From Advocacy to Action: How the Culture Compass for Europe Champions Heritage, NEB and Intergenerational Justice

05/12/25

In its Position Paper on the Cultural Compass (BEDA, April 2025), the European design community called for:

Design as a structural component of cultural policy—emphasising its role in democratic resilience, innovation, and societal transformation.
Smart Metrics, changing the decision-making frame for culture: Embed Key Behaviour Indicators.
Integration of design methods into EU cultural strategies, particularly in the green, digital, and democratic transitions.
Embedding universal design, digital accessibility, and participatory co-design in EU cultural funding to ensure intergenerational justice and inclusion for people with diverse abilities.
A stronger link between heritage and innovation, advocating for design-driven approaches to revitalise cultural assets while respecting their integrity.
Positioning the New European Bauhaus as a flagship for systemic change, combining sustainability, aesthetics, and inclusivity.

The newly published Culture Compass for Europe reflects some alignment with these principles:

It reaffirms heritage as a core priority, extending its scope to digital heritage and resilience against climate and crisis risks, supported by initiatives like the European Heritage Label, Heritage Hub, and Cultural Heritage Cloud. This opens a window of opportunity to think further and to establish the ‘Heritage of Human Creativity’ – an idea developed by BEDA members during the General Assembly in May 2025.
It anchors the NEB in EU cultural policy, announcing a forthcoming Communication and Council Recommendation on its future, explicitly linking architecture, design, and sustainable living.
It introduces horizontal actions for accessibility and participation, including a Report on cultural access for persons with disabilities, a framework for youth cultural passes, and the Intergenerational Fairness Strategy, which promotes learning through heritage and culture-led innovation.
It commits to inclusive design of cultural infrastructure and programmes, echoing BEDA’s call for universal design and participatory approaches.
It strengthens cross-sectoral cooperation between culture, education, and innovation, embedding design literacy and creative skills in lifelong learning.

For BEDA, this means that what began as advocacy for design-led, inclusive, and future-proof cultural policies is now partially reflected in the EU’s strategic vision.

The Culture Compass for Europe puts some of BEDA’s recommendations into practice without explicitly naming design. It places heritage at the heart of sustainable transformation, creating opportunities for targeted actions to advance the ‘Heritage of Human Creativity’. Many of the Culture Compass actions implicitly draw on design principles; however, the absence of design as an explicit policy component highlights the need for continued dialogue.

Last updated: 10/12/25