Culture as a part of the whole : A textanalytical study of the political debate concerning Kulturkvarteret, Örebro

This thesis examines the political discussion between local politicians, on the city of Örebro’s plans to build a new cultural centre, Kulturkvarteret. This investigation explores the politicians’ conceptions of the values and functions of culture – looking at how they express goals of cultural policy and which concepts of culture are used. The study also investigates if decisions on culture are seen, by the politicians, as pertaining to other political areas in addition to cultural policy. The method used is a text analysis approach where a model by Johannisson (2006) provides an analytical framework. Johannisson’s example summarises three different discourses used by agents of the cultural policy reconstruction process in Gothenburg during the 1990s: the quality discourse, the welfare discourse and the alliance discourse. This study shows that the welfare discourse and the alliance discourse are the most prominent in the political discussion in Örebro. The politicians primarily employ the anthropological concept of culture, whilst using the goals of cultural policy that fall both under the welfare discourse and under the alliance discourse. The conclusion of this thesis is that the local politicians appear to ascribe culture both an economic and a social value and that culture policy is seen as an aspect of other political areas in addition to cultural policy