Promoting cultural diversity on Netflix, Spotify or YouTube, and fighting against the trafficking of Mayan or Yoruba heritage: these are two of the issues on the table of a world culture summit which is being held from Wednesday to Friday in Mexico City, a first since 1998. The Covid-19 epidemic has once again shown that culture is vital for public health, said summit coordinator Pablo Raphael.
“
No one would have been able to survive confinement and stress without books, music and cinema
,” he explains.
The representatives of 160 countries, including a hundred ministers who have confirmed their presence, must adopt a declaration negotiated for a year at the end of this meeting entitled Mondiacult.
The declaration wants to guarantee “
the rights of artists
” on the platforms, indicated the director general of Unesco Audrey Azoulay, who will inaugurate Mondiacult with the Mexican Minister of Culture Alejandra Frausto.
Challenge: to fight against “
the impoverishment of cultural and linguistic diversity online
”, according to the experts who worked on the declaration.
Access to the online market for all
The danger?
“
Artificial intelligence systems
” and “
insufficient regulation of algorithms
”.
It will also be about “
the unfair remuneration of artists
”, and “
the unequal concentration of global cultural platforms
”.
Most are American or European.
Unesco wants "
all artists to have access to the online market, that diversity be accepted, and intellectual property respected
", indicates a source from the organization, without details for the moment on the courses of action. .
In the real world and the universe of objects, the Mexico Declaration claims to reinforce “
the ethical code of art dealers
”.
How?
With a "
certificate of origin
" guaranteeing that the works they sell "
have been obtained legally
", Audrey Azoulay told the Mexican newspaper
El Universal.
What happiness for the organizing country.
Mexico continues to demand the return to the country of its immense Mesoamerican heritage dispersed in Europe and the United States.
"
My heritage is not sold
", insists the Mexican Minister of Culture, Alejandra Frausto, at each auction in Paris or elsewhere of a Tehotihuacan mask or the statue of a Mayan goddess.
The African Union, for its part, announced the organization of a round table on the nagging question of “
the restitution of cultural heritage
” to sub-Saharan countries.
Unesco is considering in the same vein for 2025 "
a virtual museum of stolen cultural property
", on the eve of this unprecedented meeting for 40 years.
Global public good
In its most political aspects, the Mexico Declaration intends to define culture as a "
global public good
" by including it "
in the next United Nations Sustainable Development Goals, as was the case for education in 2015
" .
.
Finally, the Mondiacult meeting wants to lead to “
a definition of a global corpus of cultural rights
”.
This is the “
right of artists
” but also the “
right of indigenous communities to the transmission of their traditions
”, specifies a spokesperson for Unesco.
“
Indigenous languages are essential to save cultural diversity,
” explains the director general.
“
In the grand challenge of tackling climate change, indigenous knowledge is fundamental
.”
The final declaration intends to mobilize culture "
in international discussions on climate change (...) notably through traditional and indigenous knowledge systems
".
The countries will meet by workshop.
Ukraine will participate via video in a round table on “
heritage and cultural diversity in crisis
”.
Together with Iran and China, Russia will host another meeting on the theme of “
renewed and strengthened cultural policies
”.
The experts who prepared the meeting condemn "
actions that target culture in the context of armed conflicts
".