KLYS meets with its sister organization CCA
in Canada
på svenska
At the follow-up conference that
was organized by the CCA (Canadian Conference of the Arts) at the
end of June -a direct consequence of the Stockholm Conference -
the KLYS board was invited to Canada in order to discuss
questions of common interest with its sister organization.
Consequently, on November 4 - 8, the KLYS board and the
secretariat visited Ottawa. On the agenda was, among other items,
the needed action of the two organizations to prevent different
trade agreements threatening each country’s cultural policy.
If, for instance, the recently cancelled MAI-negociations would
reappear, for exampel within the WTO, we now have a common
strategy to saveguard the national cultural policy. The question
of an Agenda 21 for culture, that was proposed at the
Hässelby-conference, was also discussed, as well as the coming
Mexico-conference in June 1999. Both KLYS and the CCA are finally
determined to continue to pursue the process that was initiated
in Stockholm and which aims to bringing the cultural issues to
the political agenda.
Follow the joint meeting of KLYS and CCA day by day
Day 1 - Friday, November 6
The
Friday meeting was held at the Canadian Council for the Arts and
opened by Keith Kelly, the former National
Director of the CCA (see photography). The meeting was
an introductory meeting to present the two organizations. The
participants at the meeting were representatives of different
sections of the Canadian Council for the Arts, representatives of
Canadian artists’ organizations members of the CCA, and the
Swedish delegation. Keith Kelly opened with an overview of the
background of the CCA. The organization was founded in 1945 by
leading Canadian artists to improve artists’ social and
financial situation and to create a national fellowship among
artists all over Canada. Earlier on, the CCA was financed only by
membership fees. In 1976, however, the state granted money to the
organization which resulted in a close co-operation with the
Canadian Council. As an outcome of the government grant, the CCA
became more sensitive to the ups and downs of the economic
fluctuations. The total budget of the CCA is today around 1
million Canadian dollars.
In contrast to KLYS, the CCA consists, apart the artists’
organizations, of collecting societies, publishers and art
galleries. The 23 members of the board are representatives of the
provinces as well as of the different art disciplines. The board
meets only twice a year because of the long distances in Canada.
However, telephone- and e-mail-meetings take place throughout the
year.
During the past few years, the CCA has become more and more
involved in international issues and would like to be acquainted
with other countries’ experiences in the cultural field. The
CCA is now looking for different forms of international
co-operation, such as network and other interchanges, to find a
broad common standpoint to the question of how to deal with the
cultural issues in international contexts. Unfortunately, culture
is not often on the agenda when international agreements are
negociated. Which means that these questions may "enter
through the back door" and affect the culture in a negative
way.
A discussion followed about the lack of media coverage of the
traditional art, such as poetry, visual arts, and other music
forms than the popular music. The focus on the entertainment
field is a problem, as well in Canada as in Sweden. Furthermore,
the Canadians brought up the problem with the Canadian film
industry, which to a great extent is controlled by the USA. Peter
Curman, the chairman of KLYS talked about the Print-on Demand
technique, i e digital publishing, where the authors can skip the
publisher-link and publish their own books on the Internet, where
they can be ordered by anyone. The free-lance artists in Canada,
as well as in Sweden, often feel forced to agree to convey their
digital rights to the publishers and the media companies. A
tendency towards individualized agreements can be noticed in the
commercial world.
A comparative analysis was made of Canada’s public
lending right and the Swedish "bilblioteksersättning".
The Canadian public lending right is administered by the Canadian
Council for the Arts and has no legal status, while the Swedish
"biblioteksersättning" has been regulated by law since
1962.
The meeting continued to make comparisons of different
remuneration systems and authors’ rights for artists and
performing artists. In Canada, artists must be members of a
collecting society to be able to get their royalties from this
society. There are no extended collective licenses as in Sweden,
that cover also artists who are not members of the collecting
societies.
Finally, different international and european artists’
organizations was mentioned. The participants of the meeting
agreed that a new organization is not needed. Rather, a
non-formal co-operation in the form of a network between
artists’ organizations in the world would be the best way.
Day 2 - Saturday, November 7 - Joint meeting with the CCA
board
The Saturday meeting was a
joint meeting between the CCA board, consisting of 23 persons,
and the Swedish delegation of 10 persons. The meeting took place
in a spacious conference room at the Canadian Council for the
Arts and was opened by the Chairman of the CCA board, Pat
Bradley. The first item discussed was the World Bank/Unesco joint
conference in Washington in September about a culture in a
sustainable development, which the CCA attended. Sweden also
attended the meeting with a representative from the Cultural
Ministry. CCA’s report from this meeting is translated into
Swedish on the KLYS homepage.
The next item on the agenda was the cultural perspective on
international trade agreements (such as the MAI). Investment
issues will most surely be on the agenda for the next round of
negociations in the WTO. To assert the position of culture, the
CCA proposed that an international
network of NGOs (non-governmental organizations) on
the cultural field be formed. The network will carefully study
the development of international trade and investment agreements
and act in order to prevent the problems caused by the MAI from
ever arising again. The network will also work towards the
meeting in Mexico 1999 between the cultural ministers, so that it
will actually be held and that it presents a joint document
written in co-operation with the network.
The financing of a possible network was discussed. The World
Bank has expressed that it can only be co-financier. Another
question is which countries will be part of the network. Will
every country that announce its interest be able to join? Apart
from Canada and Sweden, up till now, Mexico, Greece, Morocco,
Croatia and South Africa have expressed their wish to join an
international co-operation on this field.
The executive committee of the CCA has written a proposal to
an international strategy to establish a platform from where the
network can start to work. The Swedish delegation approved the
document, apart from some wordings. It was decided that the
changes proposed by the Swedish delegation should be made and
that the document will be handed over to CCA’s international
committee which will pursue the mission. The aim is to find a
common standpoint before the WTO-negociations take their
beginning, and to find a common definition to the concept of
culture, which can be accepted by the two countries.
To create the network, it can be of help to study the networks
that have been created in the environmental and labour-market
fields. It was pointed out that Unesco is not to be seen as such
a network. Furthermore, the meeting discussed who will be in
CCA’s international committee. It was proposed that this
committee should invite a KLYS representative.
To conclude, the participants in the meeting decided
unanimously that the document written by the CCA with a proposed
international strategy, with the exception of a few minor
changes, can be used as a working plan to pursue the work of
establishing an international network for culture.
Stockholm , November 13 1998
Ulrica Källén
Managing Director
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