New World Cultural Policies Compendium to include Asian Countries

ASEF is partnering in the World Cultural Policies (WorldCP) project, a new web-based database of national profiles, which will expand on the highly-regarded Compendium of Cultural Policies and Trends in Europe to include Asian countries. WorldCP will include national profiles of Asian countries under the section WorldCP-Asia which is part of ASEF’s Asia-Europe Compendium of Cultural Policies programme. The project kicks off with an Expert Meeting on Cultural Policy organised by ASEF in Seoul, Korea, 27 to 28 July 2011. 18 cultural policy experts and researchers will meet at this event to discuss cultural policy issues and trends in Asia. The Meeting is conducted in partnership with the Office for the Hub City of Asian Culture of the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism of the Republic of Korea and the Korean National Commission for UNESCO. WorldCP is promoted by the International Federation of Arts Councils and Culture Agencies (IFACCA). The project will significantly enhance access to current information and analyses on the cultural policies and trends of member countries of the Asia-Europe Meeting (ASEM), while also promoting exchange and dialogue on policy making. WorldCP-Asia will build on ASEM initiatives such as the mapping of Cultural Heritage Preservation and Management Policies in the ASEM Countries, undertaken in the context of the 4^th ASEM Culture Ministers’ Meeting (Poland, 2010). The Compendium of Cultural Policies and Trends in Europe was developed by the Council of Europe and the European Institute for Comparative Cultural Research (EricArts) and currently covers the cultural policies of 41 Council of Europe Member States.