Creative Commissions for Climate Action

The Project
Following a competitive call, the British Council selected us to evaluate the flagship programme – Creative Commissions for Climate Action- which has been running since 2021. The programme supports projects that combine art, science and climate action/activism to address climate change and related environmental crises:

• Awarding a total of £1,278,923 worth of grants to 38 projects between 2021 and 2023.
• Involving more than 260 artists and creative practitioners and 100 scientists, researchers and academics in 46 countries across 176 partner organisations.
• Supporting partnerships between the UK and 46 countries worldwide

Climate themes addressed ranged from oceans and land use, through circular economy, recycling and sustainable consumption to water, food and clean air. Project partners ranged from arts organisations to local heritage partnerships and organisations specialising in disability, gender and social action. UK and international stakeholders have involved – in various ways – the Department for Culture, Media and Sport, Julie’s Bicycle, Women of the World and state governments.

Our Solution
The evaluation aimed to examine the value of creativity and culture in humanity's reaction to nature and the climate emergency, exploring how projects like those ‘Creative Commissions’ supported through multiple rounds of the programme can:

• bring a different and valuable perspective to science, technology, policy or academia
• move ‘beneath and beyond the science’, demonstrating climate change’s effects on people’s lives by humanising and creatively interpreting scientific data
• raise climate awareness and inspire change, and
• Share examples that demonstrate to people that they have agency and the capacity to act in response to the climate emergency.

Like the scope, ambition and breadth of the Creative Commissions programme, the evaluation too, was ambitious and complex.

Our analysis of the strategic and policy context outlined how global climate debates tend to concentrate on the actions of governments, national targets for net zero and financial contributions from developed countries to those most impacted by climate change. And how these debates do not naturally include society at large, or the views of the diverse communities affected.

Our report provides details on the funding rounds and projects, and analyses these by types of project partners, locations and themes. It highlights selected projects as case studies and pulls out notable examples of:

• the use of digital technologies in production as well as dissemination,
• representation of indigenous people and tTraditional kKnowledge,
• the involvement of young people,
• addressing issues of gender equality.

We were able to position the individual Creative Commissions projects – and the programme as a whole – as part of the transition of climate action and activism from being problems and solutions expressed in terms of science, technology, finance and policy to it being of necessity and more holistically an economic and social transformation informed by science and enabled by technology and finance.

Therefore, the Creative Commissions could be shown to be directly addressing the capacity building and public awareness categories of climate action that fall under the Action for Climate Empowerment umbrella, as part of the 2015 Paris Climate Agreement. As such the projects and programme could be shown to be frontrunners in the Culture-Based Climate Action (CBCA) movement – and the evaluation report is a crucial piece of evidence to promote people-centred approaches to climate action. 

Our evaluation evidenced and told the story of how the programme’s many projects have a legacy of:

• extended cultural forms and practices
• new and reusable knowledge
• creative and artistic works, and
• lasting intersectoral and interdisciplinary partnerships and networks.

We mapped how the programme contributed to cultural relations capital that international cultural exchange and collaborations can create. We plotted how project outcomes corresponded to a ‘ladder of change’ used in communications for change models in international development. And we used new retrospective ‘social media listening’ techniques to analyse projects’ online engagement.

With the help of our special advisors Bernice Lee OBE, Dr Agustina Gradin and Dr Cecelia Dinardi we created a conceptual framework of themes for climate and the environment; diversity, gender equality and social justice; and creativity and culture. By locating each project within this framework, we could examine how projects and programme such as these work at the intersections of three such different disciplines, sectors and policy areas.

Project Impact

In the end, the impacts of the British Council's programme and our conclusions and recommendations from the evaluation were so broad that it was agreed that they were relevant to all the British Council's work on climate action. 

We made recommendations to the British Council on their future:

• strategic focus and alignment – including greater alignment with Sustainable Development Goals, fostering concrete action on climate as well as improving awareness and debate, and potential social change themes to prioritise
• commissioning and support processes – encouraging projects to build into their aims the change in society they wanted to see, how to maximise reach and impact through proactive audience development and actions to support project financial sustainability 

“This external evaluation of the Creative Commissions enables us to capture some of the journey since 2021. It serves to provide evidence of the impact and value of such projects when arts and culture are at the heart of climate action. It also helps us to reflect on the process and learn from the experience to improve future initiatives. We hope that it inspires others to explore what role they can play to tackle the climate emergency, and that it shows support and solidarity to those who strive to do so under challenging circumstances.”

Rosanna Lewis, Senior Manager, Culture Responds to Global Challenges; Monomita Nag-Chowdhury, Climate Connection Programme Lead

The evaluation also highlighted how such programmes operating at the intersection of creativity, climate and social justice can relate to so called ‘loss and damage’ due to climate change, which provides opportunities for new funding and partners in the future.  The British Council has recently  partnered with UNESCO UK National Commission, DCMS and AHRC in the European Partnership for Resilient Heritage aiming to secure funding for knowledge sharing  actions as part of the EU’s Horizon programme. British Council has also worked with these partners to help build UK-international cultural heritage and climate change networks to drive policy change to participate in such  actions. British Council is a knowledge partner of the Group of Friends on Culture-Based Climate Action (GFCBCA), co-chaired by the Ministries of Culture UAE and Brazil.

“The British Council have used The Creative Commission evaluation report and learning to help shape and inform a major EU Commission partnership funding application and climate resilience programme around Cultural Heritage and Climate Resilience starting from 2026. This new international partnership programme will include a international knowledge sharing workshop on the Creative Commissions report and the proposed framework. The programme will also explore opportunities to link research and evaluation to policy platforms and policy moments through the G20, COP and UNESCO Mondiacult processes to further share our knowledge and insights in this space. This evaluation report has also been highlighted and shared with the UNESCO NGO Network process through their International Culture and Climate Action Congress Conferences. This evaluation reports helps to support and add to the emerging evidence of the impact and value of such arts projects when arts and culture are at the heart of climate action.”

Ian Thomas, Head of Evidence (Arts), British Council