About Us
HOTopics is an interactive orientation and debate platform provided by the Council of Europe's CultureWatchEurope initiative (CWE).
It has been developed and is run in cooperation with ECURES (European Association of Cultural Researchers e.V.).
A Board of Editorial Advisors is under way.
Over time, this site is to offer an innovative and evidence-based overview of culture, heritage and media issues in Europe. Experts from CWE partners and all visitors of the platform are invited to actively contribute to its content by:
- suggesting "hot" topics for debate;
- submitting background information to deepen a running debate;
- writing new articles ("ThinkPieces"); or
- commenting existing ones.
Your contributions can normally be submitted online on the platform. For additional information, please contact the editorial coordinators:
- Kathrin Merkle and Sandrine Marolleau (Council of Europe, F-67075 Strasbourg, Cedex)
- or Andreas Joh. Wiesand (ECURES e.V., Irmintrudisstr. 17, D-53111 Bonn)
or the Webmaster:
- Joerg Torkler (Medianale Group).
HOT Press
euro|topics - Culture/Media
- Debate: UN: how to reform a global organisation?
- Not much in the way of major changes | Avvenire - Italy
- Denmark can do its bit now | Politiken - Denmark
- Good reputation means it deserves support | Kristeligt Dagblad - Denmark
- Multilateral responses needed | Le Monde - France
- Unsurmountable obstacles with Trump | El País - Spain
HOT Publication
The Intercultural City - Step by Step (February 2013)
It falls primarily upon cities to design and implement policies that foster community cohesion and turn cultural diversity into a factor of development rather than a threat. This practical guide for applying the urban model of intercultural integration is designed for city leaders and practitioners wishing to learn from the "Intercultural Cities" pilot project run by the Council of Europe and the European Commission in developing an intercultural approach to diversity management. The guide recommends steps and measures to help develop an intercultural strategy and monitor its implementation.
HOT Events
Cultural Participation as a Human Right?
At a press conference held on 15 January 2013, city officials from Wroclaw (Poland) announced their intention to strive, in cooperation with the Polish Government, for an inclusion of the "right to participation in culture" as one of the basic rights in the Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms of the Council of Europe - in 2011, the city of Wroclaw had been selected to become the European Capital of Culture in 2016. A Panel of Experts, co-organized with NCK (National Centre of Culture), met on March 6 in Wroclaw to further clarify this issue. A larger Expert Conference on the right to culture in international legal instruments is to be held November 2013 in Warsaw. More...
Featured soon:
- The Culture of a Sustainable Environment
- (Non-) Participation in Culture: Issues and Remedies
- Freedom of Religion vs. Freedom of Expression: Two sides of a coin?
Council of Europe's electronic information tools:
