BASIS

What World culture Means to us?

World Culture is an open, diverse, pluralistic, non-hierarchical aggregate of cultural practices, communicating among themselves through structural or incidental, systemic or programmatic, hierarchical or subversive cultural policies, economic undertakings or social movements.

Why we need a World Culture Center?

World Culture Centers acts as catalysts and boosters of the processes in world culture, to bring vision, awareness, ethics and justice in the chaotic processes, to craft orders of creation, meaningness and hope in the future development of our planet Earth, to bring dynamics in the understanding of the different world’s cultures, to become hotspot of enlightment and juncture of resistance against the monoculture, the nationalism, domination, exclusion, selfishness, war and the end of the world.

WHAT DO WE STAND FOR?

Cultural diversity

We enhance the Declaration on diversity of UNESCO from 2001:

“Cultural diversity is as necessary for humankind as biodiversity is for nature”.

It is not only a necessary condition for economic development but also for complete spiritual, intellectual and cultural growth.

We work in line with the Gothenburg strategy:” Cultural diversity is the fourth pillar of sustainable development”.

Cultural diversity, which dwells not only among the different countries, but also in the countries themselves, in the communities, in our very selves. Culture, even in the Ancient Times, has always been mixed, heterogeneous, often leaned on contradictory discourses. That is why no authoritarian figures could exist, daring to speak in the name of the whole culture.

Nations, ethnicities, families are social aggregates, symbolic media, and communication tools. They are one of the many ways for people to unite for their interests. They change during radical changes of social and political contexts. What remains is the form –the collective belonging to the group on the basis of indicative cultural criteria: customs, language, self-determination, origin.

Intercultural action

We do not tolerate, we act.

Tolerance is the minimal concept. It is a compromise with the selfishness and domination. The tolerance means closed, god given, once forever, unchangeable identities.

We believe in open, changeable, adjustable identities and groups. That is why we strive for intercultural action – for curiosity, interest, and care for the other, willingness to enter into other’s position and understand. To experience something new.

The World Culture in the global cultural economy

We are aware of the Global cultural economy. We hail the nomadic turn of history. No one can stop the global flows of capital, the movements in the globalized labor force market, in the economic and cultural exchange and consumption. The interstate and the international trade and industrial zones are the new habitats: airports, shopping centers, casinos, ships, oil platforms, international organizations. We accept the Arjun Appadurai diagnosis. The World becomes mixed, complex, complicated. Borders and old sovereignties vanish. The theory of chaos rules, the complex systems and the butterfly effect.

We witness the lack of power of the national state to solve the complex cultural forms over its traditional positioning. The state cannot predict where and how new communities emerge and what cultural habits would they have. The state can not guarantee the moral credo of the groups or communities. But we do not agree that the panacea lies in the Huntington platform. We do not agree that war, control, domination and the monoculture are solution for the growing cultural and social diversity.

We consider that the world culture could take the role of an avant-garde of the social formations. With its innovativeness, creativity, openness, autonomy and criticism World culture can offer solutions for the globalization.

PRINCIPLES OF WORLD CULTURE ACTION

Solidarity

Culture should enrich democracy, empowering everybody with access to cultural goods. Culture is an opportunity for social cohesion and integration of different social, ethnic and other minorital and vulnerable groups.

This is why we mainstream the different, the deprived, and the marginalized in our cultural action. But we do not ghettoize them. We create an ambience of communication between the majority and minority, between the privileged and underprivileged. We create a chance for dialogue and positive action.

Creativity and criticism

We enable citizens to develop their creativity, but also the free and critical thinking. We fight to obtain a space for plurality and diversity because this leads to the biggest democratic achievement – engaged, critical and creative citizenship.

Activism

In the polarized world, where international interventions, terrorist actions, dictatorial oppressions, economic usurpation are on the table, we should not be indifferent. We must raise our voice. To express our attitudes and positions clearly. Democracy has to be strong, to exit the institutional commodity and administrative labyrinths.

Individualism

We strive for solidarity, equality and justice but only with strong and individualized citizen. Only the individualized spirit can stand against collectivistic euphoria’s, chase and violence. Strong individuals open to different thinking, to novelties, to many alternatives.

METHODS

Transversal, multilateral, participative

We are against the anachronistic concepts of guest performances and exchanges, against the problematic neoliberal ideas for cultural branding. We are against the national culture conceived as emanation of closed and defined cultural identities and values the state partakes to present to the world.

We support the methodology of the European Institute for Progressive Cultural Policies based in Austria. We appeal for cultural policy different to the existing one: cultural policy not based only on exchange and cooperation among the national cultures and cultural operators, but culture transversal, multilateral, participative, widening the democratic public space throughout the world, able to create equal opportunities among the big and the small ones, among the poor and the developed. Within this concept the culture is not based on closed national and other identities, but represents dynamism of differences, always open for negotiation, the ones which do not afraid and are not afraid of their capacity for eventual conflict. We strive for deeper contacts, for international teams, for joint projects, passion, through comprehension and exchange.

Glocality

We make use from all the capacities of today’s world. We use internet utmost as well as other forms of communications and virtuality. We work in a guerilla way, devoted and from everywhere. We use institutionalism as a method to achieve our goals. But we must create locality. For we want to influence and to change our real life and our surrounding. Our planet is real. Our lives are real. Our hopes and sufferings are real. The pain and joy we feel.

This is why we create the first World culture center in Skopje. As the world trade center is a glocality, symbol of sense, order and connectedness through uniformity, standardization and branding, so the world cultural center is a glocality, a place for action, culture, meaningness, order, hope through diversity, openness, heteronomy. The World trade center is our poetic antipode. Above its real globalistic emergence we create a cultural alternative.

Unrootedness

Being aware of the local context we chose to act horizontally, according to the Charles Landry concept. We strongly oppose the creation of new cultural infrastructure. In a situation where the museums, national operas, theatres are vast spaces in decay and presents a burden to everyone, the idea to build new ones is foolishness. We find solution in the “horizontal” use of the institutions. We want our ideas, methods and programs to exchange in the spaces of these flagship buildings.

“Nationalism is now viewed as dark, elemental, unpredictable force of primordial nature threatening the orderedly calm of the civilized life.” - Parta Chaterjee

“The man who finds his homeland sweet is still a tender beginner; he to whom every soil is as his native one is already strong; but he is perfect to whom the entire world is as a foreign land.” - Hugo of St. Victor

What World culture Means to us?

World Culture is an open, diverse, pluralistic, non-hierarchical aggregate of cultural practices, communicating among themselves through structural or incidental, systemic or programmatic, hierarchical or subversive cultural policies, economic undertakings or social movements.