Creative Europe is a is a funding programme established by the European Union to support the cultural, creative, and audiovisual sectors across Europe. The main objectives of the programme are:
safeguard, develop and promote European cultural and linguistic diversity and heritage
increase the competitiveness and economic potential of the cultural and creative sectors, in particular the audio-visual sector
The programme aims to promote cultural diversity, creativity, and competitiveness while safeguarding and promoting Europe's rich cultural heritage[1]. It facilitates cross-border cooperation and mobility for artists and cultural professionals within the EU and beyond.
In its first programme period from 2014 to 2020, Creative Europe had a budget of €1.46 billion. For the second phase spanning 2021 to 2027, the budget was increased to €2.44 billion to further bolster the cultural and creative industries.[2]
Creative Europe comprises three main strands:
The Culture strand - Supporting cross-border cooperation projects involving performers, artists, cultural professionals, cultural institutions, and organizations in a wide range of cultural and creative sectors (including among others performing arts, visual arts, literature, cultural heritage, architecture and other areas).[3]
The MEDIA strand - Strengthening the competitiveness and promotion of the European audiovisual industry through development, distribution, training, and other measures.[4]
The Cross-sectoral Strand - Facilitating collaboration across creative sectors and covering news media sector.[5]
Creative Europe for 2021-2027 introduces several key innovations compared to the previous programme period. There is an increased emphasis on transnational creative projects and innovative approaches across the cultural and creative sectors. Access to funding has been facilitated through higher co-financing rates, with greater contribution levels from Creative Europe for selected projects. For the audiovisual industry specifically, the programme prioritizes support for EU-wide cooperation to bolster its global competitiveness. A new mobility scheme aims to promote the cross-border movement of artists and cultural professionals. Additionally, the actions and initiatives have been tailored to address sector-specific needs and challenges facing different creative disciplines.[6]
History
The Creative Europe programme has its origins dating back to the previous Culture (2000-2006)[7] and MEDIA (1991-2013) programmes launched by the European Union to support cultural cooperation and the audiovisual sectors respectively. Building on these prior initiatives, Creative Europe was established for the 2014-2020 period as a merged framework bringing together the cultural and creative industries under one umbrella programme[8]. The initial 2014-2020 phase had a budget of €1.46 billion allocated by the European Commission and European Parliament.
The programme was approved by the European Parliament on 19 November 2013 and adopted by the European Council on 3 December 2013. It came into force on 1 January 2014.[9] A total of 650 of the Members of the European Parliament (MEPs) voted in favour of the programme, with 32 against and 10 abstaining.[10]
After an interim evaluation, the programme was renewed and updated for the 2021-2027 period with an increased budget of €2.44 billion to bolster support for artists, cultural organizations, cross-border projects and international outreach.[11] With its multi-strand structure and emphasis on innovation, audience engagement and global competitiveness, Creative Europe aims to safeguard Europe's diverse cultural heritage while fostering growth in creative sectors key to the EU economy.
Membership in the programme has been extended to the EU's Eastern Partnership member states. Georgia was the first neighborhood country to officially join the Creative Europe Programme in 2015[12] followed by Moldova and Ukraine joining the Programme the same year and Armenia joining in 2018.[13]
The current Creative Europe Programme unites 40 countries, in each country there is a Creative Europe Desk.[14]
An integral part of Creative Europe is the Desk Network, serving as a vital link between the program and cultural/creative sectors across the participating countries. The role and objectives of these national Creative Europe Desks are formally outlined in the Regulation of the European Parliament and Council establishing the program for 2021-2027[15]. Desks operate within this network, working to successfully achieve mandated objectives through activities like promoting Creative Europe calls, organizing events and information sessions, providing consultations to potential applicants, and continually expanding outreach efforts to engage new sectors. This decentralized network structure ensures Creative Europe maintains strong connections to creatives and organizations at regional/national levels across participant countries.
Programme details
The general objectives of Creative Europe are: (a) to safeguard, develop and promote European cultural and linguistic diversity and to promote Europe's cultural heritage; (b) to strengthen the competitiveness of the European cultural and creative sectors, in particular of the audiovisual sector, with a view to promoting smart, sustainable and inclusive growth.[9]
Creative Europe encompasses the EU's previous Culture and MEDIA Programmes which have been in effect for more than 20 years.[9][16]
The Creative Europe programme consists of three complementary strands - the Culture Sub-programme, MEDIA Sub-programme, and Cross-sectoral Strand. The Culture strand supports cross-border cooperative projects and mobility for artists, cultural professionals, and organizations across sectors like performing arts, literature, heritage conservation and more.
The MEDIA strand focuses on enhancing the competitiveness and international presence of the European audiovisual industry through development funding, distribution support, training programs and other measures.
The Cross-sectoral strand promotes transnational policy cooperation, innovative approaches to audience engagement, as well as actions supporting the Creative Europe Desks' operations and communication efforts. [17]
Overall, Creative Europe aims to safeguard Europe's cultural diversity while boosting the economic potential of creative sectors which employ millions across the EU. [18]
Programmes that existed under the Culture and MEDIA strands, such as the European Capitals of Culture, European Heritage Label, European Heritage Days[9] and the five European prizes (EU Prize for Cultural Heritage/Europa Nostra Awards, EU Prize for Contemporary Architecture, EU Prize for Literature, European Border Breakers Awards, and EU Prix MEDIA) continue to operate under Creative Europe. Also the project Re-Imagine Europe, which was initiated by Sonic Acts, is co-funded by Creative Europe.
Funding
Creative Europe was allocated a budget of €1.46 billion for its initial implementation period spanning 2014 to 2020,[19] For the current second phase from 2021 to 2027, the programme's budget has been significantly increased to €2.44 billion to bolster support for the cultural and creative sectors across Europe.[2][10]
During its initial 7-year implementation period, Creative Europe's widespread impact is evidenced by the distribution of over 13,000 grants to support cultural, creative, and audiovisual initiatives across Europe. The program co-financed training opportunities for more than 16,000 professionals working in these sectors. Its funding facilitated 647 cross-border cooperative projects involving 3,760 participating organizations from European countries. This promoted cultural exchange and networking among artists, creatives and institutions.
Within the audiovisual domain specifically, Creative Europe aided the development and/or distribution pathways for upwards of 5,000 European films to reach audiences. It also supported the operational sustainability of 1,144 cinema venues programming European cinematic works.
Furthermore, the program enabled 3,500 literary books and publications to be translated into other languages, increasing access to written works across linguistic borders on the continent.
These cumulative outputs from 2014 to 2020 highlight Creative Europe's multifaceted role in catalyzing cultural cooperation, nurturing creativity, promoting artistic mobility, bolstering audiovisual competitiveness, and safeguarding Europe's rich creative diversity.[20]
For the 2021-2027 program period, Creative Europe has allocated a minimum of 58% of its total budget towards the MEDIA sub-program. This funding stream focuses on initiatives to support and strengthen the European audiovisual sector, including film, television, and cinema. At least 33% of the budget is dedicated to the Culture sub-program, providing funding for projects involving the performing arts, visual arts, heritage conservation, and other cultural domains across Europe. This budget division broadly maintains the previous funding shares received by the audiovisual and cultural sectors respectively.[21]
Up to 9% of Creative Europe's budget has been provisioned for the newly introduced Cross-sectoral Strand. This forward-looking component recognizes that the challenges and opportunities facing these diverse sectors are increasingly interlinked in our digital age.
At its core, the Cross-sectoral Strand aims to catalyze collaboration and knowledge sharing across different cultural and creative domains. From performing arts to news media, audiovisual to literature - these sectors grapple with common hurdles around content creation, distribution, audience engagement, and technological disruption. The strand's initiatives open up new cross-pollination avenues.
A pioneering example is the Creative Innovation Labs[22], which incentivizes players from different sectors to co-develop cutting-edge digital solutions with commercial potential. This promotes an ecosystem of innovation transcending traditional industry silos.
Moreover, the strand extends vital support to domains facing acute pressures. The news media sector, grappling with structural shifts and threats to media pluralism, receives targeted funding for journalism partnerships, media literacy projects, and efforts to uphold press freedom across Europe.[23]
Underpinning this cross-sectoral approach is the expansive Creative Europe Desks Network operating at national/regional levels. These desks act as connectors, facilitating program awareness, stimulating cross-border cooperation, and ensuring outputs benefit stakeholders locally.[24]
As cultural and creative sectors increasingly converge in the digital sphere, the Cross-sectoral Strand positions Creative Europe as an enabler of boundary-crossing synergies. Its initiatives catalyze innovative and sustainable solutions to shared challenges facing Europe's dynamic artistic and expressive landscape.
The creative industries refers to a range of economic activities which are concerned with the generation or exploitation of knowledge and information. They may variously also be referred to as the cultural industries or the creative economy, and most recently they have been denominated as the Orange Economy in Latin America and the Caribbean.
The Erasmus Programme is a European Union (EU) student exchange programme established in 1987. Erasmus+, or Erasmus Plus, is the new programme combining all the EU's current schemes for education, training, youth and sport, which was started in January 2014.
The Lifelong Learning Programme 2007–2013 was the European Union programme for education and training.
The MEDIA sub-programme of Creative Europe or simply Creative Europe MEDIA is designed to support the European film and audiovisual industries.
European Union culture policies aim to address and promote the cultural dimension of European integration through relevant legislation and government funding. These policies support the development of cultural activity, education or research conducted by private companies, NGO's and individual initiatives based in the EU working in the fields of cinema and audiovisual, publishing, music and crafts.
The regional policy of the European Union (EU), also referred as Cohesion Policy, is a policy with the stated aim of improving the economic well-being of regions in the European Union and also to avoid regional disparities. More than one third of the EU's budget is devoted to this policy, which aims to remove economic, social and territorial disparities across the EU, restructure declining industrial areas and diversify rural areas which have declining agriculture. In doing so, EU regional policy is geared towards making regions more competitive, fostering economic growth and creating new jobs. The policy also has a role to play in wider challenges for the future, including climate change, energy supply and globalisation.
The Directorate-General for Communications Networks, Content and Technology is a Directorate-General of the European Commission and is responsible for European Union investment in research, innovation and development of critical digital technologies.
The European Education and Culture Executive Agency, or EACEA, is an executive agency of the European Commission located in Brussels, Belgium. It manages parts of the European Commission's funding programmes in education, culture, media, sport, youth, citizenship and humanitarian aid. EACEA has been operational since January 2006.
The European Social Fund Plus (ESF+) is one of the European Structural and Investment Funds (ESIFs), which are dedicated to improving social cohesion and economic well-being across the regions of the Union. The funds are redistributive financial instruments that support cohesion within Europe by concentrating spending on the less-developed regions.
The European Institute of Innovation and Technology (EIT) is an independent body of the European Union with juridical personality, established in 2008 intended to strengthen Europe's ability to innovate. The EIT’s three “core pillars” of activities are: entrepreneurial education programmes and courses across Europe that transform students into entrepreneurs; business creation and acceleration services that scale ideas and budding businesses; and innovation-driven research projects that turn ideas into products by connecting partners, investors, and expertise.
Interreg is a series of programmes to stimulate cooperation between regions in and out of the European Union (EU), funded by the European Regional Development Fund. The first Interreg started in 1989. Interreg IV covered the period 2007–2013. Interreg V (2014–2020) covers all 27 EU member states, the EFTA countries, six accession countries and 18 neighbouring countries. It has a budget of EUR 10.1 billion, which represents 2.8% of the total of the European Cohesion Policy budget. Since the non EU countries don't pay EU membership fee, they contribute directly to Interreg, not through ERDF.
Europeana is a web portal created by the European Union containing digitised cultural heritage collections of more than 3,000 institutions across Europe. It includes records of over 50 million cultural and scientific artefacts, brought together on a single platform and presented in a variety of ways relevant to modern users. The prototype for Europeana was the European Digital Library Network (EDLnet), launched in 2008.
The LIFE programme is the European Union's funding instrument for the environment and climate action. The general objective of LIFE is to contribute to the implementation, updating and development of EU environmental and climate policy and legislation by co-financing projects with European added value. LIFE began in 1992 and to date there have been five phases of the programme. During this period, LIFE has co-financed some 4600 projects across the EU, with a total contribution of approximately 6.5 billion Euros to the protection of the environment and of climate. For the next phase of the programme (2021–2027) the European Commission proposed to raise the budget to 5.45 billion Euro.
European Union–Kazakhstan relations are the international relations between the Republic of Kazakhstan and the common foreign policy and trade relations of the European Union.
Cross-border cooperation is the collaboration between adjacent areas across borders. In the European Union this is one of the forms of territorial cooperation. The European model is very diverse with cooperation between border regions or municipalities, or through specific cooperation structures. These structures are usually composed by public authorities from different countries organized in working communities, euroregions or EGTCs.
The European Research Executive Agency is a funding body mandated by the European Commission to support the EU Research and Innovation policy. It has been established by the European Commission, based on Council Regulation (EC) No 58/2003.
The European Defence Fund (EDF) is a component of the European Union's (EU) Common Security and Defence Policy (CSDP) which aims to coordinate and increase national investment in defence research and improve interoperability between national armed forces. It was proposed in 2016 by Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker and established in 2017. The fund has two stands; Research and Development & Acquisition. In July 2018, the European Commission announced that the EDF budget for 2021-2027 would be €13 billion. This sum was later revised by the European Commission as part of the new EU budget proposed on May 27, 2020, as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, according to which the EDF will be allocated €8 billion over this budget period.
Horizon Europe is a 7-year European Union scientific research initiative, successor of the Horizon 2020 programme and the earlier Framework Programmes for Research and Technological Development. The European Commission drafted and approved a plan for Horizon Europe to raise EU science spending levels by 50% over the years 2021–2027.
The European Union Agency for the Space Programme (EUSPA) is a space agency, managing the European Union Space Programme as one of the agencies of the European Union (EU). It was initially created as the European Global Navigation Satellite Systems Supervisory Authority (GSA) in 2004, reorganised into the European Global Navigation Satellite Systems Agency in 2010, and established in its current form on May 12, 2021. EUSPA is a separate entity from the European Space Agency (ESA), although the two entities work together closely.
Creative Europe–Armenia is the Armenian branch of the Creative Europe programme. Creative Europe–Armenia was founded in 2018, with the support of the European Commission, and is headquartered in Yerevan.
↑ Directorate-General for Communications Networks, Content and Technology (European Commission); Directorate-General for Education, Youth; European Education and Culture Executive Agency (European Commission) (2021). Creative Europe: monitoring report 2020. LU: Publications Office of the European Union. doi:10.2759/602038. ISBN978-92-76-38967-5.
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