What can a common cultural policy in Europe achieve?

Culture and art are essential weapons in the fight against two very present elements of danger threatening Europe today: individual withdrawal and generalised uniformity brought about by globalization. They are conducive to “individuation”, to use the term coined by Bernard Stiegler, and have therefore a fundamental role to play in European integration. Since theater came into existence together with democracy and can only live opposite an audience that forms an ephemeral community night after night, theater artists and stage professionals have a duty to add their contribution to the support and further development of a link between Europe and culture. Thanks to its emblematic history and long tradition of debate, the Festival d'Avignon provides a forum for reflection on how to integrate such ideas into the common political project and raise interest for this fundamental issue with theater-goers, artists and professionals. Currently, in the absence of a European cultural policy, only certain incentive and follow-up mechanisms for cultural cooperation exist. It is however impossible to build the cultural policy of the European Union by extrapolating from national policies. The French sometimes tend to project French cultural policy onto European Union level, whereas one has to take into account the European specificities. Nevertheless, France has an important contribution to make in fighting for the values put forward by its domestic cultural policy since the post-WWII era. In conjunction with the European Commission's publication of a communication on culture, and with a view to the French presidency of the European Union in 2008, the Festival d'Avignon brings together personalities from the political, artistic and intellectual arena to discuss what European cultural policy can and should look like and reflect on the question: what can a common cultural policy in Europe achieve?