ILA is part of the RESISTANCE NOW! TOGETHER coalition, which unites cultural and civil society actors across Europe and is exploring a European Artistic Freedom Act: a possible EU framework to strengthen the conditions in which artists and cultural institutions can operate freely. The goal is not to regulate artistic content, but to protect the conditions that make artistic freedom possible.
Political interference in the cultural sector — through governance changes, institutional restructuring or funding decisions — is a growing concern across Europe. Because the sector is deeply interconnected, with artists and institutions working across borders, conditions in one Member State affect the whole continent.
Artistic freedom sustains open public debate, diversity of expression and citizens’ participation in cultural life. In several Member States, the cultural sector has come under growing political pressure, from partisan funding decisions to restructured public institutions.
Existing protections don’t close this gap. While Article 10 of the European Convention on Human Rights protects artistic expression, and UNESCO’s instruments establish broader international standards for artistic freedom, these do not amount to a comprehensive, enforceable framework at EU level. EU cultural policies recognise the importance of artistic freedom but lack the binding safeguards needed to address systemic threats across Member States.
The model under discussion rests on five procedural safeguards for public decisions affecting cultural life:
Beyond existing protections, this could add three things: a deterrent against incompatible national measures, grounds to invoke these rights in national courts, and a route for the European Commission to act when EU law is breached.
Culture remains primarily a Member State competence, but Article 114 allows the EU to act where divergent national rules create obstacles to the functioning of the internal market.
The emerging legal analysis is therefore examining how differences in cultural governance and safeguards for institutional independence may affect cross-border cultural activity, market access and operating conditions for artists and cultural organisations across Europe.
The European Media Freedom Act provides an important, though not identical, precedent. Its development shows how concerns around fundamental rights and institutional independence can intersect with the internal market, and offers lessons for the further development of an EAFA.
200 cultural institutions from 50 countries make a joint appeal to the European Parliament to protect artistic freedom through a new law.
A call to explore stronger European safeguards for artistic freedom, formalising the call for a European Artistic Freedom Act.
The EU’s Culture Compass recognises the threats to artistic freedom and commits to upholding European values and cultural rights.
The European Commission, the Council of the EU and the European Parliament adopt a joint declaration on culture as part of the Culture Compass initiative, placing artistic freedom as the first commitment.
More than 30 stakeholders, including Commissioner Glenn Micallef and MEP Nela Riehl to gather inputs from policy makers.
The coalition builds a model EAFA, supported by legal research and cross-jurisdiction analysis.
©Nata Korenovskaia
Bratislava Open Culture Conference and Declaration 2025 ©Simon Luptak
Resistance Now! Together Brussels Policy Roundtable
Bratislava Open Culture Conference 2026 ©Dominik Janovsky
Within the coalition, ILA serves as the penholder for the EAFA’s early working draft, leading the drafting process and coordinating legal input from artists, legal experts, cultural institutions and civil society organisations convened under RESISTANCE NOW! TOGETHER. This collaborative process aims to articulate shared principles, document systemic threats, and translate these findings into a possible EU legal framework for artistic freedom.
This work builds on the research conducted by ILA’s Global Policy and Advocacy team, together with its sister organisation, AFI, on artistic freedom and the independence of cultural institutions.
ILA’s Executive Director, Sanjay Sethi, delivered a keynote on artistic freedom and the independence of cultural institutions at the “Artistic Freedom Now!” panel discussion, held at the European Commission’s Representation in Berlin on 23 September 2026.
Building on a call for artistic freedom in winter 2024 that connected 200 cultural organisations and reached 100 million people, RESISTANCE NOW! TOGETHER unites cultural and civil society actors in a joint response to the pressures facing artistic freedom in Europe.
We are grateful to the partner law firms providing pro bono support for the EAFA’s development: Dentons and Steptoe on the potential EU legal basis and lessons from the European Media Freedom Act (EMFA), and Gibson Dunn and Latham & Watkins on cross-jurisdictional research into existing legal frameworks. Their ongoing contributions are helping to build and refine the legal foundations for a possible EAFA.
As censorship rises and artists are targeted for speaking truth to power, protecting creative voices has never been more urgent. Since 2024, ILA has supported over 100 artists at risk. Your contribution ensures artists can keep creating, sharing, and inspiring change—protecting both their voices and the right to artistic freedom worldwide.