Abstract

This seminar presents and provides a space to discuss the key findings and insights from a Canadian-European comparative study of the integration of culture in community sustainability policy and planning in Canada and Europe. The research built on a critical examination of Canada's "four-pillar" model of community sustainability, which attempts to integrate cultural considerations into overall local planning for sustainability.

While this Canadian policy was groundbreaking, further examinations of overarching policy contexts and comparison with European approaches to integrating culture into community planning were needed. This project, involving documentary analysis, interviews, and a survey of practitioners in Canada and Europe, aimed to identify key conceptual and policy approaches from both Canada and Europe and to develop a more comprehensive map of current planning practices and policies that enable culturally sensitive sustainable community development within multilevel governance frameworks.

The research project was a partnership of the Centre for Social Studies at the University of Coimbra, Portugal, and the Centre on Governance at the University of Ottawa, Canada. The research was undertaken with the support of Foreign Affairs and International Trade Canada.

Presenters/researchers involved:
Nancy Duxbury (CES), João Mascarenhas Mateus (CES), M. Sharon Jeannotte (Centre on Governance, University of Ottawa, Canada) Caroline Andrew (Centre on Governance/ School of Political Studies, University of Ottawa, Canada)

Biographical notes

Nancy Duxbury is a Senior Researcher and Co-coordinator of the Cities, Cultures and Architecture Research Group of the Centre for Social Studies, University of Coimbra, Portugal. Her research focuses on culture in sustainable development, and the integration of cultural considerations within sustainability planning initiatives internationally. She is chair of the Policies working group of the European COST Action on ‘Investigating Cultural Sustainability’ and an Adjunct Professor of the School of Communication, Simon Fraser University, Canada. She is internationally published, and has guest edited issues of the Canadian Journal of Communication, Society and Leisure (with M. de la Durantaye), and Culture and Local Governance (with M.S. Jeannotte). She was a co-founder of the Creative City Network of Canada.

João Mascarenhas Mateus is a Senior Researcher at the Centre for Social Studies and a member of the Cities, Cultures and Architecture research group. He holds a degree in Civil Engineering and a Master of Sciences in Architecture from the Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, Belgium, and a PhD in Civil Engineering issued by the Technical University of Lisbon (2001) and prepared at the University ‘La Sapienza’ of Rome, Italy. He has worked as an expert for the General Directorate X – Culture from the European Commission on the evaluation of projects of Preservation of Cultural Heritage. In Rome, he designed and directed several restoration projects for the Portuguese Institute and for the Portuguese Pontifical College. ‘Cultore della materia’
at the Faculty of Architecture Valle Giulia, Univ. La Sapienza, Rome, Italy
(2002-2004) and associate of the ‘Scuola di Specializzazione in Conservazione dei Monumenti’, since 2002. He was technical coordinator of the Candidature of Baixa Pombalina of Lisbon to the World Heritage List and senior advisor to the Lisbon City Council Councillor and to the Lisbon Mayor for historical neighbourhoods policies (2003-2006). One of his current fields of research is the relation between urban history and image.

M. Sharon Jeannotte is Senior Fellow at the Centre on Governance of the University of Ottawa. From 2005 to 2007, she was Senior Advisor to the Canadian Cultural Observatory in the Department of Canadian Heritage.  From
1999 to 2005, she was the Manager of International Comparative Research in the Department's Strategic Research and Analysis Directorate.  She has published research on a variety of subjects, including the impact of value change on Canadian society, international definitions of social cohesion, the points of intersection between cultural policy and social cohesion, the role of culture in building sustainable communities, culture and volunteering, and immigration and cultural citizenship. In 2005, she co-edited with Caroline Andrew, Monica Gattinger and Will Straw a volume entitled Accounting for Culture: Thinking Through Cultural Citizenship, published by the University of Ottawa Press.  In 2011, she co-edited with Nancy Duxbury a special issue of the journal Culture and Local Governance on the subject of culture and sustainable communities.

Caroline Andrew is the Director of the Centre on Governance at the University of Ottawa. Her research areas centre on local government social and cultural policies, and particularly on the relations between local equity seeking groups and their impact on social and cultural policy at the local level. Among recent research projects, she is part of a research team looking at the use and production of non-English, non-French media in the Ottawa region. In 2005 she co-edited with Monica Gattinger, Sharon Jeannotte and Will Straw a volume entitled Accounting for Culture: Thinking through Cultural Citizenship, published by the University of Ottawa Press. Caroline Andrew is on the steering committee of the City for All Women Initiative and chair of the Board of Women in Cities International.

Seminar linked to the research group CCArq