The Collaborative Cultural Model

The Collaborative Cultural Model is a model for allocating government grants to regional cultural activities. Within this model, The Swedish Arts Council allocates government grants to regions and county councils on the basis of a regional cultural plan. Regions and county councils further disburse the grants to professional theatre, dance and music activities, museums, libraries, art and culture promotion, regional private archives, film culture activities and handicraft promotion activities.

The shift in regional cultural policy presumes closer collaboration between the different agencies and organisations that have financial and/or strong interests in the collaborative cultural model. The solution chosen by the Government was to set up a Collaborative Council. Agencies and organisations in the Collaborative Council are agencies and regional institutions and the council is chaired by The Arts Council. In 2013 twenty regions were included in the collaborative cultural model for the first time. Collaboration between culture and civil society is part of the collaborative cultural model. Consultation with professional cultural practitioners is reported to have taken place both in formalised and in less formalised contexts. 17 out of 20 regions state that professional cultural practitioners have participated in or been invited to participate in annual meetings. The same number state that formalised consultation has taken place on repeated occasions during the year. These consultations take different forms in the regions, in open meetings such as cultural parliaments and hearings, but also individual consultations solely with professionals in the cultural sphere. Along with municipalities and professional cultural practitioners, some civil society actors also takes part in regional working groups and networks. Collaboration partly within the remit of the Collaboration Council and with professional cultural practitioners and civil society organisations is essential to the long-term sustainability of the Collaborative Cultural Model.