Legitimate participation as the horizon of cultural events

Cultural rights are often misunderstood. Their strength lies in their capacity to transform our practices: moving from a top-down programming logic to the creation of spaces where everyone can legitimately contribute.

Legitimacy as foundation: the example of the Fête de la Musique

I regularly draw comparisons between the national short film festival and the Fête de la Musique. The former has existed since 2011, but its notoriety remains limited. The latter, created in 1982, belongs to the collective cultural heritage and has spread worldwide. This asymmetry reveals something important about how cultural rights operate in actual practices: the Fête de la Musique, although predating the contemporary formalization of cultural rights, remarkably embodies their spirit. Its principle rests on a radical authorization: anyone is authorized to play in the street or in public, and is considered legitimate in doing so. A person who wishes to take out their guitar and play three chords in front of their house has the right to do so and will be fully part of the event, at their own level. This legitimacy granted to each person precisely constitutes one of the pillars of cultural rights, which Patrice Meyer-Bisch and the drafters of the Fribourg Declaration (2007) sought to formalize theoretically. The text notably affirms the right to “choose and have one’s cultural identity respected” and to “participate in cultural life,” rights that presuppose this intrinsic legitimacy.

I co-founded the Fête du Court-métrage in 2011 with Isabelle Massot, at the request of the National Center for Cinema and the Moving Image, and I championed this dimension from the project’s inception, carrying the values of cultural rights during the first three years when we directed it (moreover, the original name was “Le Jour le Plus Court” [The Shortest Day], as it took place on December 21, the shortest day of the year, like June 21, the longest day of the year, for the Fête de la Musique): any person wishing to show their films, audiovisual creations or even home movies at their place could do so and be officially included in the program. This was enabled by a very simple and clear contributory website. Because this singular screening can interest an audience, and it creates connections. And it in no way invalidates the existence of professional film screenings or aesthetically demanding programs. Both can coexist and mutually enrich each other.

But after these early years, the project continued in a more academic fashion, because carrying this openness represents more work, as hierarchies must be deconstructed, and it is not part of professional habits, nor what they often see as their mission to “defend,” nor part of legitimation bodies. This national event is now conducted competently, that’s not the issue. What is lacking is this space we agree to give others, this openness that allows the very forms of the event to be transformed through contact with people and territories. Keeping control over a tightly packaged program that participants will receive as is presents obvious organizational advantages. But this control comes at the cost of reduced anchoring in the lived reality of communities, less appropriation by the inhabitants themselves, and undoubtedly much less sustainability.

The difference in reach between these two festivals is not coincidental. It demonstrates that when people are genuinely authorized to contribute, when they are granted legitimacy from the outset, something is set in motion that far exceeds the initial framework of the project. This dynamic of collective appropriation that cultural rights seek to make systematic is embedded in public policies themselves.

From democratization to democracy: a conceptual reversal

The Ministry of Culture took a significant step by clearly naming its orientations as early as January 2021 with the creation of the “General Delegation for Transmission, Territories and Cultural Democracy”, which became a general directorate in fall 2025, now bearing the name “General Directorate of Cultural Democracy, Education and Research.” This designation inscribes cultural rights, present in the NOTRe (2015) and LCAP (2016) laws, within an explicit conceptual framework: that of cultural democracy, in clarified opposition to cultural democratization:

• Cultural democratization proceeds according to a vertical logic: some possess power over something precious, the great works of humanity, which they bring down to those who don’t have access to them. This dominant model, despite its stated good intentions, made explicit and claimed by Malraux, rests on an implicit hierarchy of cultural values.
• Cultural democracy operates a reversal. It doesn’t start from a corpus of works to transmit, but from people themselves and their respective cultures. The assumption changes: culture is understood in the anthropological sense, as the totality of what constitutes us as persons and communities. It’s no longer about dominant culture with its precise codes, but about culture as a set of references, practices, symbols that shape our relationship to the world and to others.

Jean-Michel Lucas has long defended this distinction in his work, notably in Démocratie culturelle et droits de l’homme (2009). But the fact that the Ministry of Culture now assumes this orientation gradually modifies representations, the landscape, and legitimation bodies. This institutional clarification makes cultural rights operational in concrete projects. It allows cultural actors to orient themselves, to understand where they stand in their practices. Are we in a logic of vertical transmission or in a logic of horizontal sharing? These two logics can coexist, but it matters to know which one structures our project, which one guides our decisions.

This conceptual opposition between democratization and cultural democracy resonates, in a certain way, with what John Dewey already formulated in 1927 in The Public and Its Problems: democracy is not only a system of government, but first a mode of associated living, of conjoint communicated experience. Cultural rights apply this pragmatist principle to the cultural field: they make culture not a good to be distributed, but a process to be lived together.

The fear of relativism: a persistent misunderstanding

One objection often returns when facing cultural rights: they would constitute a form of relativism where everything would be equal. This fear deserves to be taken seriously, as it reveals a profound misunderstanding about what cultural democracy really means. Cultural rights don’t propose a relativism of values, but the establishment of democratic spaces around cultural projects. The nuance deserves to be clarified: affirming that each person has the right to contribute, to be recognized in their culture, to participate in decisions that concern them, doesn’t amount to declaring that all cultural productions are equal on an artistic level. UNESCO’s Convention on the Protection and Promotion of the Diversity of Cultural Expressions (2005) formulates this balance precisely: cultural diversity constitutes a common heritage of humanity and should be celebrated and preserved for the benefit of all. Recognizing this diversity doesn’t mean abandoning all criteria of quality or artistic demands. It means creating conditions for this diversity to actually exist, so it doesn’t remain an empty word but becomes a lived reality.

Cultural professionals legitimately maintain their place, with their expertise, know-how, years of training and practice. Their role remains essential. But this place is no longer exclusive. It fits within a democratic space where other voices, other practices, other ways of making culture also possess their legitimacy. The Fribourg Declaration (2007) formalizes this principle when it affirms the right to participate in cultural life and the right to participate in the development, implementation and evaluation of decisions that concern us. These rights don’t dissolve professional competence; they inscribe it within a relational framework where it dialogues with other forms of knowledge and practices. And each can be enriched by others, on diverse levels.

Patrice Meyer-Bisch, in his recent text Clarifier le sens culturel des droits humains, leçons apprises avec le déploiement des droits culturels (Nectart #20, 2025), recalls that cultural rights aim precisely to fight against forms of assignment and discrimination. It’s not about denying differences in skills or artistic accomplishment, but refusing that these differences serve as a pretext to exclude certain people from cultural participation itself. The question is not is this quality art? but does this person have the effective possibility to participate, to express themselves, to be recognized in their cultural dignity?.

For progressive autonomous appropriation

Cultural rights often suffer from a reputation of conceptual complexity. Philosophers who reflect, laws difficult to decipher, specialized vocabulary... This perception distances from what they truly are: a tool for understanding, evaluation and action, anchored in the daily practices of cultural actors. In my training sessions, I try precisely to reverse this dynamic, to make cultural rights concrete, operational in the real situations professionals face.

I’ve met people who had attended training on cultural rights and told me they understood nothing. It’s not about criticizing other trainers, but about highlighting what’s at stake for me: how do we move from concept to practice? And then, two days of training dedicated to cultural rights for all staff of a cultural structure for example, even if the session works well, if teams have understood the issues and experimented with methods, we must remain aware that a two-day awareness session, even successful, is not enough to deeply transform work methods. Cultural rights require time, collective maturation, progressive appropriation that far exceeds the framework of a one-time training, even if initial awareness is very useful.

This is why I advocate for progressive acculturation, where teams themselves take hold of the question. I suggest, before training, taking time together, even an hour, to exchange: “what are cultural rights?”, “how can they be useful for our work?”, “what troubles us about this approach?”. Consulting the ministry’s website, reading foundational texts, attending professional networking days, notably with Réseau culture 21, is really useful. Appropriation deserves to happen both collectively and personally. Each person must be able to find their own path, their reasons, their ways of doing. Cultural rights must absolutely not become a new injunction, a new vocabulary to mechanically apply to practices without truly transforming them. That would betray their very spirit.

If I had to formulate the spirit of cultural rights in one sentence, it would be this: practice them in all possible ways, according to contexts, desires, the needs of each situation. The essential doesn’t reside in checking boxes or respecting a new protocol that would become bureaucratized, but in creating concrete conditions so that each person can truly contribute, be recognized, participate in decisions that concern them. That’s what cultural democracy in action is: not a conceptual ideal but a daily practice, made of attention to people, respect for their dignity, openness to the multiple forms that cultural life can take. This practice sometimes happens without even naming cultural rights themselves, what matters is that it effectively transforms relationships between people, between institutions and citizens, between professionals and publics. Cultural rights reveal their power in this transformation of relationships.