ΠΟΛΙΤΙΣΤΙΚΗ ΣΥΝΕΡΓΑΣΙΑ ΜΕ ΓΕΡΜΑΝΙΑ

 Germany

In the Federal Republic of Germany, central government, the Länder and local authorities together form a threefold system of public culture policy. The political responsibility is ex-ercised by the legislative bodies at central government and Länder level and the autono-mous administrative bodies of the local authorities and their culture commissions. The government authorities (ministries of culture) and local authorities (culture departments) are responsible for the implementation of culture policy.
Under the Constitution, the Länder are responsible for fulfilling the role of the State in the field of culture. German culture policy is organised federally and decentrally. In addition to central government and the Länder, local authorities, cities and rural districts have their own responsibilities for culture in the overall structure of public responsibilities.

The following table illustrates the division of powers and the cooperation structure in the field of culture in Germany:
pdf format - word format

Culture policy in Germany is guided by the principles of decentralisation, subsidiarity and plurality. The different levels of political action complement each other. The Government operates a 'hands-off' approach, although the public sector does act as an important guar-antor and funder of cultural activity.
Recent discussions on the privatisation of public services and institutions have been char-acterised by greater openness to the idea of public-private partnership models. The local authorities bear the largest share of financing for culture, followed by the Länder. Because of its limited powers in this area, central government provides only limited funding.

For more information on German culture:
Kulturportal Deutschland
Deutsche Kultur International
The Federal Government
Conference of Ministers of Education and Culture