Benefits of enhancing cultural cooperation with the EU: evidence from Scottish stakeholders

The aim of the EU’s Creative Europe programme is to support cross-border cultural cooperation. The Scottish Government maintains that there is no feasible way to fully replicate the programme’s benefits at nation level. 

From the next European Union Multiannual Financial Framework, 2028-2032, Creative Europe and the Citizens, Equality, Rights and Values programme will merge into Agora EU. Under the current proposal this would increase overall funding for the creative sectors – an attractive proposition to the Scottish sector. 

The Scottish Government and Creative Scotland have put in place some programme support which may play a role in mitigating the loss of access to Creative Europe, including support via the Festivals Expo Fund, the Four Nations International Fund, and Arts Infopoint UK. It is important to note that these programmes do not seek to replace participation in Creative Europe. While national initiatives like these play a role in supporting cultural exchange, they cannot replicate the benefits of Creative Europe, and have limited capacity to mitigate its loss.

Overall, the sector in Scotland is highly positive about the impact of Creative Europe, and a wide range of organisations support re-joining the programme. Almost all respondents who referred to the programme in a recent Scottish Government consultation stated that they had previously benefitted from participation in Creative Europe projects, or felt that re-joining the programme would be positive for themselves and the sector in Scotland as a whole. 

Sector representatives in Scotland have specifically highlighted the role of Creative Europe in facilitating cross-border networks, collaboration and cooperation, including participation in cross-border projects, as well as the importance of funding provided by the programme. 

Scottish institutions have lost access to a programme with the unique ability to facilitate cross-border cultural collaboration and support transnational creative networks. While the UK was a member of the EU, projects supported in Scotland were linked to 34 of the 41 countries participating in the Creative Europe programme. This key transnational strength of the programme is impossible to replicate at domestic level, and its loss has been highlighted by stakeholders within the cultural sector as being particularly damaging. 

Participating in these projects, and the connections that they facilitated, supported learning, development, innovation and knowledge-sharing across all the diverse elements of the culture sector. Only by reassociating can Scotland regain the cumulative, knock-on benefits the programme brings. 

Without access to Creative Europe, Scottish organisations are unable to access significant funding opportunities. Sixty projects in Scotland, across cities and regions as diverse as Dundee, Shetland, South Uist, Inverness, Aberdeenshire, and Lewis, and the central belt, received a total of more than €18.6 million between 2014 and 2020 – which also in turn provided confidence for further funding to be committed. 

Activities that benefited included film development, youth dance, and delivery of multi-arts festivals. Scottish organisations contributed to, and benefited from, Creative Europe cooperation at a rate above the UK average, and the impact of ending membership has been particularly marked in Scotland. This effect has been felt not only across the cultural sector itself, but also in wider Scottish society, due to the loss of the diversity and internationalism fostered by participation in projects supported by Creative Europe.