The small city of Loos-en-Gohelle within the north of France is a captivating instance of how tradition might be harnessed to foster socio-ecological change. We have been so intrigued by this story of transformation that we determined to take a more in-depth look. Our findings are printed in a brand new RIFS Examine.
Loos-en-Gohelle: A city reworked
When the coal mines round Loos-en-Gohelle closed within the Nineteen Eighties, the small French city quickly slipped right into a state of structural disaster. Right this moment, Loos-en-Gohelle is in a greater financial place than its neighbours, with fewer vacant flats and higher employment figures. And that’s not all: Loos-en-Gohelle has turn out to be a pilot city for sustainable growth, with rooftop photovoltaic techniques, inexperienced renovation and development, and sustainable mobility choices. On the Franco-German Discussion board for the Future, we requested ourselves: How did Loos-en-Gohelle obtain this? What steps did it take to go from a black (coal) to a inexperienced (sustainable) metropolis?
Within the midst of the disaster, Loos-en-Gohelle put participatory cultural initiatives on its political agenda. On the annual Les Gohélliades competition, residents have been capable of inform their tales, mourn their shared historical past, and look to the longer term collectively. In time, this “storytelling” turned one thing akin to an act of liberation, as Geoffrey Mathon, deputy mayor of Loos-en-Gohelle, recounts: “Folks have such a powerful want to precise their anger, their sense of injustice, their ache! It is important that we create areas for this. We should use this vitality to take motion and dare to innovate.” Since then, participatory cultural codecs have helped form native politics. Along with the neighborhood, the native authorities has labored to develop a variety of sustainable initiatives – from natural horticulture to putting in photovoltaic techniques.
Cultural participation is a perfect software to facilitate place-based city growth, even when its strategies, resembling storytelling, appear uncommon.
Finding out the position of participatory cultural work
Our analysis focussed on: How does the native council’s method to tradition and participation differ from that of different cities? To what extent has it initiated a metamorphosis course of that differs from that pursued in different cities and cities within the mining districts of northern France? And the way is that this cultural work perceived by the local people? Our findings are introduced within the RIFS Examine Loos-en-Gohelle und sein kulturelles Ökosystem (“Loos-en-Gohelle and its cultural ecosystem”). The research reveals how involving residents in cultural work can have a robust transformative impact. Nonetheless, it additionally reveals the necessity to continuously reinvent and renew approaches to cultural participation so as to preserve momentum.
Participatory cultural work requires the assist of political establishments
The Franco-German Discussion board for the Future is tasked with growing concrete suggestions for motion for the governments of France and Germany in addition to for native authorities in each international locations with the intention of accelerating socio-ecological transformations at municipal stage. The experiences of cities resembling Loos-en-Gohelle are an necessary supply of studying for our work. In 2021 and 2022, we established a dialogue between Loos-en-Gohelle and a number of other municipalities in Germany that face comparable challenges. In a sequence of transdisciplinary workshops supported by consultants, representatives from the taking part cities developed seven key suggestions for motion.
One in every of these suggestions referred to as on nationwide authorities to strengthen and pursue local participatory cultural activities as a central lever for socio-ecological transformations. This suggestion displays the perception that not each native authority can obtain the success seen in Loos-en-Gohelle with out assist. A nationwide service centre on participatory tradition may present much-needed assist to many municipalities.
Hyperlink to the research (in German):
- Florentin, D., Veys, M., Robic, N., & Faltermeier, Okay. (2023). Loos-en-Gohelle und sein kulturelles Ökosystem: Partizipative Kulturarbeit als Grundlage für raum-bezogene Identifikation und gesellschaftlichen Zusammenhalt. RIFS Examine, November 2023. https://doi.org/10.48481/rifs.2023.029
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