From applicant to designated European Capital of Culture

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the management challenges related to the transition from the application phase to the delivery phase of the project of being a European Capital of Culture (ECoC).

Case study based on qualitative research interviews with the management team, combined with existing research on ECoC and documents on the Aarhus 2017 project.

The first main finding is that the challenges are caused by the way in which the transition from applicant to designated ECoC includes a change in management, shifting from a project to a programme structure and change in organisation. The second main finding is that stakeholder management in relation to politicians and cultural agents is challenged by a high level of ownership and expectation.

The study focuses on just one case and one phase of the project.

Consequences for the way ECoC are managed and the programme organised could be drawn from this.

The originality of the work is in that it studies this very critical phase in the project’s life-cycle in great detail, and focuses specifically on the management of ECoC.