Festivals in Context: The Role of the Arts in Local Cultural Policy
By Elena Polivtseva
What if we dared to ask not just how festivals can serve society, but how society can learn from the courage, imagination, and resilience that festivals embody?
Arts festivals take on multiple meanings depending on who you ask. For over seventy years, the European Festivals Association (EFA) has been in dialogue with festival makers across Europe and beyond, reflecting on the diversity and common strength of festivals regardless of their size, scope, or discipline. This report does not look at festivals from the festivals’ own perspective, but rather through the eyes of cities and regions — asking how they perceive the role and value of festivals within their territories.
The EFFE Seal publication Festivals in Context: The Role of the Arts in Local Cultural Policy examines how festivals operate within 16 local and regional cultural policy frameworks across Europe. Based on policy analysis, research, and insights from the EFFE Seal community gathered in the past year, it explores how cities and regions define, support, and value festivals — and how these relationships reflect broader transformations in cultural policy today.
This report situates the discussion in a complex policy environment. Political instability, social polarisation, economic austerity, and environmental urgency have placed culture under increasing pressure. Public investment in culture across the EU remains limited and is declining in many places.
In this context, culture is often recognised for its contributions to economic growth, wellbeing, and social inclusion. While these connections are important, the report highlights the need to also acknowledge the intrinsic value of artistic work and not instrumentalise culture. When culture must “speak the language of other policy fields,” it risks becoming politically vulnerable — a “little helper” in service of external goals.
The challenge, therefore, is not to isolate culture but to recognise its distinct contribution: to allow the arts to engage deeply with society while preserving their freedom and integrity. The report asks, “How can we articulate a political narrative that values culture on its own terms, especially in times of crisis and scarcity?”
Festivals offer an insightful perspective through which to explore this dilemma. Their rapid growth across Europe has given rise to the phenomenon of festivalisation, reflecting the increasing prominence of festivals in shaping cultural life, urban identity, and policy agendas. Their flexibility and interdisciplinarity allow them to address a wide range of local priorities — from sustainability and inclusion to tourism and city branding — while also making their role within policy frameworks more complex and vulnerable to instrumentalisation. At the same time, festivals form a vital foundation of cultural life, offering authenticity, immediacy, and shared experience at a moment when individualised forms of consumption threaten social connection.
Local and regional representatives across the EFFE Seal community consistently described festivals as spaces that bring people together, lower barriers to access, and stimulate cooperation across sectors. However, the report also notes the limits of short-term projects and event-based engagement. Sustainable inclusion and artistic development require long-term policies, infrastructure, and trust — elements that cannot rely on festivals alone.
In a Europe facing multiple crises and deep uncertainty, festivals are spaces to imagine, rehearse, and celebrate possible futures, helping communities consolidate their agency and preserve a sense of collectivity as it is claimed in this report. It calls for cultural policy that acknowledges the unique contribution of culture, festivals and the arts: to generate meaning, create a sense of belonging, and sustain empathy across divides.