During the 132nd Session of the Committee of Ministers* held in Turin on May 20 2022, the Council of Europe’s Committee of Ministers adopted a Recommendation on the role of culture, cultural heritage and landscape in helping to address global challenges (CM/Rec(2022)15). The Recommendation affirms culture’s transformative role in sustainable development and calls for the full recognition and integration of culture into relevant policies. It identifies the assets and skills of cultural stakeholders that should be mobilised to help address current challenges. The Recommendation also calls for a new understanding of culture – and hence policies – as a strategic element, and proposes various policy objectives and measures aimed at fostering a local approach to engage with people and communities as well as a global approach to encourage international collaboration in order to generate a collective ambition and international cooperation based on empathy and solidarity.

Find the full recommendation here.

*The Committee of Ministers is the Council of Europe’s statutory decision-making body. Its role and functions are broadly defined in Chapter IV of the Statute. It is made up of the Ministers for Foreign Affairs of the 46 Member States . The Committee meets at ministerial level once a year and at Deputies’ level (Permanent Representatives to the Council of Europe) weekly.