Cooperativismo y Desarrollo, January-April 2022; 10(1), 63-90
Translated from the original in Spanish

 

Original article

Indicators of cultural identity as an endogenous territorial resource: a proposal for municipal strategic diagnosis

 

Indicadores de identidad cultural como recurso endógeno territorial: una propuesta para el diagnóstico estratégico municipal

 

Indicadores de identidade cultural como recurso territorial endógeno: uma proposta de diagnóstico estratégico municipal

 

Maydelin Annerys Olazabal Arrabal1 0000-0002-8059-1466 maidelin.olazabal@reduc.edu.cu
Vilda Rodríguez Méndez1 0000-0001-8081-575X vilda.rodriguez@reduc.edu.cu
Ramón González Fontes2 0000-0001-8703-5297 ramon.gonzalez@reduc.edu.cu

1 University of Camagüey "Ignacio Agramonte Loynaz". Faculty of Social Sciences. Department of Psychology-Sociology. Camagüey, Cuba.
2 University of Camagüey "Ignacio Agramonte Loynaz". Faculty of Economic Sciences. Camagüey, Cuba.

 

Received: 23/10/2021
Accepted: 21/03/2022

ABSTRACT

The reduction or omission of the analysis of local cultural identity in the framework of the municipal strategic diagnosis limits the identification, integration and mobilization of this cultural resource, leads to the underutilization of its endogenous capacities and its integral contribution to the management of local development. The study started from a previous theoretical foundation with the objective of revealing local cultural identity indicators that, from the descriptive logic of the municipal development strategy, contributes to strengthen the diagnosis of this intangible resource of development. The techniques of document analysis and surveys were used to recognize and contrast the problems of the study and the scientific methods of analysis-synthesis and induction-deduction. The research established the relations and characteristics of components of relative independence with a cognitive, practical, psychosocial and patrimonial cultural repertoire and with endogenous potentialities for development, which play a referential role of local cultural identity. It was determined in conclusions that the set of cultural identity referents, contained in the Knowledge of Local Productive Systems, Local Productive Culture, Local Collective Action and Local Cultural Heritage, provide a wide source of local cultural identity indicators that will contribute to strengthen the strategic diagnosis of this cultural resource for the management of local development.

Keywords: local development; municipal strategic diagnosis; cultural identity; indicators.

RESUMEN

La reducción u omisión del análisis de la identidad cultural local en el marco del diagnóstico estratégico municipal limita la identificación, integración y movilización de este recurso cultural, conlleva a la subutilización de sus capacidades endógenas y su contribución integral a la gestión del desarrollo local. El estudio partió de una fundamentación teórica previa con el objetivo de revelar indicadores de identidad cultural local que, desde la lógica descriptiva de la estrategia de desarrollo municipal, contribuya a fortalecer el diagnóstico de este recurso intangible del desarrollo. Se utilizaron las técnicas de análisis de documentos y encuestas para reconocer y contrastar la problemática del estudio y como métodos científicos los de análisis-síntesis e inducción-deducción. La investigación estableció las relaciones y características de componentes de relativa independencia con un repertorio cultural cognitivo, práctico, psicosocial, patrimonial y con potencialidades endógenas para el desarrollo, que juegan un papel referencial de identidad cultural local. Se determinó en conclusiones que el conjunto de referentes de identidad cultural, contenido en el Conocimiento de los Sistemas Productivos Locales, la Cultura Productiva Local, la Acción Colectiva Local y el Patrimonio Cultural Local, aportan una amplia fuente de indicadores de identidad cultural local que contribuirá a fortalecer el diagnóstico estratégico de este recurso cultural para la gestión del desarrollo local.

Palabras clave: desarrollo local; diagnóstico estratégico municipal; identidad cultural; indicadores.

RESUMO

A redução ou omissão da análise da identidade cultural local no âmbito do diagnóstico estratégico municipal limita a identificação, integração e mobilização deste recurso cultural, leva à subutilização de suas capacidades endógenas e sua contribuição integral para a gestão do desenvolvimento local. O estudo foi baseado em uma base teórica anterior com o objetivo de revelar indicadores da identidade cultural local que, a partir da lógica descritiva da estratégia de desenvolvimento municipal, contribuem para fortalecer o diagnóstico deste recurso de desenvolvimento intangível. As técnicas de análise de documentos e pesquisas foram utilizadas para reconhecer e contrastar os problemas do estudo, e os métodos científicos de análise-síntese e indução-dedução foram utilizados. A pesquisa estabeleceu as relações e características de componentes relativamente independentes com um repertório cultural cognitivo, prático, psicossocial e patrimonial e um potencial endógeno de desenvolvimento, que desempenham um papel de referência na identidade cultural local. Foi determinado em conclusões que o conjunto de referências de identidade cultural, contidas no Conhecimento de Sistemas Produtivos Locais, Cultura Produtiva Local, Ação Coletiva Local e Patrimônio Cultural Local, fornecem uma ampla fonte de indicadores de identidade cultural local que contribuirá para fortalecer o diagnóstico estratégico deste recurso cultural para a gestão do desenvolvimento local.

Palavras-chave: desenvolvimento local; diagnóstico estratégico municipal; identidade cultural; indicadores.

 

INTRODUCTION

The recent approval in Cuba of a policy that institutionalizes local development as an integral and priority model in support of the Cuban economic and social development project is no stranger to the theoretical-methodological challenge of integrating the cultural approach, from its different aspects, into the strategic decision-making process to achieve the harmonious development of municipalities.

Preceded by a diagnosis that revealed, among other problems, the need to strengthen local capacities for the design and management of municipal development strategies, as well as the creation of local projects, the new policy focuses on the specific treatment of the diverse ways of life expressed in traditions, habits and habits of the local population particular identity, resulting from the economic, environmental and population circumstances that have historically shaped the municipality (Ministerio de Economía y Planificación, 2020).

Such a consideration, although it responds to a widely defended criterion, in practice it does not always measure the dimension of its value: the reality and cultural particularities of a territory play an essential role in the dynamics of its behavior in terms of development, since in the process "what determines is what has sense, meaning and value for the environment and the way of life that are inscribed there" (Polanco Noy & Caballero Rivacoba, 2020, p. 149).

The cultural matrix of the territory, in its roles defined by the diverse and complex relationships of culture in the development processes1, shows among them its function as a resource or means to achieve it (Abello et al., 2010). Its use, when it is consistent with the culturally significant capacities and demands of the local environment and assumes the cardinal rather than instrumental character of the action, constitutes a sustainable way to achieve economic and non-economic goals that can contribute to the growth of the spiritual and material well-being of the inhabitants, in accordance with their development goals.

Therefore, culture is also considered part of that set of resources of a diverse nature that make up the endogenous development potential of a territory2 and that, depending on the degree of potential they express, according to certain characteristics that define their possible use at the local level, contribute to or hinder the creation of local capacities to deploy this process.

The genesis of cultural resources, taking into account the character of the also named non-conventional resources (Max-Neef et al., 2010) is related to the territory as a culturally constructed space and significant framework of institutional, economic, socio-cultural and environmental relations that historically act in this context. The tangible or intangible product of these interrelations, consolidated on this cultural base, as well as its particular forms of reproduction, are components that could potentially constitute a local development resource.

Among them, cultural identity stands out (Escobar Nieves et al., 2017). This is recognized as a cohesive cultural core that activates processes of self-recognition, autonomy, endogenous dynamics and gives collective efficacy to the achievement of common objectives. Such mechanisms favor, in various ways, the restructuring and diversification of the local socio-economic fabric, the inclusive participation of the various development actors, cooperation for transformation at various scales and the strengthening of the territorial identity itself.

The patterns of cultural identity (CI), which distinguish the way of being and doing of a territory, are expressed in a shared cultural repertoire that differentiates it from other local enclaves through unique but highly diverse elements. They include idiosyncrasies, customs, traditions and features of popular culture, as well as knowledge, know-how and traditions (Juliá Méndez, 2016), besides, the knowledge, know how, skills, uses, movable and immovable property and those symbols, values and meanings that complement them and together make up this endogenous development resource.

The CI contains potentialities associated with the achievement of such strategic objectives for development management as: the promotion of local capacities to strengthen leadership, institutionalism and local governance, the level of specialization and territorial competitiveness, the creation of absolute or comparative advantages of specific products based on local innovation policies, the creation of concepts for territorial image promotion strategies, as well as the conservation of territorial ecosystems, rural and business entrepreneurship, cooperativism and associativity (Olazabal Arrabal et al., 2021).

The combination of the skills of a traditional craft such as diving with the demands of modern industry in the coastal area of Nuevitas in Cuba, the valorization of a local variant of the Greek language of Calabria or the tacit knowledge of Chilean farmers in the Araucanía region about the effects of the venom of the "black widow" spider, among other interesting examples reported in the literature, confirm the creation of products and services with a high level of specialization and regional competitiveness, territorial development initiatives, as well as socio-cultural and innovation projects based on CI elements.

However, the existence of a local endogenous resource, its abundance or level of potentiality, does not in itself guarantee the generation of desired changes in it, but rather it is its use integrated into the planning horizon that constitutes a conditioning factor or territorial development factor (de Dios Martínez & Fernández, 2014). Thus, the contribution of the CI will be expressed in a more tangible and effective way if its use is strategically oriented to the complementation of desired transformations in the territorial system.

For this, as part of the endogenous potential "that the municipality can mobilize through different ways and forms of management, activate them and connect them with local priorities for the benefit of the population of its territory" (Ministerio de Economía y Planificación, 2021)It must be integrated into the descriptive, analytical and propositional logic of the Municipal Development Strategies (EDM in Spanish) and finally articulated in a specific and coherent manner with the policies, strategic objectives, programs and projects of territorial development.

However, it is recognized that the promotion of CI, linked to the territory to strengthen local development as a socio-political strategy for change and the design of long-term strategies, is considered a critical node, an issue that still requires much deepening and that exposes gaps that are influenced by factors such as weak integration of the cultural dimension and inadequate operationalization in practice of the concept of the cultural dimension (Gallicchio, 2010) and which presents gaps influenced by factors such as the weak integration of the cultural dimension and the inadequate operationalization of the concept of culture and development in practice (Rodríguez Basso et al., 2020).

This limiting tendency: i) Extends to the diagnosis of cultural resources in general and CI in particular within the design of the EDM; ii) It is shown in practice through an operational bias; iii) It is characterized by the reduction or omission of local CI elements (in contrast to the described wide diversity of sources and components of this resource) and its linkage mostly oriented to local heritage (bypassing other dimensions of analysis of the resource); iv) It produces a distortion in the integration of the resource to the EDM; v) It limits its activation and mobilization in the local system and the use of its endogenous capacities for development management.

The objective of this article, based on the theoretical foundation of significant components of relative independence, derived from the analysis of the CI as an endogenous territorial resource, is aimed at revealing indicators of cultural identity that, within the descriptive logic of the EDM, contribute to strengthen its diagnosis and thus the integral use of its potential for development management. Its scope is related to the first moment of the diagnosis, that is, the identification of the resource, since correcting the operational bias referred to in this phase could prevent it from triggering the rest of the limitations described.

 

MATERIALS AND METHODS

The problem posed in this research was based on a triangulated study of bibliographic sources, interviews with experts and document analysis. The latter, in an exploratory way, covered in three steps the design of 29 Municipal Development Strategies in the west, center and east of the country, from 2011 to the present.

In order to fulfill the outlined objective, the Dialectical-Materialist method was used as a general method in which the other theoretical research methods are interrelated with a gnoseological function in the determination of the CI indicators coming from the interpretation of the theoretical findings derived from the analysis of the main variable. This created conditions to explain the essential qualities of these dimensions, the fundamental relationships with the main variable and to understand their functionality for the identification of the CI as a local resource in the framework of the socio-cultural diagnosis of the territory, within the descriptive logic of the EDM. Among these methods there were used:

The theoretical method of analysis-synthesis that fundamentally allowed studying the CI as a complex whole in its parts and qualities, in its multiple relationships, components, links and general characteristics according to the problem situation.

In this conceptual approach, the set of relatively independent components that were delimited emerge, i.e., Knowledge of local productive systems, Local Productive Culture, Local Collective Action and Local Cultural Heritage, with qualities inherent to their nature, but in essence inherent to cultural identity patterns shared with the territorial scope and, therefore, with a referential function.

The induction-deduction method as forms of objective logical inference between the known general and the unknown particular, mediated by complex relationships, was used fundamentally to recognize the nature, qualities, manifestations and links of the Knowledge of local productive systems, Local Productive Culture, Local Collective Action and Local Cultural Heritage as dimensions of the CI as a local resource.

The use of this method was also relevant to infer, from the correspondence with the analysis of the main variable in the framework of local development management, some methodological bases of the diagnosis that at the territorial level propitiate its integration and strategic management as a local cultural resource.

 

RESULTS AND DISCUSSION

From the study it was derived that CI as a local resource originates in the historical cultural and traditional matrix of the territory and on this it bases its capacity to generate development (Max-Neef et al., 2010). This source of origin, inserted in the historical-anthropological sphere and social structures, generates, enriches and diversifies through socio-psychological, practical and cognitive mechanisms, the practical heritage and particular knowledge that nourish the symbolic content of the CI.

The CI is also considered a diverse and specific resource that lies in the cultural repertoire of shared meanings, shaped in spaces of collective activity such as local productive systems, the institutional system, the settlement system and the innovation system linked to local productive processes, in which the affective, behavioral, cognitive, practical, evaluative and communicative essence with which local actors sustain and share these meanings is sedimented.

Therefore, in the process of diagnosis of the CI as a local resource, it would not only be enough to identify, based on some kind of classification or description, which element constitutes it, but also, considering the cultural conception of development, where identity is focused as a cultural dimension in which subjects, subjectivities and cultural practices are projected in close relationship at the local level (Juliá Méndez, 2016), it would then be vital to interpret who, why, how this cultural resource manifests itself and under what conditions it can contribute to development.

These data would make it possible to triangulate basic information in the evaluation of the characteristics, potentialities and capacities for use of the previously identified resource and thus determine policies, strategic lines, programs, projects or criteria for evaluating results as coherent ways and means of activating it with the rest of the system's resources in the development management process.

However, recognizing the shaping aspects of local CI can sometimes become a complex process given its intangible nature, a gap that can be overcome when the diagnosis takes into account the existing relationships between the intangible nature of the resource and the tangible elements in which its meanings are decoded and shared (processes that give rise to it, bearer groups, ecosystems, practices, uses, knowledge, beliefs, instruments, symbols, values).

Relationships that in turn are expressed in areas or significant components of relative independence, as findings linked to the aforementioned spaces of local collective activity, in which the formation of CI manifestations and referents are more precisely specified.

The first finding derived from the recognition of the link of interrelation and interdependence between CI and Local Productive Systems (LPS) in a process that conditions for both their formation and characteristics. On the one hand, it is explained that the LPS play a determining role in the identity-forming processes as markers of the dynamics of a local economy, and on the other, that in the spaces of interaction themselves, also defined by the sociocultural system where this type of activity is concentrated, "the cultural identity of the territories is at the base of the productive system and conditions its evolution over time" (Vázquez Barquero, 2017, p. 294).

In the first case, it was revealed that the organizational and coordination structure of the LPS, the interrelationships between the diversity of activities with specific functions in each phase of the production process, the use and reproduction of techniques related to these functions, as well as the type and intensity of interactions of the various actors involved, form distinctive features that historically sediment in the body of practices, knowledge, norms, skills and communicative codes with meaning and significance specific to each system.

From a deeper perspective, this could involve more functional aspects of the LPS, as described by Negrín et al. (2002), cited by Iglesias and Ramírez (2008), such as the vertical or horizontal integration of their organizational structure with certain specialization, the necessary and continuous interaction between economic, cultural, social and political activities and the complementarity of functions among the different local agents, aimed at strengthening the capacity to know, learn and act.

In this context, tacit knowledge emerges mediated by these common needs of knowledge, learning and action for the development of the system and mediating, in turn, as a useful particularity and an especially differentiating feature within the production processes contained in the locality3.

Given its origin, this type of knowledge is recognized as a form of practical knowledge, fostered by socialization and the experience of the productive process that encompasses organizational, institutional, instrumental and natural aspects implicit in the solution to specific daily problems of that system in that local context.

While it is true that it functions as a common language or code of communication, it is described that LPS knowledge: has a tacit rather than codified character, shares a common meaning among the various actors; is transferred informally through the interpersonal relationships of those who share it; facilitates at the group level the interpretation of ideas and references, the transmission of information and practical, social learning and interaction; is perceived towards the group core as a natural knowledge; is distinguished outwardly as a particular knowledge and difficult to reproduce in other groups or territorial environments.

From the above, it is inferred that in general if this is an inherent and distinctive knowledge of the traditional knowledge of the LPS, if it contains in itself the specificity and diversity coming from the cultural interrelations of the system according to the type of economic-productive activity that prevails, if it has shared sense and meaning for its bearers and given its origin and qualities, it plays a differentiating role that links it to the productive vocation of the territory and favors its identification, then the Knowledge of Local Productive Systems can constitute an indicative element of CI by conferring a particular unity to the local system, in which distinctive cultural traits prevail that differentiate it from the rest.

This variety of knowledge, which is part of the cultural heritage of the LPS, as indicators of CI features, should be recognized and described in the diagnostic process preceded by the analysis of the productive vocation of the territory, since they potentially constitute a multipurpose resource for sustaining the system or introducing innovations that promote differentiation and the consolidation of territorial comparative advantages. The effectiveness of their use at the local level could lie in this particular aspect.

In marked intersection with the formation of LPS, a territory also manifests cultural patterns defined by productive activities and practices in smaller-scale local spheres, with specialized production actors, but less dependent and interrelated in correspondence with their specific activity, as well as products, goods and services typical for their more traditional, sustainable, artisanal, ecological or utilitarian production and consumption model, which expand and diversify those identified within the economic structure of the territory or its productive vocation.

These patterns of Local Productive Culture contain relationships and cultural aspects that also mark local production dynamics of a territorial, innovative nature, mediated by tacit knowledge, but not necessarily demarcated by other conditions specific to the LPS4, but rather associated with a systematic action to control, in a specific and circumstantial way, daily conditions of existence and development, through collective or individual work for subsistence, from a productive activity, in a historical and determined form (Moreira Vera et al., 2017).

This activity of a practical, specific and circumstantial nature constitutes a common good, which confers to the Local Productive Culture a representative, rather than exceptional value5, although in different degrees and levels, groups, specific activities and exchange spaces, express attributes that distinguish it, explained by Moreira et al. (2017):

  1. Originality, taking into account that the alternative search for ways of overcoming specific circumstances leads to unrepeatable forms of response and novel results, derived from that particular context
  2. Authenticity, as a direct, valid and justified expression of the cultural event in accordance with the requirements, challenges and demands of a specific historical moment and local context

Local Productive Culture also generates activities, goods and services, as well as techniques, uses and innovations that combine traditions of know-how, typical products and other local characteristics, but which precede and go beyond the strictly economic dimension, as recognized by the Ibero-American Cultural Charter of 2005. These, in turn, carry values and contents of a symbolic nature, synthesis of the relations between cultural aspects, the differentials of the product and the identity of its origin, according to the principle of specificity reflected in the document itself.

According to the above, from the conditioning factors and characteristics of the practical production activities represented by the Local Productive Culture, it also reflects CI patterns associated with the inherent traditional methods and procedures, know-how, abilities and skills in the handling of raw materials from the environment and the creation of products and services of a diverse nature. In it, family or community entrepreneurship units are recognized as bearers and producers of such knowledge, practices and results.

In this sense, two main aspects are considered: i) The identification of these manifestations would make it possible to recognize elements with endogenous capacity as sources of valorization, innovation and creativity consistent with the local cultural environment; ii) The determinants of authenticity, applied to products and services with valued cultural specificities, could support the creation of indicators of uniqueness, traceability and quality6 (Flores, 2007) to establish relationships between products and the identity bases that gave rise to them.

In the strategic planning of local development, the identification of cultural specificities focused on patterns of Local Productive Culture can enhance the creation of sustainable development projects and contribute to the creation of mechanisms and legal instruments for the protection and transmission of knowledge, the design of a brand image for local products and services with CI, and the creation of indicators and standards of quality and promotion as a factor of local competitiveness.

The third finding is related to the psychosocial environment that characterizes identity processes. It is based on shared bases of a fundamentally affective, evaluative and normative nature, such as the sense of self-recognition, belonging and social cohesion, expressed at the behavioral level through local collective action, functioning in turn as a pattern of reference and identity.

As a cultural feature, local collective action is induced by the system of values, norms, assumptions and collective beliefs that at the same time, within an institutional framework, regulate the activities and behavior of local actors participating in the process of social construction of the territory and its cultural identity (Flores, 2007).

In the processes of endogenous development, Ramírez (2007) considers that tacit or implicit agreements, the establishment of rules, norms and procedures for the fulfillment of economic, social, environmental or political goals and objectives constitute an expression of local collective action that involves local actors in a set of activities, based on cultural, identity and heritage references, which contribute to making it dynamic.

In this sense, the search for cooperation and territorial complementarity for local collective action is also based on the practical implications of principles such as individual and collective responsibility for the social and common good, Flores (2007), aspects which, together with the type and intensity of interaction of local actors and the sense of belonging and identity, when taken advantage of, can constitute functional factors of development.

In general, local collective action trends are stimulated by needs and aspects of local interest and projected in the form of resolution capabilities for savings, productivity, creativity, innovation, resilience, solidarity, entrepreneurship, cooperation, use of technology, care of the environment, preservation of culture, symbols, heritage, among others.

Thus, the creative, innovative, resilient, supportive, entrepreneurial, cooperative, pro-environmental or any other attitude that may or may not stand out as qualities with a shared cultural meaning, by also having a cultural substrate7 and being supported by the set of values, capacities, knowledge, practices and skills linked to individual or social capital, would indicate the finding of CI elements as a local resource.

Identifying these CI markers during the municipal diagnosis would make it possible to activate them through different ways or transform them if necessary to generate or reinforce values at the institutional, business, leadership or governance level as local endogenous capacity for attractiveness, associativity, cooperation or other dynamics of the local institutional organizational structure. As a planned way to strengthen, from the contribution of cultural resources, the productive bases for territorial development.

The fourth and last finding of the study revealed Local Cultural Heritage as one of the most diverse components and one of the most directly associated with CI as a local resource due to its origin, characteristics and function.

Recognized as a tangible or intangible common good, heritage manifests itself in culture modeled in various forms through time and space as a synthesis of the local capacity to create, transmit, reflect reality, and coexist with other social groups (Rivas, 2018). Therefore, it comprises a framework that integrates monuments, cultural property, objects, ideas, material, intangible, historical-artistic and culturally relevant and characteristic ways of life.

Its essence as a CI component derived towards aspects that outline its representative and symbolic character: the belonging to a certain territorial environment, the perception of singularity that its diverse expressions and manifestations transmit to the feeling of its inhabitants and the symbolic value that accompanies it as a testimony of a present or past culture.

These and other attributes sustain the capacity of cultural heritage to reveal a certain identity, to refer to a collective cultural reality, relevant and significant for those who build and live it, and to confer a referential function to the assets constituted in this spatial framework. Widely defended in the sources consulted, such function expresses three recurrent aspects that support it:

  1. Its capacity to conserve and transmit shared knowledge derived from nature-society relations, in a specific space-time and with specific socio-historical characteristics that condense the differentials of its origin
  2. The implication of the territory as an active agent in its symbolic configuration, where the local self-recognition of the territory, naturally sets the CI referents
  3. The processes of naturalization of culture and territorialization of cultural heritage (patrimonialization), as territorial dynamics that allow the construction of durable identity references

The referential origin of cultural heritage with CI is synthesized in the assessment of Durán et al. (2018) cited in Durán et al. (2021, p. 284) by defining it as "(...) a permanent social construction, based on natural or cultural, urban or rural assets, of significance for the bearer community due to their exceptional or representative values, which as such appear incorporated in their social imaginaries and are part of their cultural identity (...)".

Taking into account the above, it was considered that if all natural or cultural assets of the territory with some level of significance, exceptional or representative value for the community or group, integrated into its social imaginary, are part of its CI, then this recognized and naturalized heritage repertoire in the local environment, constitutes an indication of CI as a local resource.

Beyond the legal figures of identification and protection of cultural heritage established by the institutional framework, its recognition at the local level constitutes a way to broaden the search for identity elements that can be exploited not only through strategies of valorization or economic profitability, but also in projects that strengthen its continuity and symbolic and spiritual value, as an objective of local development.

For this purpose, two key aspects are assumed in the diagnosis of the CI from the heritage dimension:

  1. The typological diversity that characterizes the heritage as a basis for integrating it, according to its level of potential, into the territorial planning system8
  2. The structural networks associated with the symbolic and institutional framework of the locality for heritage management9

In response to the operational gap described at the beginning of this article, this proposal took into account that indicators always have a theoretical referent; they are synonymous with an indication, sign or evocation; they represent attributes of a system defined in terms of a measurement or observation procedure; they have a descriptive angle in accordance with their function and must adequately reflect the nature, peculiarities and links of the processes related to the variable.

According to the nature of CI as a local resource, these indicators respond to the identification of symbolic forms, actions, objects and expressions of different types, in relation to the specific historical and socially structured context, within which they have been produced, transmitted and also exploited.

In line with the nexus of the process related to CI as a local resource, these indicators respond to a guiding question contextualized in the diagnosis stage of the resources of development potential: How to identify CI as a local resource to integrate it into the Municipal Development Strategy?

The bases of Knowledge of local productive systems, Local Productive Culture, Local Collective Action and Local Cultural Heritage, as dimensions of analysis of the CI as a local resource, which content of cognitive, practical, valuative or patrimonial origin provides criteria to support the first moment of the diagnosis aimed at identifying what resources the municipality has, what elements of CI it has.

The incorporation of these criteria makes it possible to cover and integrate a greater number of local CI aspects into the information base of the resources that will then move on to an evaluation phase. In this phase, other indicators and methods validated in current studies can be used for the situational and structural analysis of the resources of the development potential in the local system.

In the analysis, the proposed indicators were selected based on the identification of attributes that: i) Have a direct relationship with the categories Knowledge of the LPS, Local Productive Culture, Local Collective Action and Local Cultural Heritage; ii) Are mutually exclusive; iii) Have a descriptive function in the context of analysis; iv) Their content allows objectifying the presence of CI elements as a local resource; v) In general allow identifying which elements are part of the CI of a locality, which features define it, and how they are expressed.

With these elements, the Criteria for the CI Indicator as a local resource and the Criteria for Measuring the CI Indicator as a local resource (Table 1) were developed and discussed in a Focus Working Group, with the following results.

Table 1 - Proposed indicators of Cultural Identity as a local resource

CI indicator criteria as a local resource

CI indicator measurement criteria as local resource

Knowledge of Local Production Systems

01

Knowledge of LPS

Type of knowledge according to productive specialization and operational demands of the production system (See table 2)

Perception of specificity of this knowledge

Tradition of innovation and rationalization

Existence of differential characters: trades, practices and linguistic norm associated with the LPS

Local Productive Culture

02

Traditional knowledge and practices

Existence of traditional modes and methods of productive activities for utilitarian, food, curative, constructive, self-consumption and other purposes

Existence of specific knowledge in productive activities associated with: nature, natural raw materials, materials, production cycles and methods, among others

Subjects and carrier groups

03

Typical local products and services

Existence of products and services with local cultural specificities (food, beverages, textiles, footwear, transportation and others)

Level of relationship between products and services, characteristics and the specific local circumstances of their origin

04

Innovations based on traditional local practices and knowledge

Existence of products or techniques created or modified based on traditional practices and knowledge

Level of relationship with the specific local circumstances of their origin

05

Territorial units of local entrepreneurship

Type of family organization

Type of community organization

Other types of territorial unit organization

Local collective action

06

Interaction of local stakeholders

Level and type of relationship and reciprocity between institutions, organizations, agencies and other local stakeholders

07

Sense of belonging and local identity

Perceived sense of emotional attachment to the locality

Perceived sense of commitment and duty to the locality

Level of spatial symbolic self-recognition

08

Shared values and principles

Level of perception of solidarity, industriousness, trust, honesty, thrift, responsibility, etc.

09

Collective action trend

Perceived level of practical orientation towards proactivity, resilience, innovation, social cohesion, cooperation, entrepreneurship, creativity, knowledge transfer, competitiveness, etc.

Local cultural heritage

10

Movable tangible cultural heritage

Existence of valuable movable assets: Ethnographic, documentary manuscripts, audiovisual, furniture, clothing, musical instruments, plastic arts, ceramics, gold and silver work, religious, funerary, military objects

Level of recognition and local significance

11

Immovable tangible cultural heritage

Existence of real estate of built value: urban, rural, industrial, vernacular or popular

Existence of valuable real estate of civil, military, religious, funerary and funeral architecture

Level of recognition and local significance

12

Cultural, natural and landscape heritage

Existence of assets of natural and landscape value: Nature reserves, natural formations, cultural landscapes (Designed, Evolutionary -fossil or living-associative)

Level of recognition and local significance

13

Intangible heritage: Oral traditions

Existence of oral traditions and expressions: Language (dialects-local linguistic norms), myths, tales, legends, popular oral manifestations (Pregones (types of announcement of products with the objective to call people attention), local sayings, nicknames and local nicknames), literary-musical manifestations (décima (a ten verses poetical construction), trovos (metrical composition, generally with amorous subject matter, like a controversy), children's songs)

Level of recognition, significance and local participation

Subjects or carrier groups

Associated spaces

14

Intangible Heritage: Social Practices and Performing Arts

Existence of scenic, plastic and dance traditions and popular dances

Existence of traditional social practices: Religious and non-religious rituals and festivities

Level of recognition, significance and local participation

Representatives: Subjects and carrier groups

Associated spaces

15

Intangible heritage: Knowledge and practices

Existence of traditional trades and knowledge in primary activities

Existence of traditional trades and know-how related to the use of nature

Existence of traditional trades and knowledge related to the transformation of mineral, vegetable or animal matter

Level of recognition and local significance

Subjects or carrier groups

16

Intangible heritage: Traditional craftsmanship techniques

Existence of traditional construction techniques and handicraft production traditions of musical instruments, utilitarian crafts, food and beverages, among others

Level of recognition and significance

Subjects or carrier groups

17

Intangible heritage: Food and cuisines

Existence of traditional culinary products associated with festive activities, or typical of daily or productive activities: savory dishes (broths, roasts, stews, fried foods, side dishes), desserts, jams and sweets, drinks and liqueurs

Level of recognition and local significance

Subjects or carrier groups

18

Other heritage elements of the locality

Existence of elements of local symbology (coats of arms, flags, elements of flora, fauna or others)

Existence of representative local personalities and personalities

Existence of representative aspects of local toponymy

Level of recognition and local significance

Source: Own elaboration

The above proposal points out a set of observations for these indicator criteria to be taken into account in the process of identifying CI as a local resource.

In the Knowledge of Local Production Systems dimension, the analysis of the municipality's economic structure should be used as a starting point to identify the main economic sectors and their internal specialization in the municipality's productive vocation. This will make it possible to identify the key LPS and prepare data collection instruments taking into account the specificities of each system as shown in table 2. A brief historical analysis of the emergence of the system and its age should also be included.

Table 2 - Knowledge criteria by type of LPS

LPS type

Knowledge criteria

LPS Agricultural

Knowledge about crops and their cultural attentions according to agricultural profile: crop rotation, crop cycles, soil preparation, pest control, irrigation, fertilization, seed production and use, harvesting, storage

LPS Forestry

Species knowledge: surface areas, type of care, technologies by type of production, management, reforestation

LPS Livestock

Knowledge about the type of species: care, management techniques and instruments, type of feeding, reproductive cycle and others

LPS Industrial

Knowledge about the specialty of the industrial profile: type of raw materials, techniques and instruments, main products, forms of transportation, technology used

Mining LPS

Knowledge about: Mine characteristics, type of ore, ways of extraction, mining technique and means, collection, storage and transportation mechanisms

LPS Fishing, hunting, gathering

Knowledge about: Main species, management and production techniques by species, reproductive cycle, natural capture cycle, organization of the work force, forms of conservation and storage

LPS Services

Type of knowledge about the characteristics and demands of the main activity of the service

Source: Adapted from Silva (Silva Lira, 2003)

The triangulation of data in this dimension should seek to deepen the relationships between the level of specialization of the LPS, the historical productive results and the identity patterns identified through the instruments.

Another element to take into account in the rest of the dimensions is that the results of the participatory methods, questionnaires or field observation should be triangulated with the Documents and Records Analysis technique. This enriches and supports in the process the identification and characteristics of the resource. Table 3 shows some of those used for the local cultural heritage dimension.

Table 3 - Documents and records-Local Cultural Heritage Dimension

Documents and records

Inventory of the municipality's real estate assets

Inventory of nature reserves in the municipality (Citma, Center for Flora and Fauna)

Notarial protocols of the Municipal Historical Archive

Archives of Research for Culture and Art of the municipality

Photo-reportages, interviews and journalistic works of the municipality

Stories of life and work of artists, writers, personalities of the municipality

Documentaries and other audiovisual records focused on the socio-economic and cultural life of the municipality

Records of Scientific Events of the municipality

Photographic records of cultural events in the municipality

Source: Own elaboration

Finally, in order to organize the information on the resource and follow up on the process of evaluation and strategic orientation of the resource, it is suggested to make a CI Sheet as a local resource with the following data:

While it is true that both in theoretical debates and in the design of local development strategies, sociocultural aspects have not generally been given the importance they deserve, it is also true that much has been said about the theoretical, methodological and practical gaps in the problem, offering infinite opportunities to reduce or attenuate them.

The complex articulations of culture in the territorial sphere, together with the complexity of the concept itself, mean that there are no statistical instruments or indicators that can cover it in its entirety for the definition of cultural identity indicators. However, in these economic, historical and social articulations, it is possible to find approaches that, far from isolating it within a category, allow it to be approached, objectified and identified in this field of relations.

The proposal under consideration focuses on culture-development relations, where economic practices, collective survival strategies and popular memory provide CI with mechanisms as an adaptation resource for development and offer references to identify it.

This will contribute to strengthening an area of the strategic diagnosis of the EDM and reduce the gap in municipal decision making to integrate, mobilize and take advantage of the CI as a local resource in the management of local development.

 

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Notes

1 Since the 1960s and 1970s, the search for answers to questions of regional development and its planning has been considering non-economic criteria as factors with some degree of implication in these processes, including economic ones, taking into account the analysis of the region also as a scenario of interrelations of human activity. In it, the ties of history, collective experience, language, know-how and other expressions of regional identity are given an important weight as elements of territorial integration on which organized links are created on the basis of common interests and specific associated results. These criteria are extended in line with the historical evolution of development theories and are embodied in a more current approach such as the model of endogenous local development, which places emphasis on culture, values and institutional organizational structures as factors that foster innovation, flexibility and adaptability of the local productive system, among others, in favor of the growth of socio-economic variables.

2 In accordance with the qualities that describe the local development model, the work of González Fontes et al. (2021) states that the development potential of the territory constitutes, together with the exogenous flows of resources and the endogenous flows that feed it from the internal management dynamics, one of the natural sources on which the development process at local level essentially depends, implicitly pointing out the need to manage in a harmonious and coordinated manner the maximum possible capacity of the set of resources that make it up, at the risk of underutilizing all the wealth and possibilities of deploying internal synergies for development, in interaction with the rest of the sources.

3 Considering the territorial dimension that accompanies the analysis of LPS from the endogenous development approach, tacit knowledge transcends as a product of the relationships formed in these spaces of collective activity and becomes a differentiating feature not only from one productive practice to another, within one productive system or another, but also in a particularly distinctive, diverse and rich way, from one locality to another.

4 Such as the type of organizational structure in the form of a territorially controlled value chain, the interrelationships between the diversity of activities with specific functions at each stage of the production process, the complementarity of functions or the coordination of the system.

5 Exceptionality or exceptional character is a distinguishing feature of cultural heritage.

6 According to the author of reference and following the above order of terms, this means: recognizing that the product's differentials are rooted in the local culture, enabling the consumer's contact with the social and cultural environment of the product in its place of origin and associating it with the cultural base of the producers and their social organization.

7 Going deeper into the relationship between culture and development processes, Antonio Vázquez Barquero, in his 2007 work "On the diversity of interpretations and the complexity of the concept of endogenous development", deals specifically with a set of cultural factors that function as regulatory axes for the activity and relations of organizations in the territory. These constitute values, norms and principles that activate mechanisms such as trust, as individual or social capital that fosters the formation of associations and business networks within common interests and objectives, supports the reputation of actors and organizations and enhances the capacity to undertake joint development initiatives that contribute to success not only in the economic sphere, but also in any other territorial sphere.

8 Since cultural diversity is an expression of the originality and plurality of the identities of groups and societies, omitting or reducing the search for its heritage manifestations would in any case limit not only the use of its potential, but also the inclusive and participatory nature of the local development process.

9 Defined by Durán et al. (2021) under the perspective of community self-development. These structural networks contain the potential of the social actors related to them, either as cultural subjects involved or as actors included or excluded from the heritage management process according to their function (according to the definition of these networks), in terms of mobilization capacity, leadership, perpetuation of tradition, among others. If cultural heritage is part of the CI and the performance of these structural networks constitute and condition the support of heritage management, then the management of local CI is also sustained.

 

Conflict of interest:

Authors declare not to have any conflict of interest.

 

Authors' contribution:

Maydelin Annerys Olazabal Arrabal: Conceptualization, data collection and processing, research, writing. Original draft. Writing-revision-editing.

Vilda Rodríguez Méndez: Writing. Critical review of content referring to culture, cultural resources, cultural identity and proposed indicators.

Ramón González Fontes: Writing. Critical review of content related to local development, management and strategic planning of development and proposed indicators.

All authors reviewed the writing of the manuscript and approve the version finally submitted.

 


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Copyright (c) Maydelin Annerys Olazabal Arrabal; Vilda Rodríguez Méndez; Ramón González Fontes