Position Paper

for the Roundtable Culture & Conflict, Amsterdam, June 2013

Robert Kluijver

Session 1: The role of culture and creative leaders

First of all, culture must be seen in its dynamic aspects, not as a static given. As any dynamic process, there is a measure of conflict involved between different groups in a society, as each would like to define that society’s culture in its own terms. Both internal and external actors should accept this degree of conflict, and not see it as an obstacle, but as an opportunity to establish a pluralist, open society rather than a uniform, cohesive one.

A post-conflict society definitely needs a measure of peace. But it especially needs development, change, it needs to grow and thus leave behind the situation which led to conflict. Culture allows this to become a collective rather than an individual pursuit. Culture is the cement which keeps together society, which defines its codes of exchange. The case of Iraq, where culture was completely neglected, shows how brittle a society can become when its culture is left to decay.

The role of cultural leaders is thus immensely important. They must help reconfigure the culture of the communities they live in and work together to create a pluralistic field in which cultural differences between groups are accepted. They must drive change, instead of representing their cultural community because that could fan the flames of the previous conflict. They form a vanguard in society, a lonely and potentially dangerous position.

Session 2: Conflict and post-conflict, roots of conflict and the creation of spaces for social cohesion

We must now address the role of Western culture. This round table focuses on the question what the West can do. Although the term is usually ‘international’, it can be easily argued that the supposedly universal values of the international community are of Western extract and character. In any case this is how it is generally seen by local, non-Western communities.

The common denominator between post-conflict situations as diverse as Cambodia, Yemen and Rwanda is the international community. The same institutions with their organizational culture, often even the same individuals are found in each situation. It would be logical then to see these organizations as part of the problem, insofar post-conflict interventions are usually protracted failures. Instead the international community sees itself as a neutral arbiter, above rather than participating in cultural conflict. It is blind to its own bias, for example towards Westernized local elites. The West thus inadvertently complicates the situation and often fans the flames of conflict. It should be more self-aware, that could greatly improve its efforts to deliver assistance.

Session 3: Peace-building cultural institutions

When the government gets involved in defining national culture in a post-conflict situation, this often leads to serious conflict. I would argue that as far as State institutions go, the cultural sector primarily needs an appropriate legal framework and the Rule of Law. Any further interference from the State or the political sphere is unnecessary.

Since local funding for culture is invariably either absent or very scant in post-conflict situations, all cultural agents in a society look for external support. This pre-determines the outcomes of cultural reconfigurations – for example cultural agents must be able to speak the financial-administrative language of donor organizations – and weakens the local roots of these organizations; the danger then exists that they, together with the whole NGO / ‘civil society’ sector, are then seen as stooges of the West and rejected by society at large.

When well-intentioned Western policy makers set up programs to foster ‘community-driven change’ and culture, they do not realize that they are creating a powerful cultural interference. If they would, they could also forestall the problems they are creating. For example, attempts to create the ‘safe cultural spaces for social cohesion’ mentioned in the position paper at the grassroots level often fail, among others because they ignore the inherent potential for conflict over who will control such a space.

My position, then, is that the intervening agent should first face its own reality as a cultural actor, and accept that cultural reconstruction, indeed essential to the long-term success of any intervention, is a conflictive process. There should be a conscious choice to support the cultural vanguard in a society and thus support transformative processes, even if they lead to conflict in the short term.