Political Rescaling and Municipal Cultural Public Policies: A Comparison of France and Québec

Abstract

International audienceDo territories change public policies? This would appear to be a rather unusual research orientation. It is even a reversal of the most commonly accepted approaches to the study of territorial public action, which tend to look at this issue from the opposite perspective, that is, in examining how public policies affect territories. The municipal reforms that have simultaneously occurred in Québec and France since the late 1990s afford an excellent opportunity to consider this inversion of the issues. To do so, we take as our theme culture and municipal cultural policies. We try to define and understand to what extent there exist in Québec and France retroactive links between municipal restructuring and municipal decisions about cultural facilities and activities and, more generally, municipal cultural intervention in the urban milieu. This comparative analysis of the cases of France and Québec focuses on discourse as well as achievements. First, we look at the changes arising from institutional reforms in the supply of cultural activities, budgets devoted to culture, and cultural policies. We then consider culture as a vector in the construction of a new municipal institution and a new municipal territory

Exploring political parties’ manifesto discourse on tourism: Analysis of Scottish, Welsh and Northern Irish elections 1998–2011

“…A burgeoning literature (Cf. Trouvé et al 2007, Verhage 2005, Breux et al, 2007 details how this term refers to the rescaling of public policy when states restructure and government is decentralised (this links to the academic literature on policy and…”

The process of privatisation of cultural heritage and the arts in Italy: analysis and perspectives

“…Today, the presence of multiple actors, whose points of view are deeply rooted in a given region, tends to rescale and contextualise the transformations of the management of cultural heritage and of their physical assets (Breux et al 2007). The nonprofits' (and even the local governments') action is usually territorially bounded and rooted in local society.…”

The Prospects for Progressive Culture‐Led Urban Regeneration in Latin America: Cases from Mexico City and Buenos Aires

“…While originally limited to cities in North America and Europe, culture‐led urban regeneration strategies are now also attempted by localities outside the global capitalist core, and this has led to a multi‐regional debate on the possibilities, conditions and limits of urban cultural policy — much of which has been published in this journal over the past few years (Teo, 2003; Breux et al. , 2007; Plaza, 2008).…”

“…While originally limited to cities in North America and Europe, culture-led urban regeneration strategies are now also attempted by localities outside the global capitalist core, and this has led to a multi-regional debate on the possibilities, conditions and limits of urban cultural policy -much of which has been published in this journal over the past few years (Teo, 2003;Breux et al, 2007;Plaza, 2008). This article contributes a Latin American perspective to this debate by arguing that globalization processes have created a set of conditions and challenges in the region's main cities for which culture-led regeneration constitutes a suitable policy option.…”