Policies and sensemaking

This chapter outlines the implication of the Re.Cri.Re. analysis of European societies’ cultural milieu for policy-making. It is claimed the strategic need of carrying out policies of cultural development, as intended within the Re.Cri.Re. framework, a policy of cultural development is aimed at two main purposes: on the one hand, to define social practices that promote semiotic capital, namely the positive experience of institutions and more in general of the systemic rules; on the other hand, to introduce constraints on the opacification of the system, in order to reduce the deficit of sense it fuels. The chapter is dedicated to outline the purpose and the methodological framework of policies of cultural development as well as to present thirteen suggestions of possible actions of this kind. These suggestions target three broad domains: institutions, economy and vital worlds. In order to clarify the methodological tenets and the suggestion, a few stylized excerpts from case-studies examined during the Re.Cri.Re. project are provided.