Minister of Cultural Affairs Anne Enger Lahnstein of Norway

Speech at the Intergovernmental Conference on Culture and Development

Stockholm 30 March - 2 April 1998

Mr President, Mr Director-General, distinguished participants,

I thank the government of Sweden for hosting this global conference on cultural policies - the first of its kind since the Mexico City Conference in 1982.

We have been invited to consider new approaches to policies for cultural development, and to investigate the role of culture in the development of society.

The report Our Creative Diversity from the World Commission on Culture and Development forms the point of departure for our deliberations here in Stockholm. Our task is to transform perspectives and principles into politics and practice. To help us achieve this, a Draft Action Plan has been prepared.

I am pleased to say that Norway agrees in general with the objectives and principles stated in the draft. It is a comprehensive action plan, which spans institutions and sectors, and thus broadens the scope of cultural policy. We have prior to this conference submitted our proposed amendments to the draft. I will focus on some of our proposals in my intervention.

A most significant cornerstone has been established by introducing culture as a major key to the understanding of development. This introduces perspectives on the political aspects of development, which we regard as important, timely and therefore necessary.

Our efforts to promote our national culture must not prevent a deep respect for the culture of other peoples and countries. Our respective national cultures need and thrive in creative cultural encounters. I believe that one key factor in strengthening and developing our cultures is to secure interaction with and impulses from other cultures. Our new global environment offers, in my opinion, tremendous possibilities in this respect.

But globalisation may also threaten our cultures. There is a risk of cultural standardisation through the dominance of certain cultures to the detriment of minority cultures that are less visible and more vulnerable. Like my esteemed colleague from Sweden, I would like to underline that culture is not a commodity. Therefore an exception must be made for culture in the M.A.I-negotiations.

My own culture is, in a global context, a minority culture. But it is of great importance to me; not because it is better than other cultures, but because it is mine - because it encompasses our history, our traditions and our way of life. We all need to have faith in our own energies and creativity.

No minority - individual or group - is likely to remain unaffected by the new global openness. But the pace and direction of change should nevertheless be a matter of deliberate choice. I am therefore concerned that no culture on the global scale shall be able to crush our local or national cultures. That is basically our responsibility. Only in this way can we contribute our share to diversity and pluralism

To exploit the opportunities which globalisation offers, we shall need to elaborate - both in principle and in practice - a global ethics.

Our Creative Diversity argues for a global ethics. We obviously need a core of shared ethical values and principles as points of reference, to provide the minimal requirements any government and people must meet.

Human rights constitute, in my opinion, a significant component of a global ethics. They have a legitimacy, which transcends cultural and geographical boundaries. In the debate on human rights, civil and political rights have often been pitched against social, economic and cultural rights. The struggle for human rights is basically a struggle for human dignity - about protecting individuals and groups from oppression and exploitation, poverty and injustice, marginalisation and degradation. Thus development and human rights are closely linked, indeed interdependent.

It is my hope that UNESCO in its efforts to promote cultural rights will pay attention to the process initiated by the Human Rights Commission, which aims at strengthening the cultural rights of indigenous people.

One of the basic human rights is the freedom of expression. It is fundamental to democracy and cultural creativity. It is therefore unacceptable that artists and cultural workers in many countries of the world today must exercise that right at the peril of their lives. I am here

thinking particularly of the author Salmon Rushdie, whom I had the pleasure of meeting a few days ago in Norway.

As Minister of Cultural Affairs I see freedom of expression as the very bedrock of our culture in the broad sense, and the precondition for all creative processes.

Our development as people and our possibilities for unfolding, socially and culturally, are greatly affected by the shape and design of our surroundings.

By promoting a more active policy for our public space, we hope to bridge the gap between preservation and change, between roots and modernity. Our cultural heritage represents not only the past. It is also a necessary part of today's creative processes. It is therefore vital to safeguard and disseminate our cultural heritage. We see our tangible heritage not only as pretty pictures from the past. It is also a resource for experiencing historical continuity, and architectural diversity and identity.

The Report pointed out that there is a pronounced demand for more research on the links between culture and development. We need to develop a deeper understanding of the complex factors that shape attitudes and behaviour.

Researchers have an important role to play here, turning the critical and objective eye also on our own culture, and how it manifests itself in interaction with others.

The dramatic changes in the world of communication represent a great challenge to us. Technology opens many channels of access to cultural pluralism through the proliferation of global media. It also opens the way to the flowering of aesthetic pluralism and may lead to the expansion of forms of cultural expression as well as to their replacement and possible destruction

We therefore subscribe to the measures proposed in the Action Plan to combat the uniformity, which may result from the globalisation of networks and pictures. Editorial independence to ensure diversity and pluralism is an important principle to the Norwegian government.

We are also committed to prevent excessive concentration of media ownership. The Norwegian parliament has decided to establish a separate institution to supervise ownership in the press and broadcasting. In addition, we maintain our commitment to public broadcasting for reasons of quality and coverage.

The rights of the child in a media-rich world are of central concern. A particular challenge to us in that respect is media violence. The Norwegian government has introduced an Action Plan, which is an important instrument in our efforts to combat violence in the visual media. Furthermore we will organise an international workshop on children and the media in early 1999.

We are particularly concerned to protect minority languages and cultural diversity in the information society. We believe that Norway might have some expertise and experience in this field with its population of four million and two official languages, Norwegian and Sámi, and two official standards of written Norwegian. We would therefore like to contribute actively to the international dialogue on this issue.

Let me conclude by expressing my hope that this conference will lend a new impetus to national policies and international and regional co-operation in the sphere of culture and development. I do hope that the action plan will materialise into concrete activities. We have a certain obligation to ensure that the power of culture will light our path and show us how to create a more congenial world. Culture - and cultures in interaction - can provide the most important opportunity and stimulus for this hoped for and longed for development.