COST IS 007 Investigating Cultural Sustainability ( )  European research network: Not a research project, but allows co- ordination of nationally funded research activities in the field  24 European COST – countries, Australia, New Zealand, Canada  90 members from variety of diciplines: sociology, anthropology, geography, environmental studies, policy, tourism, arts, museum and cultural studies, communication and media studies, philosophy  COST action Chair: Dr. Katriina Soini, Jyväskylä University, Finland

 What are the main aims of the action?  Approaches, methodological challenges, working methods  Activities and outputs  Bulgarian Participation in the COST Action: challenges and lessons

Aims Aims to explore:  What does culture mean in sustainable development?  How to incorporate culture in sustainable development framework and policies?  How to assess the impact of culture in sustainable development? © All copyrights reserved by Katriina Soini

Mailstones of the Action Inventory and mapping Analysis and comparisons Synthesis Recommendations 2015 New collaborative research projects © All copyrights reserved by Katriina Soini

Clustering of thematic fields Heritage Governance Human-nature Territorial development Arts, creativity and events Tourism Theories and concepts Participation Mobility Methodologies Education Planning Others I Arts and creativity II Heritage, memory and identity III Place-based developoment IV Human-Nature Interface ”Keywords” © All copyrights reserved by Katriina Soini

WGs, other small groups established during the Action Thematic working spaces, ”laboratories” mapping and analysing. analysing and summarizing Networking and mapping. WGs, clusters, interactive exercises ”Who’s who” - book, Joint research papers Thematic books Joint research papers A theoretical book Policy recommendatio ns Curriculums Joint research projects WORKING FORM WORKING FORUMS OUTPUTS

Academic discourse on cultural sustainability Cultural sustainability Conservative Heritage Cultural vitality Neoliberalist Economic viability Communitarian Diversity Locality Environmental Eco-cultural resilience Cultural evolution Storylines Contexts Soini, K. & Birkeland, I Exploring the scientific discourse on cultural sustainability. A paper to be published in Geoforum. © All copyrights reserved by Katriina Soini

I Selfstanding: Culture as a fourth pillar of sustainability Ecological Social Cultural Economic Cultural aspects need to be considered in addition to the ecological, social and economic ones, in order to achieve sustainability. © All copyrights reserved by Katriina Soini

II Transversal: Culture as an instrument in sustainable development  Culture is not only an additional aspect, but its role is intermediating between the various dimensions of sustainability. I.e. culture drives, processes and translates the drawbacks and benefits of ecological, economic and social development. economicsocial ecological Culture © All copyrights reserved by Katriina Soini

III Fundamental: Culture as a new paradigm of sustainability Cultural transition or “eco- cultural civilzation” is needed to achieve more sustainable society. Sustainable Culture EconomicSocialEcological © All copyrights reserved by Katriina Soini

List of main Activities © All copyrights reserved by Katriina Soini  Workshops or conferences (2 per year)  Research Exchange (4-6 Shot term scientific missions – STSMs - in the year)  Training School(s)  Place-based approaches in regional development, Ghent, February, 10-14, 2014  A cutting edge research event: The Cultural Dimension of Sustainable Development on the European Research Agenda, Brussels 14 November  Working groups and Panels in Conferences, e.g.  International Conference of Cultural Policy, Barcelona 2012  International Conference of Tourism, 2013  European Society for Rural Sociology, Firenze, 2013  International Conference of Cultural Memory, Skopje 2013  National workshops and publication activities

List of main outputs © All copyrights reserved by Katriina Soini  Book series ”Culture, sustainability and development” (working title) published by Routledge (TBC)  Four thematic books  Three books in ”pipeline”  ”White paper”: summary of the results  International Master Course in Cultural Policy  Special issue in International Journal of Cultural Policy  Research Strategy  Joint research papers

Bulgarian participation in COST actions: challenges and lessons  The art of international networking  The challenge for mobilization of the national resources  Cutting-edge knowledge and professional expertise  English proficiency  Logistical capacities  Institutional support: the capacity for cooperative action at international and national level – how many joint papers; how many interuniversity projects and university consortiums; how many partnerships with local NGOs, local authorities and local businesses?

The main challenge: the culture of joint action  Innovation scoreboard 2013; the decline of Bulgaria innovation performance most dramatic after launching the Strategy Europe 2020 – with -18.7%.

Progress since the launch of the Europe 2020 strategy

Country groups: innovation performance per dimension

Bulgarian inputs  Imagining Europolis: Roles of Culture for a Sustainable Urban Future (TBC) Editors: Svetlana Hristova, Milena Dragicevic-Sesic, Nancy Duxbury  The Sustainable City – Sofia, February 2015

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