity or intellectual exchange.
The majority of initiatives are dominated by the large number of formal, institutional and public programmes and projects that naturally tend to convey and reinforce European political thinking and ideology.
Since 2000, culture seems to have resurfaced as an essential component of successful diplomatic relations between Europe and its Mediterranean neighbours to the south. Over the last few years, the European Commission has repeatedly reminded us of the key role that culture has to play in building international and external relations.
There seems to be consensus, in the South at least, that in spite of the large number of initiatives that have been undertaken, few schemes have been able to create the kind of familiarity and closeness.
It seems that outdated strategies of ‘soft power’ and binary, oppositional dialectics need to be replaced with more nuanced, horizontal and sincere strategies that move away from notions of conflict management towards genuine needs and values based on mutuality, sharing and commonality.
Psychogeography of the Mediterranean
Over time, the psychogeography of the Mediterranean has tended to fluctuate between division and commonality. Some have seen it as a bridge between peoples, others as a gulf. Throughout history it has always been a place that awakened a sense of longing or fascination, a place that either had to be feared or defended against.
The people that inhabit the coast of the Mediterranean today deserve better opportunities for creativity when it comes to highlighting their common heritage, pursuing forms of cultural fusion and creating new Mediterranean platforms and modes of belonging that will allow them to better project themselves in the world.
Historical, philosophical and theoretical studies of the peoples and cultures of the Mediterranean should, in my opinion, accompany our exploration, analysis and development of systems and structures of exchange, partnership and dialogue that seek to foster the wellbeing of communities in Europe and the Southern Mediterranean. The cultural realm, with artists, intellectuals, cultural critics, theoreticians and philosophers at its helm, seems to me to be the ideal vehicle to take us on a voyage of rediscovery into our common past.
“The cultural realm, with artists, intellectuals, cultural critics, theoreticians and philosophers at its helm, seems to me to be the ideal vehicle to take us on a voyage of rediscovery into our common past.
We need to start a process of deconstruction, re-imagination and transformation of the ideological, institutional, governance and political frameworks that determine the relationships between Europe and the Mediterranean. This will be a delicate, complicated and not particularly reassuring journey, because a process of generous and serious reaching out towards the ‘other’ will also require the need to revisit and rewrite one’s own narratives, which in most instances have been created in direct opposition to that very same ‘other’.
The intelligent work of the European Culture Foundation is particularly worth noting in this connection. Given such a wide range of sometimes contradictory programmes, there has been very little in the way of coordination between civic, private and public initiatives and a great deal of confusion on the ground in the cultural sector that these programmes are meant to serve. Despite the fact that a great deal has happened and that there is a much more lively exchange between North and South these days, there is still much to be done. Too often, Southern ‘partners’ feel frustrated and left out of the creative and analytical process.
The people that inhabit the coast of the Mediterranean today deserve better opportunities when it comes to highlighting their common heritage, pursuing forms of cultural fusion and creating new Mediterranean platforms and modes of belonging that will allow them to better project themselves in the world.
There are many ways to help diffuse and improve this situation. There is often an assumption that Southern partners and societies need to embark on a ‘learning process’. In many respects this is either doubtful or even completely untrue.
I believe it is just as important, however, for European structures and societies to also evaluate whether embarking on a process of ‘unlearning’ might not also help them to put divergences into perspective, to re-evaluate their modus operandi and bring radical creativity into their processes. Without that willingness, Northern partners can be left with a reductive, limited and perhaps even dishonest notion of their actual and potential partners, who tend to have to start culture and policy work from the ground up because they lack the necessary framework or background.
With much behind us in terms of accomplishments and lessons, the coming period calls for in-depth reflection, synthesis, learning, humility, honesty and radical creativity in terms of self-examination and the envisioning of a better common future for all.
