Belgium will host a European Capital of Culture for the fifth time, after Antwerp in 1993, Brussels in 2000, Bruges in 2002, and Mons in 2015.  On the short list are three cities: Leuven, Molenbeek, and Namur.  Larnaka and Lemesos have been shortlisted for the title of European Capital of Culture 2030 in Cyprus. 

EcocNews begins today a journey among the cities of Belgium and Cyprus to learn through their answers to five questions about the work they are doing to reach the goal of European Capital of Culture.

We start today with Leuven.

Leuven is a city east of Brussels, Belgium, known for its breweries. On a central square is the 15th-century town hall, with its tall spires. The building is decorated with hundreds of statues of local figures, biblical characters and saints. Opposite, the late Gothic St. Peter’s Church houses a “Last Supper” by the Flemish Primitive painter Dieric Bouts. Nearby, Oude Markt is a long square lined with bars and cafes. 

Why did your city decide to apply for the European Capital of Culture?
Polarization is spreading in our society. Democracy is under pressure throughout Europe. In Belgium – a founding member of the EU – the extreme parties are ever growing. The European Parliament will also look completely different in the coming years.

That polarization is not only between people. Oppositions are all around us: between humans and nature, town and countryside, science and populism, conservative versus progressive, local versus global... But what’s brought this about? Why are people seemingly losing faith in our society? Even in a country where so much is going well? Why are we so alienated from one another? Has every connection between us been lost? How do we reconnect to our common humanity?

Human nature, the title of our bid, celebrates what unites us as Europeans, but it’s also a game plan for confronting the challenges we face and which forces every city and region in Europe to make a transition that is socially equitable. To do that, we must have the courage of our convictions, look beyond our humanness and question our human dominance: how do we find a way to live in harmony with other ecosystems?

It’s our belief that we can begin to resolve the challenges facing Leuven, on the one hand, and the region on the other, by radically connecting them, by forging closer, person to person relationships between them. The problems and challenges that present themselves here, also occur in many places in Europe. So we also aim to use our candidacy to become a future-factory, to test projects and strategies, then pass them on to other parts of Europe.

What do you think are the keywords of your application?
LOV2030 is the name for Leuven’s candidacy to become European Capital of Culture in 2030. We haven’t chosen this name by chance, for love is essential to fulfilling our mission: striving together for a better future for Leuven and the entire region, by creating radical new connections.

LOV means looking for what we don’t see, for our blind spots, so that we can break through the bubbles we live in. LOV stands for radical samenleven (living together), for embracing friction and uncertainties. LOV connects rich and poor, highly and poorly educated, city and countryside. It combines culture with education, innovation and sustainability and bridges gaps that we may not even know yet. LOV means working together as one single region and reaching out to Europe and far beyond. LOV is not only Leuven, it’s wholeheartedly Leuven & Beyond.

Human Nature. Human Nature asks what it is to be human, with humanity’s good and bad sides, its instincts for survival and death, its eros and thanatos. But if we broaden the concept we derive the potential inherent in both words: man versus nature, our behaviour versus our environment, our impact on nature and climate. To this we link an image of the future: how will future generations deal with the tension between mankind and nature, and which sustainable (social and technological) innovations will then be required?

Samenleving [society] (noun), samenleven [to live together] (intransitive verb). In Dutch there are two words we can use when we talk about society: maatschappij and samenleving. Maatschappij is the literal equivalent of ‘society’, société in French or what the Germans call Gesellschaft: at its core is the ‘socius’, the associate, the associé, the Geselle.

Socius means ‘comrade’, someone whose example you follow. The Dutch word maat also means ‘mate’ or ‘companion’ but is also the word for ‘size’ or ‘order’. In that sense, maatschappij is a very normative and exclusionary word. Static and passive too. On the other hand samenleven, is active (it’s about life!) and inclusive (we do it ‘samen’, which means together!).

That samenleven is also a verb and so describes an action is shown by the fact that you have to do it with everyone, whether you want to or not, whether someone conforms to your norms or not. Samenleven is not to deny difference; samenleven is done in diversity.

Radical new connections. ‘Radical’ comes from radix, root. So something that’s radical goes back to the root, the foundation of things, the essence. We need to innovate socially. That requires radically new connections: the network – the fabric of our society – needs more nodes. It must be woven more densely, like a real net, so that it retains its resilience and no one falls through. Radical living – or loving – together, in fact. After all, is there a more radical relationship than lov?

Leuven & Beyond. Leuven is a central city with 104,000 inhabitants plus 60,000 students, in a green region, where a total of 600,000 people live. All too often, Leuven has turned its face towards Brussels and presented its backside to the region. In putting together our bid we have done a complete about-turn and are looking our region square in the eye.

How are you involving citizens in this competition?
In December 2017, in a packed City Theatre, during a major get-together of the broad cultural and creative sector, Leuven announced its ECOC candidacy. That ambition was promptly endorsed by a range of players, from the city council and broad CCI to the University and civil society.

Between 2018 and 2022 (a period punctuated by Covid 19), the first discussions with the region took place. In 2019, the city organized Leuven, Maak Het Mee, a large-scale poll in which Leuveners could share ideas, pose questions and propose projects for the Leuven of the future. Nearly 3,000 people took part. Between 2020 and 2022 we followed a process involving the broad cultural and social fields, and the heritage and arts sectors, to ascertain by means of public sessions how the land was lying, to record the existing situation, and also to formulate objectives for 2035.

As from early 2023, we organized a number of large-scale events as well as many small- scale ‘LOV-cafés’, at which we brought together different social actors from Leuven and the broader region. Because you never dream alone, the idea quickly raised to have a group of locals to spar ideas with. At one of our first events a call went out for nominations of potential members to the Dreamers2030 team - the only condition being that you could not nominate yourself. The response was tremendous. Out of 300 nominations 30 very diverse profiles were brought together and have since then acted as a very honest, outspoken and valuable sounding board. The 30 ‘dreamers’ share the invitation to collaborate with their network. Thus, ever wider concentric circles ripple through civil society.

In the spring of 2024 we sent out an open call for project ideas, encouraging civil society to devise and submit new cultural social projects. Various working sessions were organized for the purpose. Some 140 projects were submitted. Meanwhile we organized writing tables, democratic dialogue sessions, and different co-creative Labs around education, future generations, decolonization, digitalization etc. are being set up.

What are the next steps on your journey?
There still is a lot to be done. Let’s say, we’re planning on running two marathons powered by LOV2030 : one is an actual race taking place on the 13 th of April between Brussels and Leuven in which many runners will wear a LOV T shirt and run for LOV.

The second marathon is actually finalizing the program and writing the second bid book by the 15 th of July. We are looking forward to both. We’re also preparing the jury visit in September and the presentation. In the meantime, we’re working with all the stakeholders, traveling throughout the region, with our LOV-cafés and mobile workshops.

Concerning actual journey in the sense of travel, we attended the 40 year ECOC celebration and conference in Chemnitz2025, which was a very special moment and we were honored to

attend. We also met the 7 candidate cities for 2030 and had an inspiring sunny time with a lot of strong collaborations for the future.

And finally, on Europe day, the 9 th of May, all 31 municipalities in East Brabant and in Leuven itself will raise the LOV2030 flag for all to be seen. Let’s spread the LOV!

What are your thoughts on the European Capital of Culture competition?
It’s a tough competition! A lot of people put in much of their best, to create a concept, come up with a coherent artistic and cultural program, linking it to Europe and beyond, and reaching out to all citizens (young or old, rich or poor, minorities and disadvantaged people) and getting everything straight on a management and a political level. It is an immense effort, for any contestant – it already was so even in the preselection phase.

But being able to work on an inspiring project that can really create an impact on the cultural sector, on a city, a region, and maybe even on Europe is exciting and rewarding in itself. It’s also great to meet the other competitors in the different countries and to get to know a lot of people that you would otherwise never encounter. The role of the Culture Next network is invaluable.

For the 2030 competition in Belgium, Cyprus and third countries Ukraine and Montenegro, the cities of Leuven, Namur, Molenbeek, Larnaka, Lemesos, Lviv and Niksic all teamed up to meet one another and to exchange our experiences and projects. In this way, we all want to put collaboration and cooperation above competition. We think that after 40 years of ECOC - with let’s say the first 20 years being about city marketing, and the following 20 years about social change within your city – it is time to open up and really share, so we can build a better cultural Europe together, putting forward democratic values and ecologic effort.