European Commission

Urban Innovative Actions is an Initiative of the European Union to test innovative ideas and support urban authorities in their efforts to ensure sustainable urban development. It takes its roots in a strong commitment at European level to strengthen the urban dimension of EU policies. UIA contributes to the EU Urban Agenda and it is based on article 8 of ERDF. One of the 14 UIA topics is culture and cultural heritage. Under this topic, UIA acknowledges that cultural participation has a significant impact on residents’ quality of life, contributing to their well-being and their sense of belonging. The 5th UIA call for proposals invited urban authorities to propose community-based solutions in accessibility to and participation in culture and cultural heritage which can have a positive impact on growth and jobs, social cohesion and social inclusion. Most of the proposals submitted (105) proposed digital elements and tools to improve access and participation to culture and to increase social and physical well-being. The Commission has delegated the implementation of the Initiative to the Hauts-de-France French Region.

Erasmus+ is the EU Programme in the fields of education, training, youth and sport. The mechanism acknowledged that rurope needs more cohesive and inclusive societies which allow citizens to play an active role in democratic life. Education, training, youth work and sport are key to promote common European values, foster social integration, enhance intercultural understanding and a sense of belonging to a community, and to prevent violent radicalisation. Erasmus+ is an effective instrument to promote the inclusion of people with disadvantaged backgrounds, including newly arrived migrants. Erasmus+ promoted equity and inclusion by facilitating the access to participants with disadvantaged backgrounds and fewer opportunities compared to their peers whenever disadvantage limits or prevents participation in transnational activities for reasons such as:
- disability (i.e. participants with special needs): people with mental (intellectual, cognitive, learning), physical, sensory or other disabilities;
- cultural differences: immigrants or refugees or descendants from immigrant or refugee families; people belonging to a national or ethnic minority; people with linguistic adaptation and cultural inclusion difficulties;
- health problems: people with chronic health problems, severe illnesses or psychiatric conditions;
- social obstacles: people facing discrimination because of gender, age, ethnicity, religion, sexual orientation, disability, etc.; people with limited social skills or anti-social or risky behaviours; people in a precarious situation; (ex-)offenders, (ex-)drug or alcohol abusers; young and/or single parents; orphans.
Although the programmes does not explicitely mention the role of culture in well-being, in practice many funded projects addressed the issues of health and well-being with cultural and educational means.

For over 15 years, the URBACT programme has been the European Territorial Cooperation programme aiming to foster sustainable integrated urban development in cities across Europe. It is an instrument of the Cohesion Policy, co-financed by the European Regional Development Fund, the 28 Member States, Norway & Switzerland. Urbact is part of Interreg Strand C, which includes 3 other interregional cooperation instruments that reinforce the effectiveness of EU cohesion policy (Interreg Europe, Interact and ESPON programmes). URBACT’s mission is to enable cities to work together and develop integrated solutions to common urban challenges, by networking, learning from one another’s experiences, drawing lessons and identifying good practices to improve urban policies. Following the success of the URBACT I (2002-2006) and URBACT II (2007-2013) programmes, URBACT III (2014-2020) was developed to continue to promote sustainable integrated urban development and contribute to the delivery of the Europe 2020 strategy. URBACT uses resources and know-how to strengthen the capacity of cities to deliver integrated urban strategy and actions on the thematic according to their challenges. The main target participants include practitioners, city managers, elected representatives and stakeholders from other public agencies, the private sector and civil society. The document ”URBACT III Operational Programme” adopted by the European Commission in 2014 stresses the fact that cities need to act in a comprehensive way, coordinating different policies that relate to the main services that their inhabitants need: water, energy, housing, transport, culture, health, green and urban spaces, etc. To tackle all urban challenges, the city needs a holistic approach bringing together economic opportunity, multimodal mobility, energy efficiency and renewability, quality of the natural and built environment and promotion of the cultural heritage, development of strong public services and amenities in a sustainable an inclusive way.

The ERDF aims to strengthen economic and social cohesion in the European Union by correcting imbalances between its regions. The priorities and rules of the ERDF for the 2014-2020 period are laid down in Regulation (EU) No 1301/2013 on the European Regional Development Fund and on specific provisions concerning the Investment for growth and jobs goal. ERDF finances programmes in shared responsibility between the European Commission and national and regional authorities in Member States. The Member States' administrations choose which projects to finance and take responsibility for day-to-day management. The Regulation acknowledges that:
- it is necessary to promote innovation and the development of SMEs, in emerging fields linked to European and regional challenges such as creative and cultural industries and innovative services, reflecting new societal demands, or to products and services linked to an ageing population, care and health, eco-innovation, the low-carbon economy and resource efficiency.
- in order to promote social inclusion and combat poverty, particularly among marginalised communities, it is necessary to improve access to social, cultural and recreational services, through the provision of small-scale infrastructure, taking account of the specific needs of persons with disabilities and the elderly.
One of the programme investment priorities is: promoting social inclusion, combating poverty and any discrimination, including by investing in health and social infrastructure which contributes to national, regional and local development, reducing inequalities in terms of health status, promoting social inclusion through improved access to social, cultural and recreational services and the transition from institutional to community-based services.
The ERDF supported several types of activities in order to contribute to its investment priorities, including:
- investment in social, health, research, innovation, business and educational infrastructure;
- investment in the development of endogenous potential through fixed investment in equipment and small-scale infrastructure, including small-scale cultural and sustainable tourism infrastructure, services to enterprises, support to research and innovation bodies and investment in technology and applied research in enterprise.

Interreg Europe is a cooperation programme co-financed by EU Cohesion policy’s European Regional Development Fund (ERDF). Interreg Europe is part of Interreg Strand C, which includes 3 other interregional cooperation instruments that reinforce the effectiveness of EU cohesion policy (Interact, URBACT and ESPON programmes). The European Union strives to reduce disparities in the levels of development, growth and quality of life in and across Europe’s regions. The Interreg Europe programme was therefore designed to support interregional learning among policy relevant organisations across Europe. The programme’s objective is to enable public authorities and other relevant organisations to actively learn from the experience of other regions. This is a learning process which involves identifying, analysing, and transferring good practices with the aim of improving regional development policy instruments and ultimately delivering solutions that benefit all citizens. It has 5 main policy objectives, including one on education, social inclusion, integration of third-country nationals, health care, culture and sustainable tourism (Objective 4: ‘A more social Europe’). The specific objectives of ”A more social Europe” related to health and to culture are: equal access to health care, health systems resilience, family-based and community-based care, and respectively, culture and tourism for economic development, social inclusion, and social innovation. Although the Programme does not mention the specific link between culture and health, there is great potential for synergies in the funded projects because the two fields are included in the same policy objective (Objective 4: ‘A more social Europe’).

Horizon Europe is the EU’s multiannual funding programme for research and innovation between 2021-2027. Three strategic documents outlining the implementation of the programme in its first years reveal the link made between culture and health so far:
1) The Horizon Europe Strategic Plan 2021-2024 defines the key strategic orientations for the first four years of programme. The document aims to ensure an effective interface between EU policy priorities, and programme activities and ultimately, the research and innovation projects funded by Horizon Europe. Pillar II of the Programme, Global Challenges and European Industrial Competitiveness has 6 clusters, including one for Health (cluster 1) and one for Culture, Creativity and Inclusive Society (cluster 2). The promotion of social cohesion and inclusiveness and the health and well-being of its people are central aims of the European Union’s policies and programmes. The Strategic Plan acknowledges cross-cluster complementarities between the Health cluster and the Culture cluster.
2) Horizon Europe Work Programme 2021-2022. Health cluster is the action plan for the implementation of the first two years of cluster 1 Health. It contributes to six expected impacts set out by the Horizon Europe Strategic Plan 2021-2024: 1 - Staying healthy in a rapidly changing society; 2 - Living and working in a health-promoting environment; 3 - Tackling diseases and reducing disease burden; 4 - Ensuring access to innovative, sustainable and high-quality health care; 5 - Unlocking the full potential of new tools, technologies and digital solutions for a healthy society; 6 - Maintaining an innovative, sustainable and globally competitive health related industry. The document also stresses that importance of cross-fertilisation and other synergies between EU-funded projects under the different pillars and clusters of Horizon Europe. For instance, it mentions the welcome intersections with cluster 2 Culture, Creativity and Inclusive Society, such as on health inequalities, on other inequalities affecting health, or on citizens’ behaviour and engagement, but also on health economics and economic models, on cost-effectiveness, fiscal sustainability and accessibility of health care, or on adaptation of public health systems to societal challenges (climate change, environmental degradation, migration, emerging epidemics, etc.).
3) Horizon Europe Work Programme 2021-2022. Culture, creativity and inclusive society is the action plan for the implementation of the first two years of Culture cluster. It includes several calls for proposals that are relevant for the link between culture and health. One example is the call - New ways of participatory management and sustainable financing of museums and other cultural institutions, which also aims to promote the role of museums and other cultural institutions in well-being, health, resilience, social inclusion and society’s dealing with trauma and post-crisis recovery.

EU's flagship programme supporting the culture and audiovisual sectors. It has 3 main strands: Culture (covers cultural and creative sectors with the exception of the audiovisual sector), Media (covers the audiovisual sector) and the Cross-sectoral strand (actions across all cultural and creative sectors). The Programme encourages inclusion, equality, diversity and participation, which, where appropriate, shall be achieved through specific incentives that: (a) ensure that people with disabilities, people belonging to minorities and people belonging to socially marginalised groups have access to the cultural and creative sectors and that encourage their active participation in those sectors, including in both the creative process and audience development; and (b) foster gender equality, in particular as a driver of creativity, economic growth and innovation. The Programme encompasses the fundamental role of European culture and media in citizens’ well-being and in empowering them to take informed decisions.

EU's flagship programme supporting the culture and audiovisual sectors. It has 3 main strands: Culture (covers cultural and creative sectors with the exception of the audiovisual sector), Media (covers the audiovisual sector) and the Cross-sectoral strand (actions across all cultural and creative sectors). The dual objective of the Programme was to safeguard cultural and linguistic diversity and strengthen the competitiveness of the European cultural and creative sectors. The programme encouraged organisations to cooperate across disciplines and borders, as well as to develop new practices and innovations to reinforce the competitiveness and the resilience of the cultural and creative sectors. The programme funded a significant amount of projects addressing the connection between arts and culture and well-being or health (see the programme results platfom : https://culture.ec.europa.eu/creative-europe/projects/search).

The New European Bauhaus initiative connects the European Green Deal to our daily lives and living spaces. It calls on all Europeans to imagine and build together a sustainable and inclusive future that is beautiful for our eyes, minds, and souls. By creating bridges between different backgrounds, cutting across disciplines and building on participation at all levels, the New European Bauhaus inspires a movement to facilitate and steer the transformation of our societies along three inseparable values:
- sustainability, from climate goals, to circularity, zero pollution, and biodiversity
- aesthetics, quality of experience and style, beyond functionality
- inclusion, from valuing diversity, to securing accessibility and affordability
The New European Bauhaus brings citizens, experts, businesses, and institutions together to reimagine sustainable living in Europe and beyond. In addition to creating a platform for experimentation and connection, the initiative supports positive change also by providing access to EU funding for beautiful, sustainable, and inclusive projects. The document states that what people feel as a need to reconnect with nature, including for health and wellbeing, is supported by research: greater opportunities for contact with green public spaces translate into better health indices for the population and reduce income-related health inequalities. Cultural assets (heritage, arts, local craft, know how, etc.), natural assets (landscapes, natural resources, etc.) as well as social assets (social economy enterprises, local organisations and associations etc.) make a place unique. Cultural life, arts events, concerts are opportunities for connection and social interaction, the binding element that creates a sense of belonging.
The European Commission will count on the cooperation of the European Parliament, the Council, the Committee of the Regions and the European Economic and Social Committee to raise awareness and promote the debate in their constituencies, mobilise citizens and private sector actors and share available resources to support the New European Bauhaus. The cooperation of Member States and of the public authorities at international, national, regional and local levels, including participation of civil society and representatives of diverse communities, will be crucial. The Commission invited EU Member States to mainstream the New European Bauhaus core values in their strategies for territorial and socio-economic development, and mobilise the relevant parts of their recovery and resilience plans, as well as the programmes under cohesion policy to build a better future for everyone.

Adopted in May 2016, The Pact of Amsterdam launched the Urban Agenda for the EU, an EU-wide urban policy initiative concerned with multi-level governance: an umbrella for all urban policy initiatives. It enables cities, Member States, the European Commission and other key stakeholders to come together to jointly address urban issues within the regulatory framework of the EU and provide the EU with more on-the-ground data. Most actions under the Urban Agenda for the EU are delivered through partnerships, each made up of a variety of members. The aim of the Partnership on Culture/Cultural Heritage is to enable municipalities, Member States, EU institutions and interest groups, NGOs and Partners from the industry to work together on an equal footing to find solutions that improve the management of the historic built environment of European cities, promote Culture, and preserve the quality of urban landscapes and heritage. By increasing their knowledge about current and future trends/challenges linked to Culture and social inclusion (this can be about intercultural dialogue, about participation to Culture, about participatory governance of Cultural Heritage etc.), cities will develop policies that have more impact on the targeted population. There will be one peer learning visit (online or on-site, depending on sanitary conditions allowing traveling or not) to test the methodology. The visit will focus on a specific topic linked to Culture and social inclusion. Topics that could be covered during the peer learning activities (to be decided with members of the Partnership) include, among others, also: developing new Partnerships at local level within the Culture sector and other sectors, including social inclusion, health and wellbeing, migration and integration The final scope is to provide a specific tool that can be used also by other initiatives at EU level, specifically dealing with the topics mentioned above.
The Partnership has several strategies, including one for enlarging and enhancing the role of cultural urban services to strengthen the well-being of citizens (Strategy 5).