By Miranda Bird - 15th December 2008
Since the European capital of culture (ECOC) initiative was conceived in 1985, 37 cities have celebrated their contribution to Europe’s culture.
The cities have used the motivating power of the designation to galvanise the strength to achieve their dreams – from reframing themselves as cultural tourism destinations to repairing poverty-ravaged cultural infrastructures, or even simply staging an outstanding cultural event for its own sake.
With this activity, a whole canon of academic and policy thinking and programmes has sprung into life, quantifying and promoting the power of cities to drive social and economic change.
Like these cities, the UK region of Cornwall needs the rocket fuel of European recognition and celebration to power its journey towards a more prosperous and sustainable future.
Some 26 per cent of Europe’s population now lives in rural areas and Cornwall has found much enthusiasm in other European rural isolated and peripheral areas for its proposed rural version of the ECOC scheme, tentatively dubbed European regions of culture (EROC).
An emergent network of European regions of culture already has over 20 members, notably the new EROC pilot project partners – Kujawsko-Pomorskie (Poland) and South Ostrobothnia (Finland), as well as Haderslev (Denmark), West of Ireland (Eire) and Vidin (Bulgaria).
For Cornwall, the campaign for a new EROC designation has been a powerful motivator of change, even before the designation is visible. Part of the opportunity is to articulate the story of Cornwall’s distinctive culture.
It has also been important to celebrate the road travelled thus far – recent history has seen highly effective investments into Cornwall’s creative industries from EU Objective One funds. Looking into the future, the idea that one day a European spotlight may be shining on Cornwall’s culture has concentrated the Cornish mind: what would we want Cornwall’s culture to look like in the light of such a celebration?
For Cornwall’s decision makers, this new confidence and high ambition breeds new faith in the cultural sector to deliver economic and social change for Cornwall.
Cornwall’s position on the south west tip of the UK makes reaching out to Europe sometimes seem more fruitful than relating to the centre. Further, international connectedness is vitally important to Cornwall’s future health – for its markets, for its access to innovation and for the cohesion of its communities (now playing host to a new workforce from eastern Europe).
Cornwall has to negotiate a delicate line between preserving and investing in its own regional distinctiveness and still being porous to outside influences in the light of globalised markets and the increasingly mobile European population.
In the meantime, Cornwall has much to celebrate. It is a rural area with a population of just over 500,000.
Two thirds of the people of Cornwall live outside the towns. The population is highly dispersed with a coastline of 672km and a small group of inhabited islands lying 45km offshore. Cornwall has a low-wage economy and will receive support from the European convergence programme from 2007-2013.
Some 29 per cent of Cornwall’s area is designated as an area of outstanding natural beauty – the highest category in the UK – while Unesco recently recognised the Cornish mining landscape as a world heritage site, reflecting its unique historical importance.
The Cornish language has been newly recognised by the UK government as being protected by the Council of Europe’s charter for minority and regional languages. One of the key aspects for rural regions in Europe is to maintain and develop such cultural assets.
The story of Cornwall and the Isles of Scilly is closely bound to that of Europe itself. It was an ancient trading centre (cited in Herodotus), an early centre of Christianity, and with its position at a key ocean-going junction, has cultural and economic links with the western seaboard, the Mediterranean and Ireland. It is an active member of the Conference of Peripheral Maritime Regions.
The emigration of many Cornish people following the 19th century collapse of mining, which has given rise to a vibrant diaspora, and the emergence of Cornwall and the Isles of Scilly as a creative hub during the 20th century, has created global connectivity.
Projects such as the Leach pottery at St Ives strengthen links with Japan, and the new world heritage site hopes to be the first to encompass an international territory including Grass Valley (California) and Moonta (South Australia).
Cornwall’s distinctive economic and geographical circumstances have given rise to a network of vigorous small communities, expressing their way of life in a multitude of diverse and distinctive ways. This culture is not parochial but has evolved from continuous contact, trade and exchange with Europe, and indeed the rest of the world, over many centuries.
Cornwall’s spectacular landscape has ensured that Cornish culture places a strong emphasis on the environment and a connection with the natural world – values that have an increasingly significant contemporary relevance. Now is the right time to capitalise on Cornwall’s changing narrative but first we must prove the case for the EU to celebrate European regions of culture.
