European networks of cultural cooperation: changing the political paradigm?

Abstract

The article attempts to answer the question on the role of social and cultural networks of international cooperation in contemporary Europe. The processes of European integration facilitated the creation of networking relations between cultural organs in various member states. The four freedoms of a single market (the free movement of people, goods, services and capital) supported the internationalization and Europeization of public sectors, shaped the cultural exchange and built a European civil society. At least since the 1970s, the European Economic Community/European Union led the policy of encouraging cultural operators to network and assigned European funds to support this goal. At this moment, we deal with nurtured and lasting forms of international cooperation between public entities in Europe. The civil society is also gaining more power. Because of the noticed re-nationalization or the trendy concept of returning to the “Europe of homelands” and countries closing themselves because of economic and political particularities, several research questions are bound to arise. The most crucial one regards the depletion of the apolitical paradigm of civil activities and its possible - unintentional yet inescapable - politicization of the so-called third sector.