Paper short abstract:

A change occurring in the form of public funding for cultural activities has created a new resource for locally based associations and non-profit organisations in periferal areas to redefine and enhance local cultural interests, somewhat to the dismay of national public heritage institutions. Here it will be argued that while the proliferation of local NGOs is part of a global „NGOisation“ of culture, this development can be seen as a way of empowering local culture and initiative.

Paper long abstract:

In the past two decades a change of paradigm has taken place in our conception of the state and its role as broker of culture. Concrete consequences, such as a preference for competitive project funding over the funding of public cultural institutions, has created a new resource for the institutionalisation of local cultural interests in low-investment areas such as the Westfjords in Iceland. The proliferation of local NGOs has raised concerns within larger public institutions and is the subject of an emerging debate concerning the boundaries of the public and the private in cultural brokerage and expressions of cultural history.

In the Westfjords of Iceland, an area that has been severely hit by depopulation since the 1980s, some 19 cultural tourism projects dealing with various aspects of Icelandic cultural history have emerged since 1995. While each project has a unique history they are almost all based on local initiatives and run by third-sector entities. This proliferation of third-sector cultural actors in a peripheral area of Iceland is, it will be argued, the result of several movements or trends in policies regarding culture and cultural funding, rural development and tourism development, trends that have their roots in international political and academic attitudes.

In the past eight years this development has been the subject of increasing criticism, mostly as seen from the viewpoint of national public heritage institutions. I will discuss the form of this ongoing debate and its implications.