Thoughts about Social Inclusion

Gerhard Kowař, Director of KKA

When, in this issue, we repeatedly address the subject of “social inclusion”, we are not only talking about the inclusion of persons with and without disabilities. We are using the term inclusion because it has a different and broader meaning than the term “integration”.

Whereas the concept of integration tends to focus very strongly on the idea of various different “groups”, the concept of inclusion focuses more on the overall system and thus refers to heterogeneous groups in which the many dimensions of human diversity are considered systemically as all being part of a whole. Inclusion, the objective of which is to support all persons in the heterogeneity of their abilities and needs, gives priority to the individualisation of education and a corresponding approach to dealing with needed resources and institutional framework conditions.

From the perspective of education, we need to consider how (Austrian) schools should be equipped in order to take advantage of the heterogeneity of both staff and students: to develop and ensure the sustainability of key competences, to promote lifelong learning, to encourage and ensure social participation and to preserve dignity and the quality of life. This shifts the paradigm from the deficits of systems and individuals to their potentials for coming to terms successfully with a precarious future.

Two further basic considerations should be added to the foregoing attempt at terminological clarification:

The concept of social inclusion, by nature, has the inherent objective of establishing social justice, since inclusion is in diametric opposition to segregation, i.e. to the exclusion of certain groups of the population from political, social and institutional rights. Discussions about social justice, however, sometimes tend to wander into rather tenuous territory. In the course of animated debate, the term “justice” is very easily substituted with the terms “dignity” and “respect”. It almost seems as if people believed that justice could be established through the attitudes of individuals – or, as postulated just recently in the media, that justice might be an illusion; this is something that, with the sustainable future of our planet at stake, has to be decidedly contradicted.

Naturally, social inclusion also has to do with the dignity and respect of every individual; these are important preconditions for successful cohabitation. But it must be pointed out that the political sector has a responsibility with respect to the development of society, and also that many international and national legal norms have the aim of establishing and upholding justice. The fact is that in addition to moral and social responsibility, inclusion by nature has political, legal and economic dimensions which have to be talked about as well.

The second consideration is this: In public discourse on social inclusion issues, the impression is frequently given that population groups positioned outside the mainstream of society need to be integrated into it. The picture of society as having an inside and an outside is deceptive, because it makes it seem as though societies were self-contained entities, when in fact what we are really dealing with is the need to establish an internal balance between systems, the question of reconciling the various perspectives of different groups of stakeholders in the central sectors of politics, economics, education and culture. Ultimately, we are dealing with democratic and political issues that have completely changed their focus, as we have clearly perceived in observing the course of world affairs in recent years.

In this context, it is important to take a look at developments at the European level. In June 2010, the European Council adopted a new 10-year strategy, which has succeeded the so-called Lisbon Strategy. It is called Europe 2020. This strategy expressly focuses on the interdependencies of the sectors of economics, employment and social policy in reducing poverty and social exclusion. In doing so, the EU has also reacted to the danger inherent in the growing social polarisation within the Member States. The strategy “Europe 2020 for smart, sustainable and inclusive growth” also has other specific objectives, which include: raising the employment rate, reducing the school drop-out rate, increasing expenditures for research and development and battling poverty and social exclusion.

Against the backdrop of these objectives, inclusive concepts will make an important contribution to achieving the goals of the individual states in terms of both social policy and education policy. Although the sector of culture and the arts has always been a poor cousin as far as European support programmes are concerned, culture and the arts are going to be of considerable significance in preserving cultural diversity.

As you, an attentive observer of KKA’s activities, are aware, KulturKontakt Austria is committed to dealing constructively with diversity and difference, an approach that is based on inclusion and not on exclusion or segregation. This is not a moralising position, it is a concrete agenda that has to be developed not FOR but rather WITH those groups of persons to whom KKA makes its programmes available: artists, pupils, teachers and other experts from the sectors of education, the arts and culture. This requires a fundamentally new way of thinking. It is not a matter of superficially presenting ourselves as a traditional funding agency, but rather of assuming responsibility for planning programmes in such a way that the specific projects in which all the aforementioned persons participate will reflect the heterogeneity of society, and of providing additional programmes and steering mechanisms wherever they appear to be necessary in order to ensure inclusive practice.

Social inclusion means something else as well: It means going a step farther in our attempts make measures reflect the interests of our target groups, by actually including the persons concerned in the planning of these measures. It means that instead of “listening more closely” to them, as has so frequently been requested, we need to provide them with specific possibilities for participating in planning processes. In other words, social inclusion means engaging in genuine exchange with KulturKontakt Austria’s many different target groups.