Azerbaijan

Last update: April, 2025

Public initiatives and programmes to promote cultural participation and attendance in the country have constitutional and legislative foundations. The Constitution of the Republic of Azerbaijan (No.00 of November 12, 1995) guarantees everyone’s right to participate in cultural life and use cultural institutions and values. Article 14 (“The right to use cultural institutions and cultural values”) of the Law on Culture (No.506-IVQ of 21 December 2012) establishes that the state guarantees the right to use cultural institutions and cultural values in the Republic of Azerbaijan. The state implements projects aimed at simplifying the population's access to cultural institutions and spaces, as well as initiatives that stimulate the cultural activities of children and youth and their enjoyment of cultural resources through economic, social, legal, scientific-technical, and modern technological measures to ensure this right. The state ensures preferential use of cultural values for low-income populations, persons with disabilities, and war veterans.

The Rules on preferential use of cultural values by low-income populations, persons with disabilities, and war veterans were approved by the Cabinet of Ministers' Decision No. 287, dated August 20, 2015. The preferential use of cultural values for non-commercial purposes is carried out on state and municipal property, as well as in the territories of state reserves under the Ministry of Culture, the State Tourism Agency, the Administration of State Historical-Architectural Reserve "Icherisheher", and the Shusha City State Reserve Department. All of it is provided for members of low-income families, people with disabilities and war veterans free of charge and without consent. Preferential use by these populations of cultural values protected or displayed in privately owned cultural institutions is foreseen by mutual agreement.

The use of cultural resources in state- and municipal-owned cultural institutions must be carried out in accordance with their historical and artistic purposes; it is not permitted to utilise cultural values in a manner incompatible with their historical and artistic significance. Copying or public communication of works of architecture, photography, and fine arts in places permanently open to the public is permitted by the Law on Copyright and Related Rights (No.115-IQ of June 5, 1996). The exception applies in cases where the description of the work is the primary object of reproduction or public communication or where a copy of the work is used for commercial purposes without the author's or other copyright holder's consent and payment of royalties.

The Ministry of Culture runs special programmes to broaden and promote participation in cultural life for different social strata. Besides the privileged categories of the population, such as the families of martyrs, pensioners, orphans, secondary school pupils, and high school students, free and favourable access to museums, reserves, and monuments is allowed for all visitors on state official holidays and international museums, historical monuments, music, and other relevant days.

Further improvement of accessibility and inclusiveness of cultural values is scheduled in the draft "Azerbaijani Culture - 2040" Concept of the Republic of Azerbaijan, within the framework of which it is provided to establish a permanent forum, "Culture for All", to expand sustainable social relations, cooperation and dialogue between state bodies and society in the field of culture, and to regularly hold inclusive forums and other educational events dedicated to current topics in various regions; implementation of support programs for the creation of new and high-quality cultural products and cultural assets by young people; implementation of activities to ensure intergenerational dialogue in every field of culture; creating ecosystems for collaboration between creative and modern digital technology experts and for testing and promoting the results of their creativity; implementing sustainable programs, while ensuring inclusion, to enable children, the elderly, people with disabilities and other vulnerable social categories to discover their talents and demonstrate their creative potential; improving service quality, ensuring accessibility and inclusion through the implementation of digital and innovative solutions in the field of cultural services.

Last update: April, 2025

The primary developmental trends between 2015, 2019 (the pre-pandemic year), and 2023 reveal significant variations in the number of attendees (participants) across selected fields of culture. During these years, there was a sharp increase in cinema attendance, almost threefold. The data on concert attendees demonstrates a fairly noticeable rise, from 4.2% of the population in 2015 to 4.97% in 2023. At the same time, there was a rather noticeable decrease in the audience's interest in the theatrical sphere over the compared years, from 7% to 4.25% of the population. The percentage of library visitors has been slowly declining, and as a result, libraries moved to second place in visits within the cultural sector, with a rate of 24.34% in 2023.

Meanwhile, museums, second in terms of visits in the cultural sector (26.9% of the population in 2015), emerged as the top destination in 2023 despite a slight decline to 25%. The indicators for pupils in children's music, art and painting schools show a noticeable decreasing trend over these years; an increase in the share of paid education can explain this trend. Considering the indicated trends, it should still be noted that the total figures in the number of spectators and visitors in state cultural institutions demonstrate a stable tendency to growth: from 4,921.6 thousand persons in 2022 to 5,406.2 thousand in 2023 and 6,217.1 thousand in 2024, which the increasing attention of the state can explain to issues of cultural participation.

Table 4:    Number of attendees (participants) of selected cultural activities in the Republic of Azerbaijan (in % of the population, over three selected years)

Source: https://www.stat.gov.az/source/education/?lang=en

Last update: April, 2025

Table 5:    Household expenditure by recreation and cultural purpose, 2021 and 2023

Sources: https://www.stat.gov.az/source/budget_households/?lang=en, https://www.stat.gov.az/source/demoqraphy/?lang=en

Last update: April, 2025

The Ministry of Culture supports amateur arts and fosters people’s creativity through a network of cultural houses, clubs, and relevant centres. To a small extent, some clubs are associated with the State Oil Company (SOCAR), the Confederation of Trade Unions, and other organisations. According to state statistics, as of the end of 2023, the total number of clubs funded by the state stands at 2,058, comprising 323 in urban areas and 1,735 in rural regions. The overall number of seats in the auditoriums and lecture halls of these clubs totals 299,570, which equates to 30 per 1,000 of the population.

Cultural clubs and houses of culture provide the background and conditions for club circles, amateur art groups and unions, interest clubs, amateur associations, art circles and collectives, technical creativity courses and classes, as well as children's circles and collectives. Clubs supported by the Ministry of Culture offered 3,569 different types of cultural leisure activities, with almost 30,000 active participants involved. These amounts encompass 1,435 child hobby groups and collectives, with a total of up to 10,500 children participating. Events organised in the fields of people’s creativity and intangible cultural heritage at club-type cultural institutions encompass amateur concerts, performances, spectacles, games, festivals, competitions, fairs, exhibitions, excursions, tours, and conferences, seminars. 

Over the last decade, the Ministry of Culture has initiated the reorganisation of the cultural houses and community cultural clubs’ system, aiming to broaden social participation in cultural life under current economic circumstances. This initiative involved setting aside non-working functions and developing new forms, serving as infrastructural units for intangible cultural heritage. Established city and town centres of culture, along with their local lore, folklore, and artisanal branches, serve this idea by attracting relevant masters, performers, collectives, researchers, NGOs, and private structures.

The technical conditions of most club buildings are not sufficiently satisfactory. The number of club buildings requiring major repairs stands at 999, which is 45.7% of the total, while the number of club buildings in a state of emergency amounts to 94, or 4.3%. The club staff's educational attainment is also unsatisfactory. Of the total number of cultural and educational employees in clubs, 5,195 people, only 9.0% hold higher education in culture and art, 9.7% have higher education in fields other than culture and art, and 21.3% have a secondary specialised education in culture and art. 

A social survey was conducted in February 2024 to effectively organise activities related to forming a new national cultural model, “Culture for All,” proposed by the draft "Azerbaijani Culture—2040" Concept of the Republic of Azerbaijan. The survey identified the challenges facing the state in the cultural sector and ensured public participation in developing the Concept. According to the survey results, most respondents (78%) identify culture with art. Under “national and spiritual values”, 69% of respondents understand customs and traditions, 64% understand history and culture, and 43% understand moral rules. The most visited cultural institutions and events, according to respondents, were libraries (29%), concerts (16%), and museums (15%). The least visited were reserves (only 3%), exhibitions (6%), theatres (11%), and others (7%). 54% of respondents were satisfied with the demonstrated creative examples, 16% were unsatisfied, and another 16% considered them poorly consistent with modern requirements. The vast majority of respondents - 68% - expressed a desire to engage in creativity, and only 1% thought it a waste of time. Respondents considered the following measures necessary for the development of culture: improving the professionalism of employees (21%), increasing funds allocated to the cultural sector (20%), developing infrastructure and making services more accessible (17%), stimulating creativity and innovation (12%), and cooperation with other countries (12%), expanding public-private partnerships (11%). 42% of respondents positively assessed the international promotion of Azerbaijani culture, 32% considered it satisfactory, 11% thought it unsatisfactory, and 15% were unaware of it.