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YouthWiki

EACEA National Policies Platform
Romania

Romania

8. Creativity and Culture

8.2 Administration and governance

Last update: 25 March 2024
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  1. Governance
  2. Cross-sectorial cooperation

Governance

Main actors involved in creativity and culture policy and initatives for young people

In the field of creativity and culture for young people the responsibilities are divided between several institutions:

The Student Cultural Centre in Suceava is subordinated to the Ministry of Education. The other 15 Student Cultural Centres are subordinated to the Ministry of Family, Youth and Equal Opportunities.

There are 43 cultural institutions subordinated to the Ministry of Culture, including The National Centre of Art “Tinerimea Română” (“Romanian Youth”) (Bucharest).

Regarding cultural private organisations, no specific registration is needed in order to carry out cultural activities for NGOs or private enterprises. Therefore, any NGO or private enterprise with a declared objective in a cultural field can participate to consultations in the field of cultural policies and can apply for funding for cultural projects.

The Romanian law no. 52/2003 regulates decisional transparency and participation to policy making of all organisations in all policy fields, including culture. Therefore, trade unions, employers and NGOs with activities relevant for the creativity and culture for young people participate in policy making using three main methods:

  1. the National Council For Youth (NCFY) created in 2020 as an advisory body for the Ministry of Youth and Sports, composed by 50 representatives of youth civil society organisations (presented in section 5.3 of Youth Wiki). The council has a committee dedicated to culture and recreational activities for young people.
  2. the participation mechanism provided by the law no. 52/2003 on decisional transparency (providing the obligation of any regulatory authority to publish draft legislation, to receive and analyse comments and amendments from citizens and to organise a public debate at demand of an NGO or other legally constituted organisations). Although the law provide for this mechanism, debates are rarely requested and organised (e.g. in total the Ministry of Culture organised only one debate in 2017 between the January 1st and September 30th)
  3. the Economic and Social Council, a consultative body of the Parliament and the Government, organised as an autonomous tripartite public institution of national interest, having the function of an advisory board for all bills in the social or economic field, including culture.

There are three types of organisations participating to the Economic and Social Council:

  1. nationally representative trade unions, according to the Law no. 367/2022 on social dialogue;
  2. nationally representative employers’ associations, according to the Law no. 367/2022 on social dialogue;
  3. NGOs appointed by the Minister of Labour, according to representation criteria. However, the criteria are not public but NGOs organised in the previous years to vote representatives proposed for nominations to the Minister of Labour. An umbrella youth organisation: the Romanian Youth Council is part of the Economic and Social Council.

General distribution of responsibilities

The governance approach to creativity and culture for young people is top-down for policy development and partly top-down in implementation. Beside the implementation of ministerial programmes by the county offices in their structure, cultural institutions subordinated to and the Ministry of Family, Youth and Equal Opportunities (Students Cultural Centres) and the ones subordinated to local authorities are initiating and carrying out autonomous cultural projects for young people. These projects are relevant at local level.

  • the Ministry of Culture is the main central authority responsible for the development of the national policies in the field of culture, including all policies and programs targeting youth and/or in the benefit of youth (excepting the ones of the Student Cultural Centres). It also has a coordination role over the county offices implementing cultural policies at local level and a large number of state museums, theatres and musical performance institutions: operas, operetta, philharmonics etc. The Ministry of Culture is, in the same time, the monitoring authority over the implementation of policies at national, county and local level;
  • the County Culture Offices are implementing the Ministry of Culture;
  • the 43 cultural institutions subordinated to the Ministry of Culture have the autonomy to organise their own activities, under the general coordination, monitoring and evaluation of the Ministry of Culture. 
  • the Ministry of Family, Youth and Equal Opportunities is the main central authority responsible for the development of the national policies in the field of youth, including programmes and projects for young people access to culture. It also has a coordination role over the county offices implementing youth policies at local level and a monitoring role over the implementation of policies at national, county and local level;
  • the County Offices for Family and Youth are implementing the Ministry of Family, Youth and Equal Opportunities policies at county level;
  • the 16 Students Cultural Centres are organised in 15 university cities to carry out cultural projects for students.

The most important cultural institution for young people is the National Centre of Art "Tinerimea Romana” ("Romanian Youth”), subordinated to the Ministry of Culture. Its main activities include:

  • organising and carrying out shows and music concerts (choral, chamber, contemporary, symphonic, instrumental, pop, jazz, folkloric concerts);
  • organising and carrying out educational programs;
  • promoting Romanian and universal choral, classical and contemporary music, authentic Romanian folklore, classical and contemporary Romanian and universal music, Romanian and universal contemporary music, Romanian and international pop music, jazz music (blues, traditional jazz)
  • organising three artistic groups: the "Preludiu” chamber choir; the "Cununa Carpatilor” folk ensemble; the "Archaeus” contemporary music ensemble.

Cross-sectorial cooperation

There are two mechanisms of cross-sectorial cooperation between Ministries, Departments and other institutions involved in defining top-level policies and measures on creativity and culture for young people:

  1. Ad-hoc meetings
  2. Ad-hoc inter-ministerial committees organised on different topics according to the bill in preparation.

This cooperation mechanism are specific to most of the policies in the field of youth and are used by both ministries in charge with creativity and culture for young people, namely the Ministry of Culture and the Ministry of Family, Youth and Equal Opportunities.

As both the mechanisms are used ad-hoc, public information on their results are not systematically published.