Syndicate: Suggestions towards a European Media Policy

[Andreas Broeckmann <abroeck@v2.nl>]

V2_East/Syndicate: Suggestions towards a European Media Policy


Introduction

Responding to a suggestion by the Culture Committee of the Council of
Europe, the Deep Europe workshop discussed the requirements and
opportunities for developing a European policy on the role of new
technologies in the field of art and culture. (3 August 1997, Hybrid
WorkSpace, dX Kassel)

Rather than formulating a general theoretical statement, we tried to come
up with a number of practical suggestions that would help to improve our
own and other people's work in the field of European media culture. The
initial transcript of the discussion has been commented on and added to and
is now offered to the Council of Europe and other concerned parties as a
document for further discussion.

This is not a manifesto or a joint, consensual statement, but a series of
topics and problems that individual members of the V2_East/Syndicate are
concerned about.

Andreas Broeckmann, V2_Organisation <abroeck@v2.nl>



1. The V2_East/Syndicate network

The V2_East/Syndicate that met in Kassel for the Deep Europe workshop is a
network of people. It is not an institution and has no immediate need for
support in itself. The network can, at this moment, best be supported by
increasing the number and strengthening its nodes, i.e. individuals, groups
and organisations in towns and cities all across Europe.


2. European cooperation

We are working both locally and translocally. Almost each of us is working
on a national as well as on an international, initially European scale. At
the present moment, we feel that there are hardly any organisational
structures on a European level that support our activities. We feel
insufficiently represented on the level of European politics and policy
which seem to be very much geared at large-scale operations run by the
Information Technology (IT) industrial sector. We would like to be able to
identify political, bureaucratic and organisational partners through which
we can act and find support for our small-scale operations on the European
level.


3. Inclusive Europe & Kaleidodrama

We have partners in Yugoslavia and Albania, beside many other European
countries. We want these people to be represented in the same international
institutional structures (like the Council of Europe, the European Union,
etc.) so that our co-operations will find support under these European
umbrella organisations. We regard it as highly important that cultural
programmes of the EU should not be restricted to EU and aspirant countries,
but that they should also be directed at other European countries, where
this kind of support is urgently needed for building up the social and
cultural structures that will prepare these societies for future EU
membership.

Moreover, this year's 'Kaleidodrama' must not be repeated: in January 97,
only days before the deadline for applications to the Kaleidoscope
programme for cultural cooperation of the European Commission, the EC
decided that partners from East European countries did not qualify because
of a quarrel about the financial contributions of those countries to the
joint funds from which grants are paid. This meant that project proposals
that included East European partners - and thus realised the desire for
increased East-West cooperation - were universally turned down. No proper
reason was given for the rejection. Such unpredictability on the part of
the EC is unacceptable and truly disabling for our work.


4. The abolition of visa

The visa restrictions that still exist within Europe, as well as between
European and non-European countries, are stifling our work and are
sometimes making it impossible for people to meet, present their work or
develop projects together. We frequently experience the organisation of
visa as time-consuming, expensive and frustrating. Although we realise that
there are 'bigger issues' involved in this, we want to insist that in our
work the visa requirements for travelling to many, not only West European
countries, are a nuisance and a waste of time. We suggest that these travel
restrictions be rethought seriously.

In the context of European integration we want to stress the need to
address limitations on travel programs for cultural and related exchange
programs. In absence of a comprehensive settlement of border and travel
arrangements between EU members and other European countries, it is urgent
to lift visa-limitations for cultural exchange. The actual encounter of
people, travels, mutual visits and shared experiences remain important for
any cultural cooperation even at a time of improved telecommunication
opportunities.


5. Media practice

New technologies are, for many of us, both a means of creative expression
and an essential means of communication. The over 160 people from 28
European and 3 non-European countries who are part of the Syndicate network
mainly stay in touch through an Internet mailing list, and as everybody
else they are therefore dependent on affordable, easy access to the Net and
sufficient bandwidth. We need affordable, independent production spaces for
analogue and digital video and sound production. In order to be able to
work properly and involve our local communities in cultural projects using
new technologies, we need independent spaces for public presentations and
meetings, workshops, studios and offices. Our individual projects, our
networks and the need to interface our translocal with the local
activities, depend on a good technical infrastructure.


6. Funding structures

We find that in many places the funding structures are at odds with the
practical conditions of our work in the field of new media culture. In many
East European countries, privatisation has made a lot of the formerly
public services very expensive. Here, perhaps most urgently, grant
programmes are needed that will cover daily and monthly expenses of running
a media project. It is rather ironic that it is now easier to get support
for an Internet server or other powerful computers, than for rent,
telephone costs, heating, electricity, or for the salary of the person who
will use the facilities. It is certainly in the interest of the IT industry
to sell their products to independent group, media art centres and
academies.

While hardware support is available, support for the following essential
prerequisites is lacking:
- education and instruction in new media techniques
- technological support / system management (for cultural initiatives)
- dedicated funds for art and design projects in information and
communication technology
- travel and cultural exchange grants

The rule should be: provide funding at a variety of scales. If you are
interested in supporting European cultural diversity, you should support it
at the level where that diversity actually occurs.


7. Media cultural expertise

The commissions that judge grant applications from the media cultural
sector very often seem to have a lack of expertise in this field. In the
same way as it does not make much sense to ask a literary scholar to judge
the viability of the budget for a large theatre production, it seems
necessary to have people in these commissions who have some expertise in
the field of electronic arts and media technologies. We suggest initiatives:
- to invite experts in the field of media culture into art commissions, and
- to recognise the field of media and electronic art as particular a field
of artistic practice.


8. Slaves of updating

We are faced with the problem of constantly having to learn and update the
hard- and software that we are using. The intense speed of technological
innovation in the field of media technologies makes it almost impossible to
establish a firm technological knowledge and begin to apply it in creative
ways - by that time, new versions and new products make it necessary to
learn again. To some degree, we make ourselves such slaves of technological
innovation. But at the same time, the funding bodies often require us to do
'new' things and use 'innovative' technologies to qualify for the necessary
support.


9. Grant applications

For smaller organisations, applications to many funds and grant programmes
are not realistic because of the way in which the money is payed out (often
after the completion of the project and thus far too late) or because of
the amount of time and energy that would be needed to complete the
application process. They frequently stand in no relation to the
possibilities and resources of the often small and under-staffed groups.
Nevertheless, many of us are now spending an important part of their time
researching and writing grant applications for projects. Ironically, the
projects themselves suffer from the need to produce ever more, ever more
detailed, ever different proposals and descriptions of projects past,
present and future.


10. Help Soros!

We also propose a help programme for the Soros Foundations in Eastern
Europe. This is only partly meant ironically. The wide-ranging dominance of
the Soros Foundations and SCCAs in the field of cultural sponsorship is not
so much a result of Soros' expansionism, but of the lack of action on the
part of other potential, large funding bodies. If the European Union or
some of its member states had developed equivalent, distributed networks of
local and regional offices that offer substantial support in a variety of
fields, then artists and cultural practitioners in Eastern Europe would not
be so exclusively dependent on support from the Soros Foundations. The
changes which are to be expected within the Soros network (like a growing
financial independence of the SCCAs from the New York office and the likely
need for them to raise funds from other sources) will make it necessary for
alternative, strong funding bodies to emerge, public and private, local,
national and international. We suggest that the Council of Europe and the
EU should engage in this process and support existing and successful
cultural infrastructures in the governmental as well as the
non-governmental sector.


11. Education

The knowledge gap between the former East and West needs to be tackled
actively by European policy makers to foster the further integration of
Europe. New Information and Communication Technologies are instrumental in
this process and attention should be expanded beyond their ecomomic
significance to include the social and cultural impact of these
technologies. Education in new technology is one way to address this
problem. Education of students from the countries of central and eastern
Europe should not be located exclusively in the former 'West', as the
knowledge gained abroad often does not find its way back to the students'
countries of origin. We suggest that:
- Local training programmes in the 'East' should be supported by
appropriate EU funding.
- Many of the European education programs focus on education exchange. In
the short term, however, the flow of knowledge in the field of ICT will be
mainly from west to east. This fact should be recognised by European
education support programmes.
- Programmes should focus on 'educating the educators' to create maximum
local spin-off of this knowledge transfer.
-  In the field of digital media education, a European grant scheme for
students from Eastern Europe should be put into place.


12. Public culture

In democratic states, cultural activities should continue to be supported
by the government and should not be given solely into the hands of private
sponsorship. Independent cultural activities are part of the life of a
civil society. They belong in the public domain and should be supported by
the body politic which democratically represents the community.



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V2_Organisatie * Andreas Broeckmann * abroeck@v2.nl
Eendrachtsstr.10 * NL-3012 XL Rotterdam * <www.v2.nl>
t.+31.10.4046427 * fx.4128562 * <www.v2.nl/east>
second leg: Pfluegerstr.27*12045 Berlin*+30-6233293