ENThis article explores the emergence of a new cultural policy phenomenon in Lithuania: the debate about public spaces and monuments and its role in urban cultural planning. Between the 1940s and1980s state socialist cultural policy built and transformed public spaces without any discussion involved in the process. In contrast, contemporary cultural policy appears to cause endless controversies. These controversies have followed political decisions to endow Vilnius public spaces with socio-historical meaning via monument-building. By focusing on public critique and disagreement about key cultural events, which include the state sponsored national celebrations Vilnius, European Capital of Culture 2009, the Centennial of the restored Lithuania (2018) and reconstructions of urban public spaces, this study explores the new phenomenon of cultural policy controversy as an example of democratic cultural planning. Keywords: Cultural policy; national jubilees; pubilc spaces; Vilnius cultural planning.