Culture and development plans and strategy of Spanish cooperation

The strategic principles and objectives of Spain’s policy of international cooperation in development in the field of culture are set out in the 3rd Management Plan of Spanish Cooperation (2009-2012). Said Management Plan approaches culture from a dual perspective, as a horizontal priority, which means the universal and across-the-board consideration of the cultural dimension and respect for diversity in all interventions and sectors; and as a specific sector of cooperation, with the following objectives:

• General objective: to promote the material and immaterial cultural opportunities of individuals and communities as substantial elements in sustainable human development.
• Specific objectives: (SO 1) to strengthen the development of the culture sector as a factor of social cohesion in member countries, driving institutional and public policy inclusion, and maximising the structuring of the social and cultural fabric; (SO 2) to drive economic development from the cultural sector, supporting creative movements, promoting cultural production and exploring new forms of distribution, and (SO 3) to encourage individual and collective rights to access, creation and dissemination of cultural expressions.

In turn, the sector’s framework document is the Culture and Development Strategy of Spanish Cooperation, approved in 2007 and drawing largely on the Convention for the Protection and Promotion of the Diversity of Cultural Expressions. The strategic approaches put forward for the sector are the following:

• Approach 1: professional training, with emphasis on culture and development projects.
• Approach 2: political dimension of culture and its contribution to development.
• Approach 3: economic dimension of culture in its contribution to development.
• Approach 4: relation and complementary link between education and culture.
• Approach 5: sustainable management of cultural heritage for development.
• Approach 6: relations between communication and culture with impact on development.
• Approach 7: driving processes that recognise cultural rights.

In the specific field of cultural action, the National Plan for External Cultural Action was approved in 2010, whose objectives include the “Promotion of cultural cooperation as a factor and key element in development cooperation, considering culture as a resource in its own right, whose access, diversity, patrimonial conservation, training, commercial handling and industrial promotion should be given priority in our development policies”. In pursuing this objective, over the past four years a total of 63 Embassies and Consulates located in African, Ibero-American and Asiatic countries have undertaken 3,552 activities associated with Culture and Cooperation.