Julie’s Bicycle calls on governments to address the gap between culture and
environment policy.
As the world’s governments negotiate policy to effectively limit climate change, there is a
crucial gap: culture policy.
The cultural sector - the arts, creative industries and heritage - can make a crucial
contribution to accelerating environmental action. Culture is vital to national economies, contributing creative
skills and innovation, and influencing lifestyles, tastes and consumption. The cultural sector contributes to
greenhouse gas emissions and must play its part by aligning with carbon-cutting targets. But, most powerfully,
culture can change hearts and minds: it is intimately connected to place and to community; artists can move us
to reimagine our world and inspire societies to take climate action.
Artists, creative activists, cultural organisations and creative enterprises around the
world are championing action on climate and justice and calling for change.
But to have optimal impact national culture policy needs to be linked to environment
policy, harnessing the vital energy of the culture sector to mainstream climate action.
Culture policy sets the terms on which governments organise, fund and promote bodies
responsible for arts and culture - bodies that represent artists, cultural organisations, and audiences that
join together in making and sharing experiences that transform our world.
In its recent international research, Julie’s Bicycle finds that in most countries, national
culture policy currently lags behind the initiatives within the sector - and the science.
Government culture bodies across the world report that there is currently little or no
mandate to ensure that their culture sectors are aligned with national climate commitments. Such a mandate would
unlock the resources to enable the sector to align with national climate policies and it would unleash the true
potential of the culture sector to inspire climate action.
Based on 15 years’ experience, data, and research enriched by its most recent piece
of international work, Julie’s Bicycle now calls on governments to integrate culture into their climate
commitments. Arts and culture can then become a key part of the solution: the missing link.
