Culture leads to transformative change. This phrase makes sense when we realize that culture has played a major part in shaping everything human. Since it’s intrinsic to every community, it has driven the development of the human species for 500-600,000 years. It has proved to be the producer of the most scaled and powerful form of social cooperation. It is at the core of everything human, the worst and the best of us.
Culture sets the ground to face a world of “rapidly changing scenarios”: social and economic inequalities, climate change, violent radicalization, fake news, the integration of newly arrived migrants, the digital revolution, the protection of cultural heritage in situations of natural or man-made disasters, conflict settlement challenges, to name but a few.
That’s why a positive cultural action -made with the objective to help people to discover, interact and understand other worldviews and ways of life- contributes to mutual understanding and therefore to potentially more positive mutual perceptions.
Art and innovation in culture leads to transformative change
When artistic and creative expressions are involved, cultural initiatives acquire a whole new weight. Art, as a very important cultural manifestation, plays a pivotal role in building healthy individuals and healthy communities. Individuals and communities need the creative tonic that the arts provide.
Empathy, imagination and beauty can be mobilized through external cultural action in a joint reflection on the future of society. That way, it triggers emotion through aesthetical impact, it feeds a virtuous democratic participation circle, it strengthens individual and societal resilience and enhances positive mutual perceptions.
Besides art, cultural action can lead to cooperation and innovation. Cooperation maximizes power for living well and peacefully by binding parts into wholes. Innovation leads to adaptation to external changes, and development of new opportunities for life to flourish.
