Cultural Freedom and Autonomy in the Spanish Constitution
Regional Autonomy and Cultural Identity
The establishment of an open system places no obstacle to any set of provinces that could be considered the holder of the historical, cultural, and economic conditions in the region or nationality. However, it passes through a fine sieve of sociological “population” through its administrative corporations, showing their will to autonomy and thus determining the degree of awareness of their own identity.
The Third Sign: Dual Nature of the Statute of Autonomy
The third sign: the dual nature (Paccione and ordinary law) of the process of drafting the Statute of Autonomy.
The Fourth Clue: Varying Levels of Autonomy
The fourth clue: the different levels of legal, organizational, and competence of the Autonomous Communities.
Procedures for making the initiative of the statute do not highlight culturally (pages 164-168).
In short, according to the Constitution, that formation of nationality is characterized by having a more pronounced historical and cultural personality than the region, with more awareness of their identity, more capable of negotiating their policy of self-government. The Constitution guarantees a proper institutional scheme similar to the tripartite structure of state powers and a higher level of authority.
Cultural Freedom
The idea of culture is deeply connected with the idea of freedom. Culture speaks to the public about the need for radical freedom, not just the generic “free speech” proclaimed by the liberal state of law. It requires special treatment to ensure and take into account the peculiarities of cultural processes.
The complex processes of cultural life require multiple group liberties that the State of Culture should recognize:
Cultural Freedom of Creation
This includes rights to freedom of artistic, literary, scientific, and technical information, and also to protect the rights of the result of the creation (the so-called “copyright”).
The freedom of cultural creation is bounded by an active or dynamic element guaranteed (free creation) and a form of manifestation of that (literature, art, science, or technical).
- Activity Guarantee: The content of freedom of cultural creation, in all its manifestations, is the absence of any external constraint on this creative activity. This results in the denial of a culture subject to state or public policy guidelines. The inability of an “official” or “state” culture does not mean a lack of order in these matters, since the Constitution speaks of “promoting” and “protecting” access to culture and research. Namely, to encourage and promote development but without the absorption, in the area of the state organization, of socio-cultural phenomena and the elimination of extra-state initiatives.
- The Way of Representation: The Spanish Constitution of 1978 defines the manifestations of culture as a creative practice in:
- Artistic Creation: This connotes beauty and aesthetics due to human creation. The mention of art has to be accepted in a broad sense, comprising all those events where aesthetic creation is recognizable: traditional and figurative art (painting, sculpture, and architecture), dramatic, choreographic, musical, audiovisual, etc.
- Literary Creation: This creation is not unlike artistic creation in its essence, both aesthetics and externalizing your code. In this case, the spoken and written word, and its specific weight and its unique technical and legal treatment from the point of view of copyright.