As we are about to enter the last year of the current European funding cycle (2021-2027), with programmes such as Creative Europe (through which Reset! has been co-funded since 2022), Erasmus+, Horizon Europe, CERV, and others, this study by Desislava Pantcheva is an important contribution to the current conversation in the European institutional sphere.
Cultural players of all kinds, from institutions to grassroots organisations, have witnessed growing competition for these calls. The reasons are well known: funding is decreasing everywhere in Europe at local, regional, and national level; the rise of AI thoroughly influences application writing and thus the number of applications; and the programmes themselves are better recognised, thanks to the work of national desks and contact points, EU-funded networks, and other stakeholders promoting them.
The current debates on the future of these programmes are therefore very important, since the outcome of the negotiations will shape the future of the EU’s cultural strategy. In that sense, the Irish presidency’s proposal of a 30% cut to the funding of the new AgoraEU programme (which will merge the current Creative Europe and CERV programmes) is concerning. Reset!, along with many other cultural players across Europe, will keep raising its voice against these cuts and in support of an ambitious, well-funded programme for the health of culture, media, and democracy. As stated in an open letter ahead of the European Council, it is not only about defending culture but about “investing in European citizens’ future.”
Beyond funding, the structure of these programmes (namely Creative Europe, Erasmus+, and CERV) remains a central topic. For Reset! and several of our members, they are an essential asset for the future of European culture, and the logic behind them is key, since they put cooperation among European peers at the core of their DNA. In that sense, Reset! believes in these programmes and will continue to advocate for better and more sustainable funding for their future.
The dissemination of Designed to Exclude: Cultural Frankensteins, Desensitised Spectators, and the Structural Marginalisation of Grassroots Organisations in EU is part of this approach. As supporters of these programmes, we also believe a discussion is needed about their shape and architecture, their “beneficiaries”, and how inclusive they can be, especially for independent and grassroots cultural and media organisations, which Reset! represents with almost 200 members to date.
We consider this research a contribution to the current debate on the future of European programmes funding culture, with a critical but constructive approach. Even though, “the paper does not end with a reform agenda”, it ends with a collective invitation to reflect on how these programmes reshape our cultural work and how we want to transform them.
As we are about to enter the last year of the current European funding cycle (2021-2027), with programmes such as Creative Europe (through which Reset! has been co-funded since 2022), Erasmus+, Horizon Europe, CERV, and others, this study by Desislava Pantcheva is an important contribution to the current conversation in the European institutional sphere.
Cultural players of all kinds, from institutions to grassroots organisations, have witnessed growing competition for these calls. The reasons are well known: funding is decreasing everywhere in Europe at local, regional, and national level; the rise of AI thoroughly influences application writing and thus the number of applications; and the programmes themselves are better recognised, thanks to the work of national desks and contact points, EU-funded networks, and other stakeholders promoting them.
The current debates on the future of these programmes are therefore very important, since the outcome of the negotiations will shape the future of the EU’s cultural strategy. In that sense, the Irish presidency’s proposal of a 30% cut to the funding of the new AgoraEU programme (which will merge the current Creative Europe and CERV programmes) is concerning. Reset!, along with many other cultural players across Europe, will keep raising its voice against these cuts and in support of an ambitious, well-funded programme for the health of culture, media, and democracy. As stated in an open letter ahead of the European Council, it is not only about defending culture but about “investing in European citizens’ future.”
Beyond funding, the structure of these programmes (namely Creative Europe, Erasmus+, and CERV) remains a central topic. For Reset! and several of our members, they are an essential asset for the future of European culture, and the logic behind them is key, since they put cooperation among European peers at the core of their DNA. In that sense, Reset! believes in these programmes and will continue to advocate for better and more sustainable funding for their future.
The dissemination of Designed to Exclude: Cultural Frankensteins, Desensitised Spectators, and the Structural Marginalisation of Grassroots Organisations in EU is part of this approach. As supporters of these programmes, we also believe a discussion is needed about their shape and architecture, their “beneficiaries”, and how inclusive they can be, especially for independent and grassroots cultural and media organisations, which Reset! represents with almost 200 members to date.
We consider this research a contribution to the current debate on the future of European programmes funding culture, with a critical but constructive approach. Even though, “the paper does not end with a reform agenda”, it ends with a collective invitation to reflect on how these programmes reshape our cultural work and how we want to transform them.
A note from the author
I wrote this paper after years of working within the European cultural funding system, both supporting organisations trying to access it and participating in it myself. Over time, I became increasingly troubled by the distance between the cultural work I encountered on the ground and the ways we were expected to describe, measure and justify it.
At a time when public budgets for culture are under constant pressure, I believe we need to ask not only how much funding is available, but also what happens to it, whom it reaches, and what kinds of cultural work our funding mechanisms actually recognise. Some of the dysfunctions described in this paper have persisted for years. Defending these programmes without questioning those mechanisms risks defending their weaknesses along with their value.
Culture is the living connective tissue of our communities and our society. It carries memory, creates belonging, sustains relationships and gives us ways of understanding one another. We need it more than ever in times like these. That is why I believe changing how cultural funding works could be one of the strongest forms of advocacy for it. A system that is more accessible, more accountable and more capable of recognising genuine cultural value would make a far more convincing case for public investment than repeated declarations about the importance of culture.
This paper is not an argument for less cultural funding. It is an argument for taking cultural funding seriously enough to question what it has become, and what it could still be.
