#2 Policy Recommendation Area
Empower democratic and community-focused cultural heritage institutions
2.2 Support the creation of innovative labs within cultural heritage institutions, leading to participatory reuse of digital heritage
Target Stakeholders
Policy makers at the EU and national level
Heritage Networks
Cultural Heritage Institutions
Other stakeholders
Recommendation
To facilitate the shift towards a more community-focused environment, CHIs must be encouraged, through incentives such as access to more resources at the EU and national level, to turn into innovative labs: inclusive creative spaces open to new partnerships, innovation and dialogue. In order to remain relevant in the dynamically evolving digital realm, cultural heritage institutions need to be equally dynamic and eager to experiment and innovate, also in collaboration with different communities, including creators and technology experts. In order to be able to take on this task, cultural heritage institutions have to be allowed to become more “open to risk,” i.e., have the ability to embrace and manage risks and have the right to fail (by absorbing impacts of and recovering from “failure”), similar to investment structures in the private sector.
Current legal and organisational frames for publicly funded cultural institutions restrain them from introducing more experimental approaches. Therefore, we encourage these legal and organisational funding frames to be revised, allowing for more flexibility and boldness in introducing operational models and strategies that match the mission of cultural heritage institutions to generate economic, social, and organisational value through participatory approaches.
