Denmark/ 6. Financing of culture  

6.3 Trends and indicators for private cultural financing

The Ministry of Culture supports increased cooperation between the creative sector and the business world. Since 2002-2003, the Ministry of Culture and the Ministry of Business and Economic Affairs have cooperated closely on matters concerning the Danish cultural industry. Today this cooperation is based on a political agreement signed in 2007 by the government and the opposition parties. The "Agreement on a strengthening of the cultural economy in Denmark" introduces the two corner stones in the political initiatives in this field: The Centre for Culture and Experience Economy and The Four Experience-zones.

The goal for the agreement and these two initiatives is:

• to strengthen the Danish cultural industry internationally through professional guidance and international networking; and
• to forge cooperation between the more traditional companies and the companies working in the cultural field, in order to strengthen the business skills of the cultural and artistic field and to make the traditional companies learn to use the artistic and cultural skills in development of products and services.

As a part of this strategy, the report Denmark in the Culture and Experience Economy – 5 new steps (2003) was published by the Ministry of Culture, followed by other attempts to foster a closer relationship between art and business, e.g. the new Centre for Culture and Experience Economy, established by the government in May 2008 to improve cooperation between culture, business, universities and research institutions (see chapter 4.2.3), has given rise to a continuous debate in the cultural field on the cultural implications of this economic weight of cultural policy. The debate has considered, among others issues, the digitalisation and transformation of public libraries in Denmark (see chapter 5.3.4), the development of the contemporary art stage (see chapter 5.3.1), enhanced private sponsoring of The Royal Theatre and other public financed cultural institutions (see chapter 5.3.2) and the liberalisation of tax laws for cultural purposes (see chapter 5.1.5).

Recent reports on behalf of the Ministry of Culture indicate that cooperation between the cultural sector and the business sector is still strongly encouraged. In the report Reach Out!, which was issued in October 2008, the experience economy, and the Ministry's interpretation of it, is again at the forefront, as it is identified as one of three challenges to Danish cultural policy; the other two being new user groups and the question of quality. The latest "large scale" policy document issued by the Ministry of Culture called Culture for All is likewise focused on new target groups and user-generated innovation.

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