Kulturpolitik in der Demokratie

Abstract

The present article investigates the legitimacy of cultural politics from the perspective of democracy politics. This question is dealt with on the basis of the Lincoln formula, “government of the people, for the people, and by the people.” Democratic equal liberty can only be implemented on the basis of solidarity among citizens and of the citizens towards the state; culture and the arts can contribute to these forms of solidarity, e.g. by constructing national cultures. In contemporary migration societies, this specific achievement of culture and the arts has, however, become doubtful, and has to be re-defined. Furthermore, culture and the arts are said to contribute to civic education, thereby enabling “government by the people”. Finally, culture and the arts create spaces in which conceptions of the public good can be confronted with each other, i.e. different meanings of “government for the people”.

The second part of the article analyses different forms of financing culture and the arts out of the perspective of democracy politics – public financing, philanthropy, sponsoring, crowdfunding, and cultural and creative industries. In this way, the theoretical considerations of the first part are confronted with practices of cultural politics.