The Arts and Culture sector, in a broad sense, has yet to integrate an open data agenda into its strategies for developing and strengthening democratic governance processes. This situation is evident throughout Latin America, not only at the level of national governments (in departments and Cultural Councils) as well as sub-national ones (municipalities and regional governments), but also at the level of regional (Mercosur, etc.) and global instances (UNESCO and UNCTAD, for example).

A commitment to open government for culture, as a sector, means transforming its structures by empowering sectors that have historically been unable to participate in the processes that define cultural development priorities. This is the promise of open data. In other words, greater cultural diversity (and a diversity of cultural expressions that highlights the real aspirations, realities and needs of people and their communities) requires greater cultural democracy and transparent, participatory and open models of cultural governance. Based on this premise, Mauricio Delfin proposes to explore the possibilities of data in the cultural sector of Latin America and, in that way, help us understand a sector where policies and data initiatives have not been properly explored to date.