Kontupiste :Culture and digital society for all

ContextThe metropolitan area of Helsinki is the economic, cultural and political capital of Finland. With 1,455,677 inhabitants, the city is recognised as one of the leading creative cities in the world. It is part of the UNESCO creative cities network since 2014, and was World Design Capital in 2012.

Helsinki City Council has outlined a development strategy for 2013-16. The main areas of the strategy are the wellbeing of residents, the attractiveness of the town, urban development and the balance between economy and good management. Culture has a place across all strands, and is instrumental for tourism, leisure, entrepreneurship and cultural services.

Keeping sight of the objective to provide a rich cultural offer across all of its territory, Helsinki strives to reach out to its suburbs. In fact, in the articulation of cultural policies, the “Helsinki model” pursues cooperation between cultural institutions and the suburban region.

Kontula is a neighbourhood located at the eastern periphery of Helsinki and is home to 28,300 inhabitants. The neighbourhood is between 40 and 50 years old, “with a bad reputation” , and the Cultural Office of the City of Helsinki’s explicit objective is to enhance the quality of life and identity for its citizens, renewing a sense of belonging by fostering local participation and access to cultural and technological facilities and services.

• Social cohesion

• Citizenship

• Skills

• Access to culture

• Digitisation

• Innovation

KontupisteKontupiste is an information and communications technology services centre serving Kontula residents. Its mission is to provide access to cultural and technological experiences for citizens regardless of their level of education or social status; to encourage residents to engage in active citizenship; to impart the skills to understand, access and use new media and social networks; and to contribute to the attractiveness of Kontula.

Kontupiste started with the funding of European programmes Urban I and II, and has continued working after the financing ended (2000-06). The initiative seeks innovative ways to prevent urban inequality while fighting the digital gap and promoting cultural projects (often at the crossroads of art and technology).

Kontupiste’s office is a mini-cultural centre located in the middle of the Kontula shopping mall, where citizens can access Internet terminals with a large selection of open source software, free user accounts and guidance in computing in a relaxed and pleasant environment. In addition to these more operational services Kontupiste also organises art exhibitions by and with residents (in cooperation with the Finnish Museum of Photography) and a wide range of activities in new media and culture.

In addition, Kontupiste also served as the operational centre for the Kontufestival; Urban TV, and other subprojects such as Open Albums, a digitisation platform to share old photos of families and the neighbourhood (www.albumitauki.fi), as well as Cultural Courses. The projects of Kontupiste are often cross-innovative or transcend traditional boundaries, such as the peer-learning network “mekans”, which fosters interactions between residents via experiences of life-long learning and communication technology.

ChallengesFrom the point of view of Kontupiste, there are strong disparities between the centre of Helsinki and its suburbs. The key challenges of the latter are: aging, age-related digital exclusion, economic disparities, unequal access to cultural services, and high unemployment. By providing training and equipment for all, Kontupiste seeks to bridge these gaps.

© Lasipalatsi Media Centre

Budget and financing

The annual budget coming from the city’s Depart-ment of Technology, covers one employee and technical services and amounts to around €60,000; Helsinki City Board annually allocates a budget to employ jobless Helsinki residents. Among other units Kontupiste organizes training for those resi-dents. Employment subsidies are used to promote employment and especially young people are pro-vided with additional and versatile work try-out and employment opportunities that help them to move towards their goals. Trainees from universities are working in Kontupiste annually.

Additionally for several projects (media festival, an-imation calendar, exhibitions, etc.), it has organised activities to raise annually around €20,000.

The municipality assumes 70% of the costs of Kon-tupiste, while 25% is funded through state support and 5% by private investors.

ImpactKontupiste has allowed many citizens to access technology tools and thus digital culture. Kontupiste and its associated projects have also contributed to changing the image of Kontula and strengthening social ties between neighbours. Kontupiste is often cited as an example of how cultural centres can drive social change across districts.

Kontupiste activities and projects often exert a broad impact, internationally or nationally. For example, the Open Albums project was initiated in Kontula, and later spread to many cities in Finland (Jyväskylä, Lahti, Raseborg). As of 2015, Kontupiste is planning to replicate this initiative in other collaboration projects in various European locations. For the moment, it will continue and expand to some extent to the Mellunkylä region as well.

Kontupiste has created new employment opportunities thanks to employment subsidies and to innovative ways to expand models of Lasipalatsi Mediacentre to Kontula. It is worth noting also that most of former employers of Kontupiste have become employed in other workplaces, which is obviously partly because of skills and experience they learn in Kontupiste.

© Cécile Houpert © Lasipalatsi Media Centre

www.cultureforcitiesandregions.eu

Contact :

Marianna Kajantie, Managing Director Lasipalatsi Media Centre

marianna@lasipalatsi.fi

Links :

http://www.lasipalatsi.fi/info-en

TransferabilityThe uniqueness of the project lies in the focus on digital literacy and training in the use of new technologies, an aspect that is not very common in cultural policies but essential to ensuring equal opportunities in the information society era. From a wider perspective, it is a simple yet very well-balanced strategy for renewing the “commitment to the place” through local participation and uses of technology. As such, the project is highly replicable in cities and regions facing similar challenges.

SustainabilityThe project has demonstrated a high level of resilience by overcoming first the end of URBAN funding, then the operational change to the Helsinki Cultural Office and the new model under the control of the Lasipalatsi Media Centre (see below in management). The key to resilience lies in a high participation rate and constant demand by local partners for activities. From a small-size media and digital cultural centre, Kontupiste has gradually grown into a hub and catalyst for local community-led projects.

Management level and partnersThe Helsinki Cultural Office is the initiator of the project, and partners with local and non-profit organisations. Between 2006 and 2012, the programme was directly managed by the Helsinki Cultural Office. Since January 2013 the Lasipalatsi Media Centre Ltd operates Kontupiste, and also provides technical advice and services for users. A key challenge here was to “adapt” the model of Lasipalatsi Media Centre to a peripheral neighbourhood and create a “pocket” media centre that could serve resident’s information and communication needs.

Tips Tailor the project strategy and action plan to the actual needs of the local communities (in this case, digital gap due to an aging society).

Develop local linkages to strengthen the capacity to connect and interact with other projects proposed over the territory.

Choose a popular area (shopping mall) to facilitate outreaching to a maximum of people from different backgrounds.

Make use of the opportunities offered by a space where people gather frequently. Kontupiste is not only a training centre but also a laboratory for social interactions to inspire new projects.