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Conference Looks for Solutions to Problems Facing Cultural Policies

On 21-25 August, Tallinn University will host the 10th International Conference on Cultural Policy Research titled “The Cultural Governance of Global Flows: the past and future”, which focuses on the problems countries will face during globalisation. Many pressing subjects such as the regulation of global cultural service platforms, using cultural policies to solve migration-related issues, cultural diplomacy in an international conflict space, will be discussed.

Tallinna ülikooli hoone eestvaates

 “”Cultural flows” refers to the motion of everything culture-related in the world – content, products and even people,” says one of the organisers of the conference, Professor of Media Innovation at Tallinn University, Indrek Ibrus. “In today’s context it may refer to migration, which, in addition to political issues, will pose new challenges to the cultural policies of receiving countries,” he said and added that it can also refer to the motion of cultural content on the Internet – a process over which states are gradually losing control, but one that is an ever-increasing challenge in implementing cultural policies.

Discussions will be held over the possibility to guarantee easy access to online cultural content to citizens of small states, while still allowing small state-based digital cultural institutions survive next to Netflix and Amazon. The modern cultural space is globalised and extremely dynamic, and the questions this situation brings to cultural policies is what this conference is all about.

“People consume online culture for hours every day – we watch films and videos, read newspapers, and communicate to representatives of other cultures across borders. Cultural policy is what determines the films we are allowed to watch, how the media is funded and how easy it is to import or export cultural products,” said Ibrus about the importance of cultural policies. “At the same time it is a fact that even though unwanted migration is not a real issue in Estonia, it has created political tensions. This shows that questions regarding cultural policies and cultural ‘strangers’ entering our cultural space is something people care about very much.”

For more information, visit the conference website iccpr2018.tlu.ee. The Estonian Public Broadcasting (ERR) Cultural portal will show the keynote speeches live on 22, 23 and 24 August at 13:30-14:30 local time, there is also a live feed on the conference website.

During the five days, there will be 192 speeches, 6 round table discussions, 4 plenary sessions and 10 panel discussions. The keynotes are held by top researchers from Europe and the USA: Professor J.P. Singh (University of Edinburgh, UK); Professor Jose van Dijck (University of Amsterdam, the Netherlands), Professor Joseph Straubhaar (University of Texas at Austin, USA); Professor Madina Tlostanova (Linköping University, Sweden). The conference is hosted by three academic units of Tallinn University: Baltic Film, Media, Arts and Communication School, School of Governance, Law and Society, and School of Humanities.

Additional information: Kerli Onno