To answer the question why British people were able to change themselves, and to change their sense of values, I would like to emphasize the existence of middle-class people. In British society, middle-class people are extremely industrious. My definition of middle-class is "a group of self-aware people." I always tell my students to remember that middle-class people always pay attention to how others are viewing them.
Mr. Kanzaki has introduced his definition of culture, stating that a culture constitutes in a series of "habits" common to a social group. Well, in Britain there is a group of people who are aware of being watched by others, and they play an important role as a backbone of the British society. Since they are sensitive as to how they are valued by others, they make much of polite manners and common sense, both of which Japanese people have lost or are losing today.
It is the middle-class that created the Open Space and National Trust Movements; they created the new sense of values, preferring countryside to city, inconvenience to convenience, and open space to crowded and crammed space. These trends and movements were motivated by their wish to improve workers' daily lives.
In the Open Space Movement, they endeavored to secure common open spaces in cities, accessible by every citizen. At that time, perhaps half the citizens were bothered by such middle-class movements, since these movements involved land ownership issues. However, owing to these movements, the UK today has abundant cultural and tourism assets.
Next, I would like to introduce Glasgow, a shipbuilding city. In addition to shipbuilding, Glasgow had such industries as coal mining and the iron and steel industry. During the first half of the 20th century, the city flourished as a center of the war industry.
In 1990, Glasgow was elected European City of Culture of the year. During the bidding campaign for this election, citizens of Glasgow strove to rediscover their local cultural assets. That was during the 1980's; since Mrs. Thatcher was elected Prime Minister in 1979, the policies of the 1980's featured political and economic centralization in London. Faced with declining local economic and industrial power, citizens of Glasgow tried hard to discover their local identity.
Today, Glasgow is known for a festival called May Fest, which is now regarded as the second largest festival in the UK, after the Edinburgh Music Festival. As the title indicates, the festival is held annually in May, for about three weeks. A great many tourists and artists visit the festival. Also, many popular music stars achieved fame in Glasgow.
I would like to emphasize that to promote tourism, you have to know your own locality. Glasgow is located close to Edinburgh, which was once the capital of Scotland.
Since Edinburgh has many middle-class people, its service industry is vigorous. In contrast, Glasgow, a city of laborers, underwent serious economic recession as a result of changes in social and economic structures. Since the city was unable to depend on its industries for survival, citizens tried hard to discover what else their city had. As a result, they found many relics of the Industrial Revolution. As Professor Takada mentioned earlier, citizens of Glasgow decided to make full use of such old manufacturing tools and equipment. These industrial relics are now shown to tourists, free of a charge. In other cities in the UK, it is popular to preserve old iron bridges as tourism resources.
Glasgow is the birthplace of Charles Mackintosh (1868 - l928), architect, artist and founder of the Glasgow School of Art. The school building is now open to the public, inviting still more tourists. In other words, Glasgow has successfully converted industrial means to cultural assets.
Takada: Dr. Inose has told us that Glasgow was an industrial city, having few cultural assets. I would like to add to her comment that, concerning the rediscovery of its local culture, Glasgow owes much to Melina Mercouri, a Greek actress who became the Greek Minister of Culture. People of my age may know her; she was in such movies as "Topkapi" and "Never on Sunday." in which she played a role of a prostitute who does not work on Sundays.
When she served as the Greek Minister of Culture, Melina Mercouri proposed the European City of Culture Program: European cities would take turns in serving as a City of Culture for one year. For the first European City of Culture, Athens was selected. Glasgow bid for candidacy, and it was during this bidding campaign that Glasgow's citizens reevaluated their cultural assets. In Japan, we do not have to imitate this European program, but I think we can consider introducing something of this kind.
In Japan, to promote local culture, many local communities have constructed a new cultural hall, theater, and other facilities, spending a lot of money. But by changing our viewpoints, we can create a new culture without spending much money. For instance, Byodoin Temple in Uji held a concert featuring Tsutomu Yamashita, a percussion player, accompanied by Japanese drums and Buddhist songs by priests. Since it was a very unique concert, other temples, including Enryakuji Temple in Kyoto, began holding concerts at their temples.
It might be interesting to hold a ballet concert at a former factory where machines are still installed.
Inose: If local communities organize such programs, they are likely to be successful; I mean national governments must not be involved in such programs. In the case of Glasgow, it was successful because the British government was not involved.
Takada: I heard that a French community also held a
