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CULTURAL POLICY IN GLOBALIZATION
Author:                   City : Baku   Country : Azerbaijan

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-       OSI Arts and Culture Network Programs Coordinators Jamboree Meeting was held in Uzbekistan, Tashkent on May 23-28, 2002.

Outstanding scientists from EE and CIS countries participated in this conference. Among invited ones we could mention, Arts & Culture Programs Coordinators from Russia, Azerbaijan, Armenia, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, Kyrgizstan, Kazakhstan and OSI Sub board members

Katalin E. Koncz, executive director of OSI Budapest represented proceeding of the program at plenary session. She briefly familiarized participants with current programs.

She said: We have always prided ourselves on moving with the times and, if possible, ahead of the times. During our short history, we have undergone several far-reaching transformations. But most of these changes have occurred in response to opportunities that presented themselves and without a strategic plan.
We are again in the midst of a radical transformation but this time we are following a strategic plan. As we are about to implement major structural changes, I want to spell out what the strategic plan is so as to minimize the disruption and give everyone clear guidance where we are heading.
Our previous goal was to help with the transition of the former Soviet empire from closed to open societies. There was a strategic vision behind the lack of planning: it was a revolutionary moment and we would have missed an historic opportunity if we had insisted on planning before acting. It will be recalled that for several years we spent money without a budget. Then we had to introduce some order into the chaos and that is how the Open Society Network (OSN) consisting of a matrix of national foundations and network programs came into existence.

It was a valid vision and we can be proud of what we have accomplished. Our mission is far from complete. The collapse of closed societies does not necessarily lead to the emergence of open societies - and we must continue our engagement. But the revolutionary moment has passed, and the challenge of our times has shifted from the problems of transition to the problems of globalization. We must shift our own focus accordingly. Our new goal is to foster a global open society. [What I mean by this is explained in my books and I will not repeat myself here.]
To serve our new mission, we need a significantly different organization. It has to be global in scope and it has to be able to make an impact on how governments and international institutions conduct themselves. In the past, what we have accomplished we have done on our own; I was singularly unsuccessful in influencing Western policy - and I tried repeatedly. Now the situation is almost completely reversed. We can achieve relatively little by acting on our own because the problems of globalization are so large that we can hardly make a dent in them however hard we try. To put it in perspective, we have been spending hundreds of millions a year, but the United Nations Millennium goals require $50 billion a year. We can achieve a lot more by influencing what governments, international institutions and other foundations do. And for the first time we seem to be able to influence policy. For instance, we have played a role in getting the U.S. government to step up its international assistance by $5 billion a year in the coming years.

In order to influence policy, we must maintain and expand OSN. But we cannot do it the same way as before. OSN is a large international organization with wholly dependent local units, which enjoy an unusually large degree of autonomy. This model has served us well. It has allowed us to implement the principles of open society better than any other form of organization. But we cannot go global with a network of wholly dependent national foundations disbursing grants. We must reshape our structure more thoroughly. But, in contrast to our previous habits, we must act on the basis of a strategic plan that will take several years to implement. This is not a revolutionary moment. We have built up a valuable, well-functioning network and we have much to lose by unduly disrupting it. We need a strategic plan that is implemented over an extended period, say three or four years, so as to put in place a new form of organization without destroying what we have created. I am happy to say that I have such a plan. It consists of converting OSN from a wholly dependent network into a partly dependent network of networks (OSNN).

The strategy has been maturing in my mind for some time and the transformation is already well underway. Imperceptibly we have formed a loosely knit network of independent but like-minded organizations - from the International Crisis Group to Global Witness and even UNDP - that could cooperate with us and each other on specific issues. In Africa we have established regional rather than national foundations. Some of our network programs have gone global; we have a national presence in Turkey and Indonesia that have been only partially funded by us; and we are getting engaged in a number of countries (Peru, Mexico, Afghanistan) without thinking of setting up a national presence. But it is only recently that I have come to terms with the budgetary implications of the new strategy and formulated what may be properly called a plan.

The plan involves cutting some existing activities as well as adding new ones. In some countries, the national foundations will cease to exist in their current form. Whenever there are cuts, there are job losses. We shall try to mitigate the human costs by announcing the cuts well in advance and providing assistance and support to those who are losing their jobs. Above all, we do not want to keep people in the dark because that would be demoralizing. We cannot announce the strategic plan in detail because there are too many moving parts and the details will be worked out only after consultations with the people involved, but we want to communicate the broad strategic decisions that have already been reached. We have set ourselves the following main objectives:

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Preservation and nurturing of the intellectual capital and goodwill that has accrued to the national foundations and the network as a whole, because this is the platform that allows us to be heard;
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Expansion of the geographic reach of the foundation networks; •

Reallocation of resources within the existing networks to where they are most needed;
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Development of expertise in new areas concerning issues of globalization;
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Refocusing of existing network strategies to concentrate on the areas most relevant to global open society.
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Increasing cooperation with partners at both a local and international level.

The first major cuts will occur in the 8 countries that are expected to join the EU in 2004. We intend to cut our spending dramatically to a total of $10 million by 2004 (excluding some network programs like HESP, health, and women, and pre-existing institutional grants, as to the Polish Helsinki organization). Two national foundations - Estonia and Slovenia — have already made the transition and the other six are facing it now. Each national foundation will have to find its own solution. Some may remain independent as the Estonian foundation; others may merge into a local institution as the Slovenian foundation. We intend to continue supporting programs in such key areas as the rule of law, vulnerable populations and civil society but this may be best done outside the national foundation. The foundation boards will be more concerned with the issues of open society, both at home and abroad than with the distribution of money. The executive directors will support the boards and act as the local coordinators of the network of networks. The foundations concerned are setting up a working group on how best to implement the new strategy.

We plan a similarly sharp reduction in spending in the Balkans a few years down the road, but the Balkan foundations have too important a role to play in their societies at present to be subjected to the additional burden of internal reorganization; nevertheless, they ought to be aware of what is in store and bear it in mind in designing their programs. We look to the Russian Foundation to support an increasing portion of its programs with funds from outside donors. Changes are also underway in the Mongolian foundation, which is establishing an open forum for influencing both governmental and donor policies, and in South Africa, where the foundation will focus on open society issues while maintaining its crucial work on crime and criminal justice and its successful program on community radio. We expect to maintain close to our current level of expenditure in the rest of the CIS countries for a longer period; and we intend to increase our involvement in Latin America, Africa, the Middle East and Southeast Asia through our network programs rather than by establishing additional national foundations.

The US Programs will also be significantly affected. Engaging public opinion, shaping academic and public discussion, and monitoring and influencing policy will now take center stage, in Washington and at the state level, while grant making will begin to decline, meeting a target for steep reductions by 2006. Where program commitments exist, we will, of course, honor them, but will start to withdraw from some areas of activity sooner rather than later. We will take as much care as possible not to disrupt the important work our funds have enabled. In some areas, a spin-off of OSI-sponsored activities with co-funding may be desirable and possible.

Human rights in the United States will remain a priority, and I expect a significant continuing presence in this area, and, ultimately, to integrate it with justice and rule of law programs in the network as a whole. Influencing US foreign policy is increasingly important, and we will step up efforts to build a domestic constituency for a more multilateral approach. We have made a good start on this with the expansion of our Washington office. We will also make greater use of open society fellows.

Inevitably, network programs will be affected by our shifting geographic focus and our concern with global public policy. Some network programs, such as those in law, media, women, information, economic development, and East-East already operate globally. Others, such as the Local Government Institute (LGI) will also go global. Cultural Link will be merged with East/East and other cultural network programs will be phased out but we will maintain the Culture Sub-board as a policy and advocacy unit without a program budget. We will rethink our work in public health, cutting back on some programs, while maintaining our concern with vulnerable populations such as the mentally disabled and bolster our role as advocates in public policy debates on such issues as harm reduction, the relationship of over-incarceration to the spread of TV and Multi-Drug Resistant TV, the high cost of pharmaceuticals needed to treat AIDS and MDRTB and the need for increased international public expenditures to combat epidemics of infectious diseases.

Education and youth programs used to take up a third of our budget. Our main task in this field now is to find ways to preserve and build upon our past achievements without investing substantial new resources. I am pleased to report that Step-by-Step, on which we spent over 100 million dollars, is making considerable headway in embedding itself in national educational systems. The same is true of some of our other educational innovations. We are willing to devote limited additional resources to maintain these programs and we hope to influence educational policy with modest expenditures on programs. The Education Sub-board will entertain multi-year proposals from national foundations but only if they are directed at policy or have a clear exit strategy.
EU has been permanently endowed. HESP and СЕР will be more closely connected with CEU and continue as long as OSI continues, albeit with a gradually declining budget. We shall also maintain our Roma programs for the long term while attempting to enlist other donors to help us address the many forms of discrimination suffered by this minority.
While we are reducing the extent of our wholly owned programs, we are increasing our grant giving to other organizations that pursue an open society agenda on a matching fund basis and we encourage the national foundations to follow a similar policy. This will give us greater flexibility and allow us to have greater impact with a given expenditure of funds.

Although we are moving away from sole support, we do not rule out being the sole founder when necessary. Insisting on co-funding in all cases would endanger our entrepreneurial and innovative spirit. But where opportunities for donor partnerships are available, we will pursue them. We shall also encourage the formation of alumni and professional associations and policy forums. We do not intend to give this loosely knit network of networks (OSNN) a formal structure because open society is too abstract a concept to sustain a network on its own but we are willing to maintain it in the hope that it will generate autonomous activities in a variety of fields that will promote open society indirectly.

Altogether, I have a strong sense that we are moving in the right direction. I have a few years of productive life left and I feel I can make the most of it by bringing OSNN into existence.

The other reporter represented their projects, related to the Arts and Culture.

Armenia: PRIVATE LOOK 2001 2nd International Film-Festival/Symposium Reporter: Aram MKRTCHAN This initiative is to be presented as an example of a project aiming at fostering entrepreneurship in culture. As Private Look becomes traditional event in Armenia, firstly I would like to briefly present the origination of the initiative; afterwards, describe the recent festival/symposium in more detail through PPT presentation. Especially the practical outcomes of the project, the evidences of its sustainability, and plans for future are the most important concerning this project. The event was widely covered by the national mass media; therefore I will try to prepare a short video clip combined from TV newscasts about the event to visually illustrate the project.

Azerbaijan: Cultural Heritage of Azerbaijan in web-sites. Reporter: Tariel Mamedov, PhD, Professor, Editor-in-Chief of the magazine “Musigi Dunyasi” (World of Music).

Globalization is the most significant process of the present. It means the following: integration on worldwide level, based on principles of free migration of capitals, information, and various resources. Globalization is impartial and anonymous. It is like spirit of the times.

Touching no general globalizations problems, we would focus on its only one aspect, videlicet: its effect on national cultures. We believe that national cultures desire: firstly, to keep their identity; and secondly, to be interesting to the world community. These two points do not exclude each other. One of the essential problems in globalization epoch is the one to preserve traditional knowledge. In a word, culture in globalization does not loose itself. On the contrary, it reveals its basis, and opens its essence. Needs of national cultures are the following: cultural inheritance and tradition knowledge. Both are specific values, assisting to see the world and existences sense in this world. It should not leave own ground. In other cases national culture disappears.

Creation of Web sites, devoted to national culture is one the ways to integrate into the worlds culture. This task is successfully implemented in Azerbaijan. The following sited were shown:
1. Electron version of printed magazine Musigi Dunyasi : musigi-dunya.az
2. Vagif Mustafazadeh. Personal site of outstanding Azerbaijan jazz pianist and composer: vagif.musigi-dunya.az
3. On-line catalogue of composers and musicologists of Azerbaijan: composers.musigi-dunya.az
4. Qara Qaraev. Memorial site, devoted to great Azerbaijan composer: qara-qaraev.musigi-dunya.az
5. Azerbaijan Discography (1900-1940). On-line catalogue. The site is devoted to first gramophone records in Azerbaijan: diskografiya.musigi-dunya.az
6. Baku Musical Academy. History. Traditions. Present: musakademiya.musigi-dunya.az
7. Uzeir Hajibeyov. “Principles of Azerbaijan Folk Music. E-book: musbook.musigi-dunya.az (will be accessible in September, 2002)
8. International musical cultural magazine Harmony: harmoniya.musigi-dunya.az (will be accessible in June-July, 2002)
9. Electron version of scientific-practical magazine Intellectual Property: intellect.musigi-dunya.az (will be accessible in June-July, 2002)
Azerbaijan: Cultural Industries in Azerbaijan: Contemporary Situation and the development perspectives (Ministry of Cultures project)
Reporter: Ayten Hajiyeva
This Project consist of 4 parts:
1. Already conducted training on the topic Cultural Industries in the period of Transition
2. They have prepared the report on each sphere of the Cultural Industry (Publishing, Cinematography, Copyrights Protection, TV and Radio, Multimedia and Network Projects). Cultural Policy Department jointly with Center of Marketing and Social Research SIAR conducted statistical research on the above mentioned issues. This was the first time when such kind of research was implemented in a cultural field. The report has not been published yet, because they have some disputes on the results of the research. 3. Realization of the interactive debates and discussion on TV.
4. Online e-conference We and culture. Expectation and realities
Kyrgyzstan: Museum as an innovative model of culture - NGO Center of Museum Initiatives
Reporter: Almash Naizabekova

The aims and goals of the project were to develop museum management and information technologies. The project have been realized in tree steps:
The first step of the project - creation of the museum resource center for developing of the initiatives towards the implementation of the project.
The second step - research trips to Russia in order to gain best experience on museum management
The third step - seminars on museum management and information technologies for museum managers of the republic
The project is successfully being accomplished. Thanks to the knowledge got from the project the museums of republic are actively working out new projects on their future activities. Fine Arts Museum succeeded to continue this project 2002-2003.
Trainings for museum managers and local government will be held by the Center of Museum Development of St. Petersburg.
Experienced trainers from Russia and UK will conduct the trainings.
Silk Sound Road Music festival - Information Art Center of Soros Foundation-Kyrgyzstan.

Music festival of contemporary and folk music and master classes for music Institutions of Kyrgyzstan took place in Chuy valley, in Issyk-Kul region and Bishkek. Professional musicians from about 20 countries participated in the festival. It was a bright combination of contemporary and folk music alongside with the theatre performances and art exhibitions. The young musicians of Kyrgyzstan music Institutions communicated with the world famous musicians. The main thing was that the rural people managed to see that big event and to contribute to it by their own participation. The video presentation of the festival will be at Jamboree.

The Great Silk Road is the Road of Friendship of the Great Mountains - NGO Zodchiy, Osh

This project was supported at the end of 2001 and is in the process of implementation. Zodchiy is and NGO which unites architects, designers and sculptors who are very keen on the design of their town Osh, the ancient town of the Great Silk Road. The aim of the project is the creation of the sculptural park under the open air on the bank of Ak-Bura river, at the foothills of Suleiman Mountain, which is the object of pilgrimage. Sculptors from Central Asia, Caucasus and Mongolia will work in this project. The importance of the project is that the sculptors will work outside, at the places of the future sculptures and everybody will have an opportunity to see the process of creation of sculptures. That will be like open workshops and master-classes for the young artistic people. The project presents a great importance for the whole Fergana Valley.

Russia: Seminar for museum professionals of Kyrgyzstan
The project aimed to organize professional seminar for museum managers and representatives of local authorities of the Republic of Kyrgyzstan in order to develop their professional skills up to European standards and work more efficiently. The project is joint with National Fine Art Museum of Kyrgyzstan. Therefore each subject of project submits own application form. The present application form gives description and budget of Centers part of project. Amount of the participants is 40. The training teams are famous experts of post-soviet museum space. The methodology is elaborated during of seminar program lunch by Business Leader Forum in Russia (1996-1999) and in Uzbekistan (2000). Duration of the project is 6 months (April -September 2002). Duration of event is 5 days.

Museum of Uzbekistan in new economic conditions
Reporter: Vassily Pankratov
The training took place in Samarkand from the 2nd until the 6th of November, 2000. 34 representatives (mostly directors and top managers) from 28 Uzbek museums participated in the seminar. It included lectures, round-tables, master-classes, training exercises and competitions. The main topics were: museums as generators of cities revival, visitors care, forward planning in museums, museum marketing and fundraising, PR in museums, museums and tourism. “Chemal” Project: Culture as resource of territorial development
Reporter: Valery KLAMM
Considering culture as resource of regional development, the projects initiators plan launching effective structure of cultural collaboration of two Siberia territories and Moscow. From one hand it is Chemal region of Altay Republic, unique natural complex and “tourist Mecca of Siberia.” On the other hand there is Novosibirsk, the largest megapolis of Siberia, scientific and cultural capital of the region. And at last Moscow as “exporter” of progressive cultural technologies.

Novosibirsk and Altay could submit invaluable aid to each other to improve cultural situation in both regions. Altay has unique natural ecological resources. Novosibirsk, both city and regions could use it for cultural tourism industry. Novosibirsk, in turn has creative and technical opportunities to transfer innovation cultural technologies to Altay regions. We mean firstly summer season when thousands tourists from various Siberia and Russia regions aspire to Altay.

Currently Altay is the place of tourist pilgrimage. However it is evident that old infrastructure in culture and tourism area, which is inheritance of Soviet times, is morally depreciates and physically dilapidated. It makes leisure very simple, as set of entertainments submitted by the nature.

For the last years the Government of Altay Republic, charity foundations, local business, Novosibirsk cultural NGO, and their Moscow partners started interacting in organization series of festival events and cultural actions. At the moment there are created all conditions (and readiness of parties) to transform this interaction into systematic partnership. It is aimed to jointly elaborate strategies in cultural policy that is resource of socioeconomic development.

Partnership configuration supposes:

Interregional collaboration (Altay Republic - Novosibirsk - Moscow )

Intersectional interaction (Power - NGO - business)

Interdisciplinary character (cultural industry – tourist events - interethnic dialog)

Altay Republic Government plans to elaborate republican strategy to develop culture to October, 2002. Concluding materials of this Project could be a factual basis for this elaboration.

The goal of supposed project is to launch collaboration mechanism among Altay Republic powers, local tourist business and Novosibirsk and Moscow cultural NGO. It would allow to make culture the resource of development.

Uzbekistan: International Festival of Contemporary Music Ilkhom-XX in Tashkent and Samarkand.
Reporter: Alexander Jumayev

It will be presented by artistic director of the Festival, Tashkent composer Dmitry Yanov- Yanovsky. We will do this together but he will be a key speaker.
The main idea of the presentation is to show the Festival in dynamics of development and to trace its influence on musical community of Tashkent and Uzbekistan in general.

Some Presentations were planned but were not held at this conference. These were the following:

Kazakhstan

Central Asian Film Festival - within the frame of Culture as an Interethnic Dialogue Practically all Cultural Link projects suggested from Kazakhstan had very important Central Asian component.

First one is the master class of string quartet. It was organized in Almaty and participants came from Tajikistan, Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan and Armenia. The second one is the roundtable Women of Central Asia in Culture and Art. Except sharing of creative experience during this event were discussed serious questions of gender problems, violence, and unemployment among women in our region. The most fruitful and wide project is the Film Festival Start Look Afresh, which is going the third year. The group of young filmmakers initiated this festival. They suggested organizing small film seminar, which can represent the creative works of young cinematographers. First of all they announced their manifest We are young, but we shoot are films! Nobody knows us, but we exist! We represent our generation, that is why we want to show films and we need the feedback! Their first experience became very successful and they decided to make it wider on the next year. In 2000 Film Festival Start Look Afresh became Central Asian. And the results were superb. First of all, it was creative meeting of really young people - film students from Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan gathered in Almaty and discussed questions connected not only with film, but also more with cultural and political situation in their countries. Documentary films represent realities; feature films represent authors mood and self-identity. Young Kazakh filmmakers are more independent and they used to shoot films in conditions of free market. They dont know any censor. As for Uzbek students from Academy of arts - they said, that their department was close for closing, but their awards in this Student film festival helped them to survive. In Tajikistan even was difficult to find anybody for representation the country. But they organizational committee met these difficulties only in first years. Now they established real ties and festival became more and more successful. If you only look through the catalogue of festival you find the main positives achievements and results of this event:
1.As I said before - this festival was organized by young initiative group.
2.On the basis of this group was created the NGO and besides this festival during the year they organize different theater events, produce TV programmers and moreover short film debuts
3.If you look at jury members you find, that except Shukhrat Abbasov - maestro of Uzbek Film Art, all other member are the representatives of close to young generation and they represent different countries: Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan and Kazakhstan. In this case we can say about the exchange of experience minimum of 2 generation.
4.This exchange is going not only through talk and discussion, but also through representing their films in out competition informational program, where we shown the best Central Asian film of last years.
5.The main program of festival consisted of feature and documentary films competition, but the most important part - everyday discussions of films and related problems. It was critical component of this project.
6.The educational component consisted from master classes of the themes of experimental video and low budget filmmaking.
7.One of the most interesting components was the case study of Summer Art-school

Conclusions:
First, it is live regional project with good perspectives and ties.
Second, it unites young generations of creative people and provides, the continuity of generations.
Third, besides traditional film showing component, this project is developing in critical thinking and educational aspects.
Forth, this project helps to develop the new NGO and initiates new art projects.
Critical remarks and proposals regarding the work of ACNP and co-ordination of projects in Central Asia
Apparently, at present only the culture may become a truly effective tool forming the regional unity of the Central Asia. In this regard, it is necessary to identify the positions enabling a maximally effective use of the culture as a vehicle of unity outlining the main properties and omitting the minor ones. There are some contradictions between the purposes and tasks of contests and terms of issuing grants. Unfortunately, it happens so that the quality of projects can be undermined with the stereotypes of the ways of drawing up grants. As of today it is possible to underscore the fact that a certain group of people who know how to write projects for issue of grants appeared, and it is they who receive financial support. The crucial aspect is to steer clean of the stereotypes of estimation. This requires having an idea of the processes that form a new culture of the region and the role of projects of the program in it. I offer the following compulsory positions to be taken into consideration when implementing ACNP and Jamboree:
1. It is essential to impose quotes on projects (CL, CP, LI) in order to hold the home contest of projects in Central Asian countries.
2.The overwhelming majority of the projects must educate. Such projects must solve the following tasks: educating on the policy of programs, unfolding specific opportunities of overcoming the stereotypes of artistic thinking, expanding the notions about new means of expressiveness. The mechanism of an educational component must also be of regional character (For example, it is cheaper to hold a seminar of a traveling type when a trainer or trainers can travel from Kazakhstan to Kyrgyzstan and, say, to Uzbekistan etc.)
3. forge steady horizontal ties inside each type of art. The purpose of this area is actually to form a unified cultural venue in the Central Asian region by creating various sorts of steady ties between the representatives of evolving cultural trends -musicians, writers, translators, cultural scientists, contemporary artists, producers.

Mongolia

Establishment of MA on art management
Project funded by MFCS and co-funded by OSI ACNP Cultural Policy grant competition. The project devoted to develop and institutionalize the Master Degree Training in Arts Management - the first one in the country, and include Art Management courses as a part of Curricular for all students at the Mongolian University of Culture and Arts with a long term goals of:

Building management capacity of Mongolian art organizations to market and increase financial support for their arts

Arts and culture management, leadership, and educational system produce professional quality artistic work and production second to none.

Modernity-play-play script

Project funded by OSI ACNP Cultural Policy grant competition.
The project devoted to support the development of Mongolian modern play writing and writers through conducting workshops & master-classes; organizing competition on contemporary new playwriting & translation of world famous contemporary plays; to produce the best plays on the stage of UB and countryside theaters with long-term goal of to enrich the repertoire of central and local Mongolian theaters and independent theater companies with modern and new plays and to assist the growth of youth talented play writers.

Mongolian Art Council

A spin off project of MFOS AC program
The project devoted to establish open, transparent and independent organization named “Mongolian Art Council” with the strategic objectives on lobbying for changes and development in legislation that support the arts, in assisting capacity building in the field of art management, in ensuring funds from local and international funding resources, in expanding and networking Council activities with international partners, and in contributing to the further development of an open and democratic society, where art and culture will be independent of governing political parties, and an integral and vibrant part of an open and democratic Mongolian society.

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