Grüne on culture and media

The Greens want to develop several sites so they can host large concerts, festivals and street festivals. Such events are to be run by the city itself on its own land wherever possible and be affordable for all Berliners.

The Greens want to bring big concerts to Berlin. Certain places should be improved for this. The city should run these places itself where possible. Tickets should be affordable for everyone.

The sites named are Straße des 17. Juni, the apron of Tempelhof airport and the Olympic grounds including the Waldbühne. The platform complains that global stars recently played in other cities and that the ZDF New Year's Eve party is moving to Hamburg. Major events are to be climate-neutral, following the example of the "Labor Tempelhof" project. The party rejects contracts with Eventim like the one for the Waldbühne. Overpriced events and sports events without fairly priced ticket allocations are to get no support on state-owned land, and access should be low-barrier.

The Greens want to secure clubs, small music venues and open-air formats for the long term because, in the party's view, they are threatened by rising costs, rents and displacement. The plan includes protection through planning law, dedicated funding and an emergency fund for venues at acute risk.

The Greens want to protect Berlin's clubs. Many clubs struggle with high rents and costs. Clubs should get public funding. There should be an emergency fund for clubs in trouble.

The tools include planning requirements set by the state and districts, simpler permits, help with temporary uses, the noise protection fund and support for the Clubcommission. At the federal level, the party advocates social rules for commercial leases, classifying clubs as cultural institutions in the Baugesetzbuch (federal building code) and a reform of noise rules. Clubs with curated programs are to get their own funding line, supplemented by structural funding for more planning security. Awareness work against discrimination, the drug-checking project and training on climate protection are to continue or be strengthened. A permanent model based on the Jugendkulturkarte (youth culture pass) and the ClassicCard is to be examined.

The Greens want to support Berlin's games industry because they see video games as part of the cultural and creative economy and as a driver of digitalization. Plans include better training paths, new trade fair formats and media literacy programs.

The Greens want to strengthen the games industry in Berlin. There should be more training for these jobs. New trade fairs should make games from Berlin better known. People should learn to handle games well. This should protect against addiction and extremism.

Education and training options for the industry are to be expanded. The platform wants to support the development and marketing of games from Berlin, including through new trade fair formats, and the industry is to become more sustainable. The House of Games is to be open to Berlin studios as well and become a cultural venue together with the Computerspielemuseum (computer games museum). Media literacy programs for young people and adults are meant to prevent risks of addiction and extremism. Games and XR media are to be used in schools and museums. Nonprofit places to play board and card games, soundtrack concerts and esports are also to be strengthened.

The Greens want creatives and cultural workers to be paid adequately and to share in the revenue from their works. When AI is used, personality rights, copyright and usage rights are to be protected, for which the platform envisions more regulation and stronger media oversight.

Many artists in Berlin earn little. The Greens want them to be paid fairly. Large platforms should share their profits with them. Their rights should also apply when artificial intelligence is used. Media oversight should become stronger.

According to the platform, international platforms, streaming services and publishers benefit from Berlin's creative scene without giving creators a fair share or paying taxes here on their revenue. In the party's view, AI models shift value creation and threaten livelihoods. The Greens want to push regulation forward, in the media sector by strengthening the supervisory authority and the Medienanstalt Berlin-Brandenburg (regional media regulator). In addition, there is to be investment in media literacy for all generations. The platform says resilience against manipulation and fake news also strengthens democracy.

The Greens consider reckoning with the SED dictatorship still necessary and want to preserve sites of remembrance. In addition, the period after 1989 is to receive more attention, including far-right violence, the Treuhand privatization agency, and mass unemployment.

The Greens want to keep remembering the East German dictatorship. Important places should be preserved. These include the SEZ and the former Stasi headquarters. The years after the fall of the Wall should also get more attention. Back then there was a lot of far-right violence and many people had no work.

The SEZ on Landsberger Allee is to be preserved and the Campus for Democracy in the former Stasi headquarters developed further. For the post-reunification period, the program names the so-called baseball bat years, the effects of the Treuhand, and the devaluing of East German life stories. Democratic initiatives between the fall of the Wall and accession, such as the Round Tables, are also to become more visible. Culture, media, science, and research are to be used for this work and exchange.

The Greens want a culture funding law that secures Berlin's cultural landscape for the long term. They also want binding minimum fees for artists and more money for the independent scene from the City Tax. The platform cites cuts by the current coalition and precarious working conditions in culture.

The Greens want a law for funding culture. It should secure theaters, museums and artists for the long term. Artists should get a minimum fee. The independent arts scene should get money from the tax on hotel stays.

The law is to be drafted together with the cultural scene and its associations. Plans include simpler and more flexible grant rules, more targeted support for individual art forms and young artists, and more cooperation across government departments. Independent expert juries, search committees and open calls are to be used more often, especially for top jobs at large institutions. Rising wage and operating costs are to be covered, including in project funding. The independent scene is to receive an adequate share of revenue from the City Tax, Berlin's tax on overnight stays.

The Greens want to reverse the cuts to the Arbeitsraumprogramm (workspace program for artists) and create more studios, rehearsal rooms and cultural venues. Culture is to become a fixed part of urban development and public real estate policy. The platform cites rising rents and displacement.

Artists need rooms to work and rehearse. Many can no longer pay the rent. The Greens want to create more of these rooms. City-owned buildings should be used for this.

The workspace program is to offer more space, take better account of all art forms and get new funding models. Public buildings are to be used for culture, properties bought strategically, and additional cultural spaces planned into new neighborhoods. State-owned real estate is no longer to go to private investors without an open process; the platform names the Alte Münze as an example. Culture is to be considered at Tegel, Tempelhof, the ICC, Molkenmarkt and Nalepastraße. The Greens back a House of Jazz and a house for dance and choreography. An expanded culture register, an urban development plan for culture and free temporary use of government office buildings are also planned.

The Greens want Berlin's cultural sector to become climate-neutral as well. This is to apply above all to institutions with high greenhouse gas emissions.

Berlin should stop harming the climate. This should also apply to theaters and museums. The Greens want to set up programs for this. For example, buildings should use less energy.

Together with the federal Green Culture contact point, structures and programs are to be developed at the state level. As examples, the platform names better energy efficiency in public cultural buildings and the reuse of stage sets and stage materials. Touring productions and large events are also to achieve a better carbon footprint.

The Greens want basic cultural services in every borough, including outside the S-Bahn ring. These include libraries, music schools, youth art schools and children's theaters. Cultural education is to become a required task for all publicly funded cultural institutions.

Everyone in Berlin should have culture close to home. This includes libraries, music schools and theaters for children. Teachers at music schools should get permanent jobs. Students should be able to visit cultural places four times a year.

The sites of the Zentrale Landesbibliothek (central state library) are to be merged in one modern building. Freelance teachers at music schools are to become permanent employees, which the platform justifies with current court rulings. Small children's, youth and puppet theaters are to be strengthened. Students are to be able to visit cultural institutions at least four times a year. Cultural education is to be anchored in the culture funding law, the framework concept for it developed further, and the project fund for cultural education expanded. The fund's expert jury is to work free from political interference.

The Greens want to bring back the free-admission Museum Sunday and extend it step by step. In the platform's view, taking part in culture should not depend on money. For young adults, Berlin is to develop a replacement for the federal KulturPass, which was cut.

Culture should not depend on money. The Greens want to bring back Museum Sunday with free entry. Later, more museums should be free all the time. Young adults should get their own offer from the state.

In the long run, the permanent exhibitions of the state museums are to be free as well, alongside borough museums and municipal galleries. Public venues are to be better equipped and free open-air formats expanded. The Karneval der Kulturen and the Fête de la Musique are to get more funding. Because the federal government ended the KulturPass for young adults, the state is to create its own offer.

The Greens want to secure memorial sites and remembrance initiatives and fund their educational work. This ranges from remembering the victims of National Socialism and reckoning with the East German dictatorship to queer history. In the platform's view, remembrance culture grows from the bottom up.

The Greens want to support memorial sites. These places remember the victims of the Nazi era, for example. The East German dictatorship should also be remembered. There should be an archive for queer history.

Support is to go to institutions dealing with National Socialism, the SED dictatorship, sexualized violence against women in wars, the post-reunification years and the immigration society. Alongside the Schwules Museum, a queer-feminist archive center is to be set up. Together with the federal government, the former Stasi headquarters is to be developed further into a Campus for Democracy. The platform condemns nationalist misuse of monuments, for example at Soviet war memorials. Historic monuments are to be given explanatory context where current research calls for it.

The Greens want to continue addressing Berlin's colonial history and implement the "Kolonialismus erinnern" (remembering colonialism) concept step by step. Looted art and human remains are to be returned more easily, and streets with tainted names renamed more easily. The platform sees Berlin as bearing historical responsibility for the genocide of the Herero and Nama.

Germany once had colonies. Many wrongs were done there. The Greens want to remember this and create a place for learning. Stolen art should be easier to give back.

The remembrance concept includes a central place of learning and remembrance. The coordination office "Decolonize Berlin" is to be strengthened. Provenance research on the holdings of museums and collections and at universities is to grow. Streets whose names have colonial, racist or antisemitic references are to be renamed more easily. The UN Decade for People of African Descent is to be made visible by funding civil society activities and anchoring it in the administration. The city partnership with Windhoek is to be expanded, especially civil society exchange.

The Greens want to defend press freedom, expand rights of access to information, and protect journalists from lawsuits meant to intimidate them. Media workers and creatives are to get better social protection and a larger share of the revenue their work generates.

The Greens want to protect press freedom. Journalists should get information more easily. Nobody should scare them with lawsuits. They should also earn more and have better social protection.

The program wants to support investigative reporting and fact-checking through stronger rights of access to information. Journalists are to be protected from politically motivated lawsuits. Self-organized spaces and networks for exiled and local media workers are to be supported so they can work and live in Berlin. The plan includes stronger personality rights and copyright as well as easier access to social insurance. The Greens want to fight business models that use creative work without payment; the program says artificial intelligence is speeding up this trend.

The Greens want attractive and independent public broadcasting and intend to keep following the ongoing reform. The regional broadcaster rbb should reflect the diversity of Berlin and its surrounding area in its programming.

The Greens want strong public TV and radio. These stations should stay independent. The Berlin station rbb should show how diverse Berlin is. The stations should have enough money.

The program lists as goals more transparency, diverse appointments to leadership posts and oversight bodies, solid funding and fair working conditions. The Greens want to accompany the reform process that has begun in a constructive and critical way. The reasoning is public acceptance of broadcasting, whose independence from the state is, in the program's view, under deliberate attack by anti-democratic forces.

The Greens want to rework film funding in Berlin and give more weight to women, East Germans and BIPoC. Movie theaters are to be preserved as cultural venues across the city wherever possible.

The Greens want to improve funding for films. Women, East Germans and people of color should get more support. Young filmmakers should get more help. Movie theaters should stay open all over the city.

The plan includes more transparency, stronger funding for visual effects (VFX), binding minimum social standards and better selection procedures. The focus is on young talent and up-to-date training. Among film festivals, small and innovative formats in particular are to be strengthened and connected. The new cinema funding is to be geared more toward arthouse theaters and toward criteria such as decentralization and participation.