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Why have Basque citizens said no to a new Guggenheim Museum?
A few months ago, Basque institutions decided not to continue with the process of expanding the Guggenheim Museum Bilbao in Urdaibai. The museum designed by Frank Gehry is one of the most emblematic buildings of contemporary modern architecture, and no one questions the influence it has had on the socio-economic transformation of Basque society as a whole. Taking these factors into account, why have Basque institutions decided to abandon a project that, a priori, could have a similar impact in an area in need of economic revitalization? Is the rejection by a large part of the local community a sign of arrogance or simply conservatism? Many regions undergoing deindustrialization and depopulation would love to have an opportunity like this.
This article seeks to analyze the set of factors that have influenced this decision and raises a series of considerations on socio-ecological transition processes from a sustainable human development perspective. These reflections arise from the listening process carried out by the Agirre Lehendakaria Center (ALC) in the Urdaibai region during 2025, in which more than 1,000 people participated. The full content of these conversations and the reports published by ALC can be consulted at www.urdaibai.agirrecenter.eus
Although there are still many reductionist interpretations of the impact of the Guggenheim Museum Bilbao on the economy, Basque society does not agree that the transformation experienced in recent decades in the Basque Country and Bilbao has been caused exclusively by this project. In general terms, there is no doubt about the positive impact it has had on Bilbao's international positioning as an example of urban transformation, but the narratives gathered during the listening process present a much more complex and nuanced interpretation, in which the set of public and private interventions is valued as an exercise in collective intelligence. There is more talk of a community-based public-private collaboration movement than of magic solutions.
“The Basque transformation is a social movement, not a start-up.”
The prevailing narratives consider that it has been a project driven forward without consulting the population. There is a great deal of debate about the balance that must exist between the obligation and responsibility of local public authorities to make ambitious proposals and the need to consult the population, but there is also a growing consensus on the need to do things differently. Hierarchical processes, in which society is consulted in an instrumental or cosmetic manner, are no longer accepted uncritically. Even though it is endorsed by a major institution such as the Guggenheim Foundation and the museum in Bilbao has had a major positive impact, this is not enough for society to support it uncritically. The listening process has identified five main narratives about this project, but all of them called for more information and a truly participatory process.
“Unlike in recent decades, tourism is no longer viewed positively.”
In this specific case, since the initial decision to promote the expansion was made more than 15 years ago, the change in Basque society's perception of tourism has not been taken into account. While just two decades ago it was considered an engine of economic development, today it is identified with gentrification, inequality, precarious employment, and rising housing prices. As there has been no listening process during all this time, the institutions promoting it have not been able to take this change in social perceptions into account.
This rejection shows that in the Basque Country there is a social majority that demands new instruments of collaborative governance. The Basque Country has a tradition of public-private collaboration that is viewed positively and, unlike in other regions around us, is not interpreted as an exercise in privatization of the public sector. Currently, these practices should be reinforced in their community perspective so that they do not become hierarchical instruments disconnected from social perceptions in the region.
In this sense, new digital tools make it easier for us to visualize the set of actions being carried out in a territory and to cross-reference them with existing social perceptions in real time. This exercise of collective interpretation of information and generation of new proposals allows us to build intervention portfolios based on collective intelligence, connecting with the tradition of auzolan that exists in the territory.
Updating these practices involves incorporating simulation capabilities into these collaborative governance processes. In the future, we should be able to simulate the social, economic, environmental, and cultural impacts that an initiative of this nature could have, and analyze them openly with the participation of society as a whole, before making a final decision.
Related information
Putting people at the center of transformation processes
Article by Giulio Quaggioto, published in issue 0 of K Magazine
Photographs: ALC.
As the discourse on (social) innovation evolved in the last decade, it has increasingly brought to focus the value of distinguishing between incremental and transformational innovation. The former works within existing paradigms to bring about discrete improvements, the latter seeks to create new paradigms altogether. Given the urgency brought about by the polycrisis and the collapse of trust in institutions (as reflected quite dramatically in the latest Edelman Trust Barometer), the call for systemic transformation has grown louder. In a statement that well epitomises the current zeitgeist, Darja Isaacson, head of Sweden’s innovation agency Vinnova recently noted that (impact) “Innovation is not only political. In our current time it is existential”.
System transformation, portfolio approaches, missions and moonshots, transformative innovation policy: all these approaches put the question of transformative intent at their core to emphasise the need to move beyond incrementalism. This, in turn, raises a fundamental question: if a transformative intent is central to the need of the day of addressing structural inequalities, who is to set that intent?
And as a corollary: How do we prevent the process of setting a collective, ambitious direction of travel from falling into the old trap of top-down and expert driven decision making, thus replicating existing power imbalances?
How do we make sure that we do not fall into the eternal temptation of thinking that we start from a tabula rasa, and acknowledge existing dynamics in society and their evolutionary potential (rather than working backwards from an idealised future)?
How do we create the collective will to transform in the context of a deficit of trust in institutions and erosion of the social contract? How do we square the paradox that we know social transformation takes time, and yet we face the urgency of a collapsing planet, and the pressure from leaders and funders who expect immediate results?
System transformation, portfolio approaches, missions and moonshots, ALC’s approach to transformation has important insights to offer on the above questions. First of all, it is grounded on the (remarkable) experience of transformation of the Basque region: both in the past, in a context of low trust and conflict, and in its current attempt to embrace more purposefully the challenge of climate change.
Secondly, it is centered around people and their narratives as a way to understand the opportunities to “nudge” a social system towards its evolutionary potential. In doing so, it often embraces oblique entry points (such as food) as a way to tackle difficult questions around trustand collaboration.
And, lastly, it seeks to accelerate transformation by adopting a multiscalar approach - intervening at the micro, meso and macro level in a system at the same time to generate positive feedback loops and generate momentum for change. The combination of these three factors means that it strives to generate the will to transform at different levels within a system, putting people at the center.
I had the pleasure of collaborating with the ALC’s team in projects of the United Nations Development Program that applied the “deep listening” approach in different contexts and communities around the world - from exploring food as a way to transform the regional economy in Thailand and Pakistan, to helping create opportunities for community regeneration in Mozambique. Their approach helped us ensure that the interventions we designed were grounded on a granular understanding of local dynamics and created distributed agency at different levels of the systems that communities wanted to transform.
The experience of working with ALC has also opened up a reflection on potential directiosn of travel that the Foundation might want to explore moving forward. A couple that might be worth mentioning are:
First, as the ALC methodology evolves and is being applied in more and more countries, how can it evolve to embrace more purposefully different, non-western worldviews and forms of knowledge? The deep listening approach is a great starting point to create a permeable space of “contamination” where a new form of understanding that is truly endogenous can emerge.
And second, digital tools can be applied at different stages of the ACL process to enhance and accelerate effects, and provide new insights for real time learning and adaptation. Here the caveats of potential bias, the need for informed consent and lack of quality digital inclusion apply.
I very much look forward to future collaborations with ALC. K
Article by Giulio Quaggioto, published in issue 0 of K Magazine
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New models of financing social innovation: ALC at the Birds Study Visit in Lisbon
ALC participated in the Birds Study Visit, organized by Portugal Social Innovation, a European meeting that focuses on the future of financing for social innovation. This visit is part of the BIRDS program (Boosting Investment Related to Development of Social Innovation), in which several countries are collaborating to create future Centers of Competence in Social Innovation in Europe.
Over two days, representatives from public institutions, social organizations, financial institutions, and European networks met at key venues in Lisbon, such as BPI All in One, Casa do Impacto, and Caixa Geral de Depósitos. The goal was to share lessons learned, compare approaches, and explore new financial instruments that generate real and sustainable social impact.
Financing at the service of social transformation
One of the central themes was how to design financial instruments that are truly aligned with social innovation objectives, overcoming fragmented approaches or those limited to conventional profitability metrics.
To respond to complex social challenges—such as aging, digital exclusion, and a just ecological transition—it is not enough to innovate in solutions: we must also innovate in how they are financed.
This requires new indicators, return models, and forms of collaboration between public, private, and community actors.
Gorka Espiau, director of ALC, participated as a speaker. In his presentation, he highlighted the need for systemic approaches that combine different types of financing and presented a possible roadmap for defining financing for social innovation competence centers (NCCs).
Towards a European architecture for social innovation
The visit is part of the collaborative process promoted by the BIRDS program to build a common social innovation infrastructure in Europe. The future Competence Centers will articulate an ecosystem of knowledge, training, advice, and experimentation to support transformative solutions. In this context, financing is not a secondary element: it is a structural axis that must accompany the entire social innovation cycle, from listening and shared diagnosis to the consolidation of scalable responses with local impact.
ALC participation in this meeting is part of its collaboration with the Spanish Ministry of Social Rights, Consumer Affairs and the 2030 Agenda for the design and creation of social innovation competence centers (NCC).
Collaboration with the Provincial Council of Alava and the Vitoria-Gasteiz City Council in the revitalisation of the Basque language.
During 2024, Agirre Lehendakaria Center has analysed the initiatives of the Provincial Council of Alava and the Vitoria-Gasteiz City Council for the revitalisation of the Basque language, within the framework of the new AROA strategic plan.
In addition, interviews and listening sessions have been held with social agents of different profiles to understand their perceptions of the Basque language and detect opportunities for its strengthening.
This analysis has made it possible to identify patterns in perceptions and attitudes towards the Basque language, both positive and negative. It has revealed key factors that can act as levers to encourage its use, as well as social and cultural obstacles that require specific strategies. The research has also highlighted the need to promote an inclusive narrative adapted to the different sectors of Alava's society, with special attention to youth and foreign communities that currently do not have sufficient proposals adapted to their linguistic integration.
Programme Abstracts of the 3rd International Seminar - A Human Rights based approach to Palliative Care: Towards Solutions for Public Health Palliative Care
The Case of Lada (Asturias) and Velilla del Río Carrión (Palencia)
Complex challenges such as just energy transition require an approach that addresses not only the replacement or creation of new jobs, but also provides answers to interconnected issues such as migration and ageing of the population, deindustrialisation, the transformation of the economic activity of a territory and the conditioning factors towards its historical identity (mining, industry...), etc.
The Lada and Velilla Innovation Platform is a multi-stakeholder partnership, made up of two university innovation centres and an electricity company, created to address the closure of two coal-fired power plants in Spain using the working approach of the social innovation platforms.
Everyone can name many of their “bad” features that he would like to keep under control. Our Columonist Psychotherapist Ilya Latypov believes that others still see us real. And they accept us as we are.
There are two extremes in our idea of how well other people can “read” us. One is the feeling that we are completely transparent, permeable, that we are not able to hide anything. This is especially strongly a feeling of transparency in experiencing shame or its easier variation, embarrassment – this is one of the features of shame.
But there is another extreme associated with the first – the idea that we are able to hide from other people what we are afraid of or that we are ashamed to
https://rc-promoteur.com/la-plupart-des-methodes-contraceptives-ne/
show. The tummy sticks out? Let’s pull it properly and we will always walk like that – no one will notice.
Speech defect? We will carefully monitor our diction – and everything will be in order. The voice trembles when we worry? “Excessively” blushes the face? Not very competently put speech? Vile grimaces? All this can be hidden, because those around us, seeing this, will probably turn away from us.
In addition to physical disabilities, there are also personality characteristics. You can be ashamed of them and carefully mask, believing that we will be able to make them inconspicuous.
Greed or stinginess, obvious bias (especially if objectivity is important for us – then we will hide the addiction very carefully), talkativeness, impulsiveness (this is ashamed if we value restraint) – and so on, each of us can name many of our “bad”features that we are trying to control.
But nothing happens. It’s like drawing up the abdomen: you remember a couple of minutes, and then switches attention, and – oh horror – you see it in a random photo. And this pretty woman saw him – and still flirted with you!
It is hard to believe that other people treat us well, seeing many of our features that we would like to hide. It seems that they stay with us because we manage to control ourselves – but this is not so. Yes, we are not transparent – but also not impenetrable.
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