Societal impact of cultural heritage

Expected Outcome:

Projects should contribute to all of the following expected outcomes:

• Enhanced understanding of the societal impact of cultural heritage; Good practices and case studies to enable positive societal impact described and documented, for the context of the research area chosen.
• Capacity building and knowledge dissemination among practitioners and policymakers.
• Produce and disseminate policy recommendations, guidance, and toolkits, supporting policymakers, in. the context of the research area chosen as appropriate.

Scope:

Heritage is a dynamic resource that can foster societal resilience, intercultural dialogue, and a sense of belonging in increasingly diverse and fragmented societies. It can contribute to social cohesion and resilience through arts, design and cultural practices. Thus, cultural heritage is central to the preservation of the social fabric and community cohesion. Understanding and amplifying the societal impact of cultural heritage is essential for reinforcing identity, cohesion, and global leadership based on shared values. Research proposals should explore how cultural heritage actively shapes civic engagement, social innovation, collective memory, and the transmission of democratic values.

Moreover, it is crucial to develop new narratives around heritage — ones that are forward-looking, critically aware, and deeply connected to Europe's evolving values. Such work will not only strengthen Europe's internal cohesion but also position cultural heritage as a strategic asset in addressing global challenges.

In this context, social innovation could also translate into working with cultural heritage practitioners and custodians to explore how cultural heritage can solve some of today's societal challenges (achieving better social inclusion, social cohesion, well-being, and equality). Whereas previous research (including contributions by SSH disciplines) has widely explored developing heritage-based education, contribution of culture to rural development and cultural tourism, there are some fields that could benefit from more research: cultural participation and access to culture, with a focus on young people; gender roles and identities; a shared cultural heritage and shared responsibility in the light of security challenges.

Research projects should choose one of the following areas:

A. Cultural participation and access to cultural heritage

Access to culture, acquired through socialisation and education, plays a crucial role in shaping cultural practices and preferences. As mentioned in the Political Guidelines^[1] for the European Commission, there is a need to improve access to cultural heritage, in particular for young people, and contribute to tackle cultural inequality and strengthen a sense of identity and belonging. In addition, attention should be paid to disadvantaged groups, eventually solidifying participatory culture and democracy and fostering a sense of stewardship towards cultural heritage.

A Special Eurobarometer on Europeans’ Attitudes Towards Culture^[2], published in May 2025, showed that a majority of Europeans believe that their country and the EU should work more closely together when it comes to making arts and culture more accessible to everyone.

Prior research^[3] indicates that increased cultural participation can potentially enhance civic engagement, social inclusion, and democratic governance, and counteract alienation and social disengagement. However, research also indicates profound and multifaceted barriers to access. These barriers include, for example, geography, including the challenge of rural isolation; under-representation of minority groups; economic disparity.

The proposals should explore good practices for fostering access to cultural heritage, with a focus on young people and ways to empower them to take an active role in their communities and strengthen social cohesion. Proposals should also explore which are the main barriers for access to culture and effective means to increase cultural participation, identifying specificities for different types of groups.

The proposals should employ interdisciplinary and participatory methods to identify effective models for inclusive cultural participation. Results are expected to guide policies on cultural access, with recommendations, for instance, for digital infrastructure, educational programmes, and cross-sector collaboration to foster inclusive citizenship.

B. Gender roles and identities

Cultural heritage has the power to promote diversity and inclusion by showcasing diverse narratives and histories, but it can also perpetuate inequality if stereotypes, cultural role models, and representations are limited or biased, silencing marginalised voices.

The proposed research should explore the complex relationships between cultural productions, representations and societal attitudes towards different sexes and gender identities, with a focus on understanding how culture can shape our cultural landscape and influence our attitudes and imaginaries.

Proposals should provide an analysis of the representation and overview of different gender identities and intersecting factors such as racial or ethnical background, disability or socioeconomic background, in cultural fields. Proposals should explore how gender aspects have been absent, or forgotten, in major supranational cultural narratives. Proposals should provide actionable recommendations on how to promote a more inclusive and diverse representation, including in the cultural content, and to address the absence of diverse representations in the cultural field. These recommendations should be developed in a dialogue with different stakeholders, for example researchers, policymakers, cultural heritage institutions, civil society representatives.

C. Cultural heritage, cohesion and security

The proposed research should explore the role and conceptualisation of cultural heritage as a distinctive element of our shared identities and democratic values. It should also examine the links between culture and security including issues of disinformation and foreign information manipulation and interference (FIMI) etc. Proposals are expected to explore the notions of shared heritage and shared responsibility as an expression of our social interdependence, and culture as a factor of union and cohesion.

Cases of instrumentalisation of cultural heritage and the political influence on museums or other cultural institutions should also be taken into account in the research. Culture can also face factors of destabilisation, attacks on cultural heritage can destabilise society and jeopardize security while cultural content can greatly influence public opinion and the imaginaries. The proposals should explore how to deal with polarising narratives and controversial aspects of cultural heritage use.

The proposals should propose good practices, policy guidelines, run pilot projects and propose didactic materials to raise awareness on existing challenges, enhance “neutrality” in cultural heritage management, collective responsibility and cultural resilience; explore the notions of care and repair applied to cultural heritage.

Proposals shall clearly indicate the thematic area they have selected to work on.

Proposals should adopt a multidisciplinary approach (involving, for instance and not exhaustively, heritage and museum studies, cultural anthropology, ethnology, media studies, theatre studies, literary studies, musicology etc.) to assess and demonstrate how cultural heritage initiatives contribute to societal well-being, community empowerment, inclusion, and sustainable development while identification of needs for further research in the field should be promoted.

Proposals should prioritize empirical research, participatory methodologies, and policy innovation to maximize and communicate the transformative power of cultural heritage across all layers of society.

Proposals should connect to both formal and non-formal education, particularly arts education. Encouraging collaboration between cultural heritage actors and educational institutions would enhance impact.

Proposals should build on existing knowledge, activities, networks and platforms, notably the ones funded by the EU, for example paying attention to the future digital tools and platforms provided by the European Collaborative Cloud for Cultural Heritage (ECCCH), and the Common European Data Space for Cultural Heritage.

Furthermore, links should be established and complementarities sought with closely related actions, such as relevant R&I actions funded by Horizon Europe or Horizon 2020.

[1] https://commission.europa.eu/document/download/e6cd4328-673c-4e7a-8683-f63ffb2cf648_en?filename=Political%20Guidelines%202024-2029_EN.pdf

[2] https://culture.ec.europa.eu/news/eurobarometer-publishes-findings-on-europeans-attitudes-towards-culture

[3] Culture and democracy, the evidence - Publications Office of the EU