Cultural Promotion in Germany
“Traditional high culture is losing its relevance”

The data show that cultural sponsorship is very important in Germany. In this interview, Birgit Mandel, Professor of Cultural Education and Cultural Management at the University of Hildesheim, explains why this system of funding should, in fact, change.

Mrs Mandel, in January 2017 the Elbe Philharmonic opened in Hamburg. The building alone cost about 800 million euros; its operation will devour billions more. In Germany, such large cultural institutions are strongly supported by the state. Does this really make sense?

At the very least, it’s an expression of the way we promote culture in Germany: with high financial commitment and a predilection for traditional middle-class institutions of high culture.
 

This can also be seen in the distribution of subsidies. Theatre, music and museums receive more than half the funds.

Yes, that’s right. And even in absolute numbers, the sums are impressive. With a total of 9.9 billion euros in state cultural funding, we’re the absolute frontrunners worldwide, even if this represents only 1.7 per cent of the total public budget. Apart from this, there’s also another special feature of the German funding system that explains the great importance accorded high culture in awarding subsidies.

And that is?

That it has a decentralized organization. Each of the sixteen federal states is primarily responsible for its own promotion of culture. In addition, we have the subsidiarity principle, which states that the smallest administrative unit should always assume the corresponding task before the respective higher-ranking institution does so. In the case of cultural funding, the smallest units are the cities and municipalities; they account for 45 per cent of cultural funding. The federal states assume about 40 per cent and the federal government about 15 per cent. And this constellation in turn leads to a very high density of cultural offerings, one which is probably unique worldwide.

Could you please explain that?

When each federal state is responsible for its own cultural offerings, each aspires to provide its own prestigious cultural venues. In this the federal states are in competition with one another. In total, Germany has over 150 public theatres, often having three divisions with repertories, 130 public symphony and chamber orchestras, about 6,000 museums, of which half are publicly funded, 40 festival halls and about 7,000 festivals. A quarter of all professional music orchestras and 14 per cent of all permanent opera houses worldwide are in Germany; and about 8,000 libraries.
  Let’s take a closer look at the role of the federal government in this system. It’s striking that it contributes only a little to the funding of, for example, theatre and music, but that it assumes the responsibility for almost the entirety of cultural funding abroad. Why is that?

Fundamentally, the federal government in the German federal funding system has very limited powers; in principle it is responsible for the funding of only trans-regional matters such as the protection of specific cultural assets, the Prussian cultural heritage and its museums and castles, specialist libraries, supra-regional film promotion and international cultural relations. What we’ve observed in recent years, however, is a steady increase in federal funds, especially for nationwide model subsidy programmes, including in the area of cultural education.

Let’s return to the Elbe Philharmonic. Was the building a good investment in terms of promoting culture?

That depends on how you define what cultural promotion should do. On the one hand, we know that prestigious projects such as the Elbe Philharmonic play an important role in the cultural identity of a city or region. Even if people never use these buildings, they still tend to identify positively with them. On the other hand, since at least the 1970s, the promotion of culture in Germany has laid claim to contributing to the cultural education of all population groups in our society. The big question is whether it can do justice to this claim. We now know that only about ten per cent of the population, largely academics with high social status, make use of cultural institutions such as concert halls, theatres and museums at all.

“HIGH CULTURE IS CONSIDERED THE CORE OF GERMAN IDENTITY”

But hasn’t high culture always been directed to a niche public?

Yes, to an extent, though the interesting thing about the German cultural promotion system is that this fact doesn’t really play a role. In Germany, the idea that art and culture are important cultural goods for the whole society is firmly anchored in public opinion. This is also underpinned by the Basic Law: cultural policy is founded on the guarantee if artistic freedom [Article 5, paragraph 3, sentence 1, Basic Law; editor’s note.]. From this and supplementary legal commentaries it has been inferred that the state must secure this autonomy by promoting art and culture so as to protect them from the constraints of the free market and demands of specific utility.

But that’s actually a good idea.

In principle, yes, but it has led to the situation in Germany that for a long time now there’s been no need whatever to concern ourselves with the actual use of publicly subsidized offerings. Traditional middle-class culture is still considered the core of a German identity that remains unquestioned even by those who suffer because the big institutions are so drastically favoured in the distribution of funds: the independent cultural scene and the socio-culture. But precisely this so-called identity is now subject to change.

What changes do you mean?

For a growing part of the German population traditional high culture is losing its relevance. One reason for this is a general change in habits of reception, not least because of digitalization. Another reason is the new impulses emanating from migratory movements. People of different ethnic backgrounds are bringing different habits of reception and cultural preferences into our society. The major challenge for the art scene and cultural policy in Germany is to change existing institutions together with new audiences, new users, new actors. Moreover, the institutionalized cultural scene must be countered with new, more flexible forms of organization that also take the cultural interests of future generations and people engaged in the cultural sector into consideration.