Wellbeing through culture, delivered by various service models

The study studied three specific models: the financial model, cultural admission and service steering. Each of these models is widely used by Finnish municipalities and this will likely continue with the adoption of the wellbeing regions. The financing model is the most used and best known of the three. The target groups vary in respect of the different models used: the target group associated with the financing model is the clients of adult social work services, while the cultural admission model targets maternity clinic clients and service steering focuses on housing services’ clients. 

The models are based on local actors and locally developed practices and form a basis for development, governance and data collection. Streamlining is however necessary for the successful functioning of these cultural wellbeing models. National support and coordination is required so that the practices can be unified.

The wellbeing regions will have a significant impact on how these cultural wellbeing services are organised in future. Challenges here lie in identifying the local models and experiments that should be unified in order to enable their transfer to and functionality in the wellbeing regions. Monitoring and data collection methodologies are likely to remain important here. Impact evaluations, user data and comparisons are clearly required. Despite the challenges the cultural wellbeing services are considered important: culture has a special place in the wellbeing regions and in municipalities.  

The study was targeted at those municipalities and wellbeing regions that already have models in respect of cultural well-being. The data was collected via a survey that had 74 respondents. In addition, two interviews were also undertaken.