I would like to know how I can get a job in a European cultural
context. (eg. working on projects, such as the European city of
culture)I have been a serious supporter of Europe for over ten years,
have experience in marketing and PR for blue-chip companies, fluent
languages, and studied art history. I'm good at marketing, sales,
organisation, evaluating art, dealing with people and clients at high
levels and in different cultures. How can I research this area ? Am I
qualified? Who should I approach to work in this field? I would also
be willing to relocate to a different country.

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Request for Question Clarification by easterangel-ga on 13 Nov 2002 05:32 PST

Hi! By European culture do you mean museums, theater or libraries or
European tourism? Just let me know. :)

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Clarification of Question by clarette-ga on 13 Nov 2002 05:51 PST

Not just museums etc because that is then specialised museum work. It
is difficult because I'm trying to clarify a hunch by asking you this
question ! Who organises the European city of culture project for
example ? I wonder also if there are companies who specialise in arts
sponsorship - they would also be involved in marketing culture. Also-
I'm afraid my similiar question was posted while I was tring to just
edit it so it looks like I have two similiar questions on the go now.
I don't know whether you can ensure the other one is cancelled ?  Many
thanks.

Hello clarette

European-wide cultural initiatives, including annually selecting the
two cities to be the European Cities of Culture, are administered by
various bodies within the European Union (EU). The EU's website is at
http://www.europa.eu.int/ and is almost always the best place to start
when researching anything which falls under its jurisdiction. However
I would point out that the sheer volume of information on that site,
coupled with the fact that many documents are available in anything up
to 11 languages, can make navigation something of a pain.

Most of the following information has been located by careful
navigation on the EU website. Although information on the EU website
is available in many languages I am going to point you to the
English-language version of each document; links are available within
each document to take you to the same information presented in other
languages if that would be easier for you.

The main body of the EU that deals with real-world, concrete
day-to-day work is the European Commission (EC). The EC has its own
sub-site at http://www.europa.eu.int/comm/index_en.htm and if you go
there you will note that one of the links in the "Economy and Society"
is "Culture". Following this link will bring you to the European
Culture Portal:
http://www.europa.eu.int/comm/culture/index_en.htm

Reading through the material within this Culture sub-site will give
you a good broad overview of the kind of cultural work done by the EC,
ranging from cultural heritage through to the visual arts and cinema.
There are also plenty of examples of work that the EC has done to
support and fund cultural activities within the EU member countries.

With regard to your specific question regarding the European Cities of
Culture (now properly called European Capital of Culture) initiative,
this is now run by a programme set up by the EC called Culture 2000:
http://www.europa.eu.int/comm/culture/eac/c2000-index_en.html
Despite its name, Culture 2000 has a remit to continue its work of
promoting all forms of culture in Europe until 2004. Following on from
that the annual European Capitals of Culture will be decided in strict
rotational order, from each EU member state in turn, by a small panel
consisting of seven "leading independent figures who are experts on
the cultural sector". This is detailed, unfortunately in the usual
obfuscated wording in which legal documents are usually written, at
http://europa.eu.int/eur-lex/pri/en/oj/dat/1999/l_166/l_16619990701en00010005.pdf
(Adobe Acrobat document). Annex 1 (page 4) of that document lists the
next host countries in chronological order starting with Ireland in
2005 and ending with Italy in 2019

It's worth noting that the new rotational method of choosing Capitals
of Culture does not commit the EC to funding or sponsoring the chosen
cities -- in fact it even allows European countries who are not member
states of the EU to submit nominations. You can read more about the
history of the Cities of Culture idea, which has been running since
1985:
http://europa.eu.int/comm/culture/eac/capeurcult_en.html

The new structure which comes into force from 2005 pretty much reduces
central EU control of the Capitals of Culture to one of deciding which
of the country's nominations will be ultimately made Capital of
Culture. All detailed activities regarding what will actually be done
to recognise the city's status will be organised by the relevant
national, regional, and local governments, but not by the EU or EC.

That having been said, as mentioned above there is a general central
cultural initiative within the EC, so obviously there must be a way to
obtain work with the relevant section of the EC.

As with many bureaucratic organisations, simply finding out how to
apply for a job with the EC seems to be  something of a hurdle in
itself! There is a recruitment front page at
http://www.europa.eu.int/comm/recruitment/index_en.htm and a page at
http://europa.eu.int/comm/dgs/research/recruitment_en.html which tries
to explain their recruitment policy, however digging around a bit
further locates http://www.cec.org.uk/work/index.htm which gives a far
clearer specification of how EU recruitment works, and
http://www.cec.org.uk/work/recruit.htm for a list of current
vacancies. Note that vacancies and the applications for a vacancy are
actually called "competitions" -- a turn of phrase which certainly
confused me the first time I looked at it. Additionally, if you are a
British citizen then the Civil Service Recruitment Gateway has an
entire section on working for European institutions at
http://www.euro-staff.gov.uk/ -- if you are a citizen of another EU
member state please advise in a clarification request and I'll see if
I can find something similar.

Unfortunately, despite much searching, I haven't seen any way in which
you can send your details off to the EC "on spec" in case they have a
suitable vacancy. It seems like the only way to apply is indeed to
keep watching the recruitment competitions until a suitable one
arises. In the meantime I can only suggest you familiarise yourself
with all the material produced by the EU in the field of culture so
that you have as much knowledge as possible about the work they do and
how they do it.

I hope this goes some way to answering your question and I wish you
the best of luck in any future career in Europe.


Regards
iaint-ga


Search strategy:
Mostly following likely-looking links from the EU front page at
http://www.europa.eu.int/
One Google search: "european commission" site:.uk

Very useful and practical information.

Hi, Clarette-ga,

If you're living in the US, I don't see how you can get a job related
to the European City of Culture project, unless you're very
enterprising and find some sponsorship organizations based here that
also have an organizing role or can find some niche or need that you
can fill from the US.

Jobs in Europe

England
One source of information on cultural jobs, in England, Scotland and
Wales, at least, is the Media Section or the Marketing/PR Section of
the Guardian newspaper: if you're buying a newspaper, the ads are
printed at the end of those sections. (The Media Section is printed on
a Monday, as I recall, and I don't know abut the Marketing/PR
section.)

Jobs advertised in the Guardian,
http://jobs.guardian.co.uk/0,9452,,00.html

Ireland
In Ireland, it would be The Irish Times,
http://www.irishtimesjobs.com/ and the Sunday Business Post,
http://sundaybusinesspost.monster.ie/.

* Personally, I think getting hold of the print editions, in a library
for example (which only works if you live in a big city with a
well-resourced library), is better for getting a "feel" of the jobs
and the requirements.


A much easier route would be to contact recruitment agencies based in
Europe or with an international network of contacts, and let them know
you're available. If there's something I haven't understood, or some
more info you'd like to have, please post here and let me know.

Hi - I'm not actually living in the US. It's not just a "job in
Europe" I was looking for, it's more to do with being involved
specifically in European cultural issues (rather than British
interests etc - I'm in London). I'm very concerned about beauty,
harmony, justice, equality and speak languages. I'm studying art
history (modern, post-graduate) and I speak languages fluently as well
as have a lot of professional experience in marketing.

Dear Clarette-ga, 

   Have you tried looking at the Media Section of the Guardian to see
if there are jobs relating to "European cultural issues ... beauty,
harmony, justice, (and) equality"? 

   Have you contacted recruitment agencies to see what kind of jobs
are available in regard to those concerns?

   Have you approached any arts organizations on a formal or informal
basis to see if they're interested in your services?

   Have you come up with any ideas as to what you can do to help
promote "European cultural issues"? Can you be more specific as to
what excites you about those ideas, and what it is you would like to
do around them? Would you like to help a city win the award of
European city of culture in the future? By, for example, drawing up a
marketing campaign to promote that city either among its own citizens
or within the administrative centres of the European Union?

  I could ask more questions, but I think that will do for the time
being.