Pécs, as the victim of multi-level governance: the case of the project ‘European Capital of Culture’ in 2010

Abstract

The Hungarian city Pécs celebrated the European Capital of Culture (ECC) project in 2010. The story of the project provides evidences on Hungarian governance and development policy, but it is also relevant to the European dimension as this paper focuses on the question of multi-level governance (MLG) and the associated problems of Europeanisation.

The ECC initiative is a real European project connecting one city with the whole of Europe through a 1-year cultural jamboree that attracts thousands of tourists and a number of cultural investments, offering the chance to the city concerned about bringing an intense change in its development. The ECC project also represents a challenge for the ‘European spirit’ since the designated cities have to follow common formal and informal requirements and values to create the European ‘added value’.

The challenge is particularly significant for a Central European city at the periphery of both the country and the European Union, not simply geographically but also in terms of politics and power. The original aim of the ECC projects is to enhance the creativity of the designated cities by placing them on the European map through the collaboration of European, national and local actors as partners in the project implementation based on the model of MLG.

However, in our experience the case of Pécs was slightly different. Namely Pécs was unable to establish real partnership with higher governmental levels and this was not because of the lack of creativity and ambition but rather due to the lack of empowerment and real guaranties of independence; therefore, Pécs was rather a victim of MLG than the beneficiary of a new governance model provided by the project. Pécs was the first Hungarian city to apply for the title of ECC; however, only a narrow circle of the local intelligentsia initiated the idea and the official arena of politics was neutral towards the proposal for a long period of time. This fact is important in order to understand what happened in Pécs. The initiative was generated from the bottom up, which was a strong point in the case for Pécs’ bid. However, there is another side of the coin. Even this ‘bottom up’ spirit disappeared as the local society lost its control of the initiative during its implementation.

The city is experiencing financial problems over the maintenance of the new cultural investments and from the ongoing conflict between the ‘creative class’ and local political elite. This led to the loss of both the opportunity to create a new paradigm for development and a stronger local cohesion. This paper aims to summarise why the governance failures of the project led to this paradoxical situation, one so different from the dreams formulated in the bid in 2006 and to recent dramatic economic decline.

Keywords:

• European Capital of Culture
• multi-level governance
• local governance
• urban development