16 September, OACPS House, Africa Room, Brussels
A half-day workshop was organised by Reset, Culture Concepts and Avril Joffe, UNESCO Expert, Witwaterstrand University, South Africa as a part of a series of events in Berlin, Brussels and Antwerp in September 2022.
This half-day symposium addresses the campaign for a cultural goal in the SDGs, less as a technical policy addition than a deep rethink of Culture’s current position in sustainable development and public policy per se.
The symposium will assess the reasons for UNESCO’s failure to secure a cultural goal in 2015 SDG process; what has changed in the global policy landscape and how this might impact the campaign for a cultural goal (#Culture2030Goal); and, consequently, what new themes and policy frameworks are emerging as priorities for Culture in the near-to-medium term.
In 2015 the United Nations General Assembly adopted 17 Sustainable Development Goals, “a blueprint to achieve a better and more sustainable development for all” and set to be achieved by 2030. However, despite lobbying from many cultural organisations and UNESCO itself (Hangzhou Declaration), Culture failed to become a distinct Goal.