The Misguided Debate on Funding Cuts for Culture

In 2025, debates over funding cuts for culture are heating up, following unprecedented reductions in public subsidies and a political shift in this direction. It is not “culture” that is under threat, but the subsidized cultural sector. The real issue? Perhaps not so much the amounts, but the purpose: why and what kind of culture are we funding with our taxes? Let’s explore this taboo to advocate for a fairer vision—one that defends a public cultural service in service of democracy.

Don’t Confuse Culture with the Subsidized Sector

Midway through 2025, one of the major societal debates revolves around funding cuts for the cultural sector. The phrase “funding cuts for culture” is often used, but this is inaccurate. What’s at stake are cuts to the *subsidized* cultural sector. Let’s be clear: culture extends far beyond this narrow framework. In its anthropological sense, it is what shapes us as human beings—encompassing our intimate practices, personal histories, daily tastes… Culture also includes intangible heritage recognized by UNESCO, such as oral traditions, artisanal know-how, or community celebrations.

UNESCO defines intangible cultural heritage as “the practices, representations, expressions, knowledge, and skills—as well as the instruments, objects, artifacts, and cultural spaces associated with them—that communities, groups, and, in some cases, individuals recognize as part of their cultural heritage.” This broad vision shows that “culture” is far from being limited to state-funded institutions. Within this vast landscape, there is also the commercial cultural sector, such as streaming platforms or entertainment industries. It’s crucial to name things precisely to avoid oversimplifying or essentializing the debate.

The current changes concern only a strong trend of reduced public funding from certain local authorities for the cultural sector. It’s undeniable that these budget cuts are straining the actors of the public cultural sector, whose balance relies on intertwined support from the state, regions, departments, and cities. A reduction in one of these funding sources destabilizes this fragile ecosystem, like a house of cards. We’re seeing cultural associations forced to close for this reason. The current budget crisis only exacerbates an existing fragility: the delicate and unstable dance of cross-funding (state, region, department, municipality), now undermined by each institutional level retreating to its “priorities.” This triggers even fiercer competition among cultural actors: historic institutions, independent companies, associations, and local artists.

The Illusion of the Budget Debate: Form Over Substance

The heated, polarized debates—unfortunately too often lumping all elected officials together—focus exclusively on the *amounts* of financial support, i.e., the *form*, which is only a partial aspect of what culture is and what the community should care for, rather than the *substance*: the collective meaning of these expenditures in light of their public costs. Yet, this is the real issue and the true reason behind these funding cuts: they are political choices with budgetary impacts, not inherently budgetary decisions, no matter what some may claim. Local authorities, having lost fiscal resources, may now face tougher budget trade-offs, but this has always been the case to some extent.

Let’s be clear: France’s culture budget represents only about 0.6% of the state’s general budget in 2025, or roughly €4 billion out of a total budget exceeding €800 billion. Budgetary decisions—whether increases or cuts—for subsidized culture thus have minimal macroeconomic impact. It’s misleading to suggest that slashing cultural budgets will meaningfully address deficits elsewhere. The real issue behind the cuts is not budgetary but fundamental: *Why* should taxes fund a specific cultural sector, and *what kind* of culture are we talking about? What are policymakers’ choices with citizens’ money? This taboo question, often sidestepped in favor of quarrels over numbers, is essential—it challenges the legitimacy of subsidized cultural models.

We discuss numbers and amounts as if culture’s intrinsic value could be measured solely in euros. Yet, like education budgets, the real value lies not in the sums allocated but in the methods and content transmitted. Of course, culture and education require financial means, but with equivalent budgets, one can promote emancipatory approaches or, conversely, stifling and exclusionary ones.

Moreover, some subsidized structures, like EPCCs (Public Cultural Cooperation Establishments), designed for structuring cultural actions across territories (80 to 90 in France), have budgets statutorily guaranteed by the founding authorities, making them immune to political adjustments—unless their status is modified or they are dissolved (as happened to Arcadi, France’s first live performance EPCC in 2005, dissolved on December 31, 2018, by the Île-de-France Region under Valérie Pécresse).

The Digital Shift: Where Culture Truly Lives Today

Let’s face it: mainstream culture has been shifting toward digital and commercial spaces for 20 years. Look around on a train, subway, or café: it’s not subsidized cultural productions occupying minds and bodies, but platforms, networks, and virtual communities. A 2024 study found that over 80% of under-40s cite video streaming, online music, or gaming as their primary cultural practices, while attendance at subsidized venues stagnates. Cultural life now unfolds in transnational, horizontal spaces where no public support dictates or hierarchizes content.

Yet, while an increasing share of cultural creation and sharing emerges in these spheres, public spending continues to favor the historical model: heavy institutions, heirs to the royal then republican system, perpetuating a symbolic distinction between high culture and popular culture. In reality, funding structures reflect a paradox: claims of broadening access while most subsidies benefit an already-initiated audience and a professional cultural class, often urban and integrated into selection networks.

We’re led to believe that defending democratic culture hinges solely on financial trade-offs or that funding a specific professional sector magically fosters cultural emancipation. But the facts are clear: citizens’ cultural practices now occur mostly online, on commercial platforms—even among cultural professionals themselves!

A System of Distinction Perpetuating Dominance

Overvaluing so-called “excellence” in art serves, sociologically, to manufacture hierarchies and domination. As Pierre Bourdieu explains in *La Distinction* (1979): “Taste classifies, and it classifies the classifier”, highlighting how cultural preferences reinforce social inequalities. These hierarchies are now illusory, as cultural power no longer resides in subsidized institutions but in digital networks—far more horizontal and democratic.

The subsidized sector, a legacy of royal cultural patronage, once served as a tool of political influence. Historically, French cultural subsidies date back to the monarchy, used to consolidate power, later evolving into a centralized republican model in the 20^th century. Culture, shaping worldviews, is a powerful tool of power; what matters is not its existence but how it’s wielded and the integrity with which it’s employed.

Let’s ask: Are we content funding, with our taxes, an educational system that excludes, stigmatizes, and ranks children rather than including and empowering them? The hypocrisy is glaring. Privileged classes, including the left, know this well: when possible, they enroll their children in private schools, which aren’t always more virtuous but have better odds. Some public schools adopt child-rights-respecting pedagogies, but they’re rarer.

Applying this logic to culture: Are we satisfied funding a hierarchical, postcolonial, and patriarchal system meant to distinguish elites from scorned popular cultures? Of course, it’s nuanced—some cultural actors work respectfully toward cultural rights. But they’re often marginalized by the cultural hierarchy and may be the first hit by funding cuts, even as they represent, in my view, the future. We must address the core issue: the *forms* of cultural action.

As for democratization rhetoric, it crumbles under scrutiny. Middle and upper classes champion public culture and schools yet unapologetically opt for private education, fostering de facto segregation. The same applies to cultural attendance. Subsidized festivals cater to the already-converted; renowned venues offer “excellence,” but for whom? Ultimately, overvaluing the subsidized sector perpetuates symbolic domination: that of an elitist culture (historically male, white, postcolonial), legitimized by public money, whose emancipatory promise has too often devolved into a system of distinction.

Artistic Freedom: Shield or Privilege?

If we discussed subsidized artistic projects instead of funding, we’d tackle the real issue. Immediately, subsidized culture’s defenders would cry political interference in artistic freedom, claiming subsidies guarantee autonomy. But this has never been true: public cultural funding exists to consolidate political influence. Today, however, subsidized culture no longer holds its former sway. In reality, this “freedom” defense masks a protection of sectoral privileges tied to political power—once predominantly left-aligned, reflecting these professionals’ roots. But “left” doesn’t automatically mean open-mindedness or tolerance.

We must return to fundamentals, questioning the legitimacy of cultural models and professional practices—otherwise, we’ll never progress. When content is scrutinized, “artistic freedom” is brandished as a magical shield, silencing critique under the guise of resisting political meddling. This stance warrants scrutiny. From post-1870 nation-state promotion to Malraux’s republican cultural democratization, public support has always served to shape public space, showcasing what’s deemed worthy of the collective.

Defending artistic freedom sometimes borders on defending the status—even privileges—of a microcosm unwilling to rethink public cultural missions amid societal shifts. Local cultural officers express despair over cuts leading to closures, but this mainly reveals a competition exacerbating asymmetries and marginalizing experimental forms.

Toward Democratic Renewal: Daring the Substantive Debate

Budget cuts, like those announced by regions such as Pays de la Loire (a 50% reduction, per Alexandre Thébault, culture delegate), disproportionately weaken grassroots and citizen-led structures reliant on local funding—those embodying a decentralized, territory-anchored vision of culture and cultural rights. This underscores the urgency of debating *content* over budgets. Adjustments often target the most vulnerable initiatives, risking the marginalization of experimental forms or those serving culturally marginalized publics.

Some local officials, occasionally against the state, defend emancipatory policies (e.g., Avignon’s mayor Cécile Helle prioritizing working-class neighborhoods), but such resistance is isolated. It doesn’t reverse the silent restructuring underway: funding concentration, fierce competition, erosion of the republican pact, and a return to viewing culture as mere ideological vector.

This is why, in my work with artistic teams, I focus on: *What are we doing? Why? For whom? How?* These questions could transform debates into constructive, emancipatory dialogues rather than superficial budget squabbles.

Policymakers, who arbitrate priorities and reshape cultural legitimacies, must reconnect with artists on this deeper level to avoid competitive instrumentalization and restore culture’s role as an inclusive commons. The way forward on cultural funding lies in linking arms with officials on the democratic *purpose* of these investments—digging deeper than surface-level disputes, embracing dialogue and self-questioning. In short: forging new cooperative paths.

To move beyond financial grievances, we must courageously confront the real questions:

• *What do we want to pass on?*
• *Who decides what’s passed on?*
• *How do we ensure citizens’ real inclusion in defining the commons?*

Culture can no longer evade a profound reckoning with its content, hierarchies, and dissemination modes. It will survive only if a broad, unflinching dialogue—among artists, institutions, officials, audiences, and citizens—opens on the vocation of public cultural action and its rightful place in a renewed democracy.

As Hannah Arendt wrote in *The Crisis in Culture* (1961):

“Culture, which is what endures in the world as works, needs a public space to appear and be transmitted. For culture and politics belong together: it’s not knowledge or truth at stake, but the sharing of a common world.”

As long as cultural policy remains an afterthought (or a residue of institutional power), it will be neither democratic nor emancipatory. The challenge: to confront this foundational debate—not just the use of public funds, but the definition of what constitutes culture today, and who holds legitimacy. Without this, culture will remain the misguided subject, the symptom of a democracy afraid to look itself in the mirror.