M-AM424 Advanced Seminars in the Arts, Cultural and Creative

Industries Policies for the cultural and creative industries

(or ‘sector’)Part 2: 20 Sep 2021

Last Week - recap

• Are policies for the creative industries simply economic or business-stimulus policies? (eg. taxation policy, interest rates, trade agreements)• Or, are the creative and cultural industries a distinctive ‘industrial’ sector with

particular characteristics which require specific policy approaches?• Which ministry or ministries oversee the ‘creative and cultural industries’? Does

responsibility for the creative and cultural sectors reside in different ministries in your country?

Some common policy approaches in the CCI

• ‘Creative Cities’ policies (attract investment, talent, tourism, branding, develop infrastructure and a ‘creative milieu’ which generates added value to the economy)• Link to urban planning (eg. creative placemaking policies)• Development of ‘Creative Clusters’ & ‘Hubs’ (link to ‘creative city’ policy too)• Encouraging ‘Creative entrepreneurship’

There has been the rise of a particular ‘discourse’ around the concept of creative cities, dominated by terms like “innovation”, “entrepreneurship”, “clusters”, “networks”.And sometimes it is connected to, or confused with, urban regeneration discourses and policies, eg. a culture-led urban regeneration policy could involve developing new creative clusters.

• So we should look at what is the main purpose of the policy: is the motivation to revitalize a district economically and socially? To drive economic growth and develop a particular economic sector (the CCI)? To attract tourism? Who is the policy for?

• In other words, policies for the creative industries can also be leveraged for additional benefits to the broader urban landscape (eg. beautify a city), and for social benefit.

Creative CitiesIn Semester 1, we talked about ‘global cities’ and competition among cities; and how a city that is branded as being ’creative’ gains competitive advantage.

We also looked briefly at Richard Florida’s idea that the new ’creative class’ (who include scientists, engineers, academics, finance specialists etc. as well as creative people), are the ones with the potential to supercharge new economic growth in a city through the generation of “new ideas, new technology and/or creative content.”

ØAn economic labour policy based on keyfactors of the 3T’s – talent, technology, tolerance.

ØAttract the “creative” class to drive economic growth for your city or renew your city’s economic life

We also looked at the ideas of Charles Landry, one of the first people to use the term ‘creative city’, who saw a creative city as a place where local cultural and creative resources are applied by city governments to address urban problems.-Landry’s ideas emerged at a time (early 1990s) when many cities in Europe were experiencing de-industrialization and economic uncertainty.

Cities seem more likely to be hotbeds of creativity because of their density.Ø ”some of the centres for creative environments can be found in

densely populated metropolitan regions like London, New York, Los Angeles and many other advanced post- industrial cities” (Pumhiran 5).

Ø Let’s take a closer look at why creativity seems to thrive in cities rather than rural / provincial districts.

“Cities are the most complex artefact created by human beings and their most significant investment. They make civilizations manifest. They drive cultures, they embody their values, they anchor identity and are crucial to development” (Landry, “Creative cities and sustainability” 51)- Charles Landry, “Creative cities and sustainability,” Enabling Crossovers: Good

Practices in the Creative Industries, Asia-Europe Foundation, 2014, p. 51

“Cities are viewed as the creative environment that helps firms develop innovative products. Agglomeration in cities also generates multiple spillover effects, breeding learning processes that favour the creation, diffusion, and rapid adoption of new ideas.”- Lee & Rodriguez-Pose, “Innovation in creative cities: challenging the established views”, 2016

http://voxeu.org/article/innovation-and-creative-cities-new-evidence

“Skills, talent and expertise cluster in them as do trade, commerce and markets.”- Landry, “Creative cities and sustainability” 51

A theoretical basis for the link between cities and creativity:

Peter Hall studied the cities & civilizations of Athens, London, Florence, Vienna, Paris, Berlin in his book Cities in Civilization.

Hall’s paper ”Creative cities and economic development” (2000) discusses the theoretical basis for linking cities and creativity, and consequently the flowering of civilization:

• What drives the creative individual to relocate to cities (the “apparent misfit”)• The idea of an “artistic milieu” which describes “the general state of manners and

mind” in a particular place and time (adopting ideas from the 19th-century philosopher Taine)• A societal “paradigm shift” (breaks in ideology, or scientific models of explanation

that lead to experimentation, innovation and the new)• Disruption - “structural instability” or a “genuine uncertainty about the future

within the general scientific and technical environment” (p. 644 – 645).

The environment (or pre-conditions) of the civilized city

• “structural instability”• Large size• Trading cities• Patronage exists• High-culture exists, fueled also by the ‘bourgeois class’• Migrants from different places: “renewal of the creative bloodstream” (Hall 646)

Hall also adapts the idea of the ‘creative milieu’ (adopted from Tornqvist and Andersson), which incorporates the ideas of social and knowledge networks and associations, information-sharing, expertise, memory, and diversity of people and activities.

(you can try to relate this to Landry’sidea of the creative milieu: how similar or different are their descriptions?)

“Agglomeration in cities also generates multiple spillover effects, breeding learning processes that favour the creation, diffusion, and rapid adoption of new ideas.”- Lee & Rodriguez-Pose

Landry’s definition of ’creative milieu’:

“a place – either a cluster of buildings, a part of a city, a city as a whole or a region – that contains the necessary preconditions in terms of ‘hard’ and ‘soft’ infrastructure to generate a flow of ideas and inventions. Such a milieu is a physical setting where a critical mass of entrepreneurs, intellectuals social activists, artists, administrators, power brokers or students can operate in an open-minded, cosmopolitan context and where face to face interaction creates new ideas, artefacts, products, services and institutions and as a consequence contributes to economic success” (quoted in Pumhiran 5).

This Photo by Unknown Author is licensed under CC BY-SA

Landry’s definition of ’creative milieu’: ‘hard’ and ‘soft’ infrastructure

• place-based: the physical environment is important to facilitate the flow of ideas and innovation. • It also has some intangible attributes: “ ‘Soft infrastructure’, on the other hand,

consists of “associative structures and social networks, connections and human interactions that underpins and encourages the flow of ideas between individuals and institutions” (quoted in Pumhiran 5).

CLUSTERING: CREATIVE CLUSTERS

Image from: https://creativeconomy.britishcouncil.org/guide/hubs-clusters-and-regions/

CLUSTERS: a concept from business

“A cluster is a geographic concentration of related companies, organizations, and institutions in a particular field that can be present in a region, state, or nation … they raise a company's productivity, which is influenced by local assets and the presence of like firms, institutions, and infrastructure that surround it.”- From the Institute for Strategy and Competitiveness – Harvard Business School

http://www.isc.hbs.edu/competitiveness-economic-development/frameworks-and-key-concepts/Pages/clusters.aspx

The concept of ‘clustering’ for competitive advantage arose from management theorist Michael Porter who wrote The Competitive Advantage of Nations (1990)

CLUSTERING

• Clusters are not only clusters of similar companies, or a grouping of firms that produce things. They can extend “downstream” across the value chain to include distribution channels, firms in related businesses, and governmental and other institutions ”such as universities, standards-setting agencies, think tanks, training providers, and trade associations—that provide specialized training, education, information, research, and technical support.” (from Institute for Strategy and Competitiveness – Harvard Business School)

• Clusters include private firms, public and government institutions, non-profit enterprises, both small and large firms / organisations.

A classic example of a ‘cluster’

From Harvard Business School, Institute of Strategy & Competitivenesshttp://www.isc.hbs.edu/competitiveness-economic-development/frameworks-and-key-concepts/Pages/clusters.aspx

Place-based

Competitive advantage of clusters (Porter)

1. Productivity advantage: access to knowledge, specialists, technology, labour.

2. Promotes innovation: there is means to quickly leverage on new opportunities; knowledge-sharing and research leads to innovation.

3. Promotes “new business formation” (Flew 23) because of access to knowledge, labour, financing.

Purpose-built cluster: Singapore’s Mediapolis

A creative industry cluster is not like the California wine cluster which is geographically-specific (and climate-specific) – meaning that any city or region can set up a creative industry cluster.

Mediapolis@ one-north

Tenants include:• Infinite Frameworks (studio &

production)• Globecast Asia (media services)• Discovery Networks• Namco Bandai (game company,

Japan)• Haymarket media • M&C Saatchi (advertising)• Mediacorp

Clusters: birth, development & decline

• Clusters may develop organically or may originate due to a particular environmental factor (eg. Climate)• They may be purpose-built• However, clusters may also decline (eg. the car industry in Detroit)

because of changing global economic factors

Clusters applied to the cultural and creative industries

3 kinds of models:1. Building cultural districts: Could be part of a culture-led urban regeneration policy: revitalize under-developed or derelict districts, stimulate tourism (city branding), attract creative class. Focused on the ‘traditional’ cultural industries that have been publicly-funded for a long time.

West Kowloon Cultural District, Hong Kong: a massive real-estate development project!

Clusters applied to the cultural and creative industries

2. Repurposing buildings and districts, encourage creative entrepreneurship and linking producers and consumers: re-purposing old or abandoned buildings and encouraging creative businesses and services (including arts, F&B) there- May be done through zoning and urban planning; tax incentives, city planning- Could start organic and ground-up, with government intervention at a later stage- Includes “production” (eg. design firmsand “consumption” (consumers) activities- “Hubs”- Could leverage on heritage appeal of the buildings

Huashan 1914 Creative Park, Taipei

Clusters applied to the cultural and creative industries

3. The industry park model: purpose-built industrial clusters growing a particular segment (eg. media, design, videogames, etc.)- Generally ”production”oriented.

Mediapolis@One-North, Singapore

CCI clusters & urban planning

There may be creative clusters that emerge organically, from ground-up activities of entrepreneurs, small businesses and individual creative practitioners.

Saigon Outcast, a ”creative hub” in Vietnam: https://creativehubs.vn/saigon-outcast-h467

CCI clusters & urban planning

There may be urban planning policies that leverage on characteristics or existing activities in a district, or connected to urban regeneration and renewal -eg. government support of a ground-up cultural or creative district – for example, an area with a strong music ecology. Governments may be motivated here by the desire to stimulate tourism, especially “creative tourism”, and these districts are primarily about consumption, not production.

Haji Lane, Singapore. Image from: https://honeykidsasia.com/haji-lane-with-kids/

Critique of creative clusters approach: • it is easier to focus on the ‘hard’ infrastructure; the ‘soft’ infrastructure is less

well-understood• Purpose-built cultural clusters or creative districts/ parks may be top-down and

do not take into consideration the pre-existing cultural and social resources in the district• Focus of the policy, or 2 different value orientations: is it economic-centric or

cultural-centric?

From Smith and Warfield, “The Creative City: a Matter of Values”, in Creative Cities, Cultural Clusters and Local Economic Development, edited by P. Cooke and L. Lazzaretti, Elgar, 2008. Reprinted in Research Papers in Economics, https://econpapers.repec.org/RePEc:elg:eechap:12738_12.

'Creative Cities’ as a concept is not well-defined• Is it about the city itself being creative, or a space that makes its

population feel creative and inspired – ”emotionally satisfying environments”? (David Yencken, “The Creative City” essay from 1988 )

• Does it describe an economic development policy? An urban planning policy? • Is it about using a ‘creative city’ approach to address urban social

issues? (Landry)• Is it about using the creative and cultural industries and practitioners

as ‘tools’ to achieve other goals? (eg. urban regeneration, tourism)

The Creative City infrastructure?

“As the city is increasingly a site of consumption, and a site of cultural, creative and services production, rather than of industrial production or ‘9-to-5’ office work, the leisure, entertainment, hospitality and tourism sectors are increasingly important elements of the ‘night-time economy’ …”- Flew, ”Beyond Ad-hocery”

A multi-pronged approach: top-down and ground-up

“The concept of ‘soft infrastructure’ is a reminder that networks are never simply technological, or clusters simply institutional or economic; both are embedded in systems of ongoing interaction among institutions in communities, frequently linked in physical and interpersonal rather than virtual terms. It is also an indicator of the importance of creativity, not simply in the development of new products, services or IT code, but in the development of a dynamic city or region.”- Flew, “Beyond Ad-hocery”

Roberta Comunian, “Rethinking the Creative City: the Role of Complexity, Networks and Interactions in the Urban Creative Economy,” p. 1174.

Roberta Comunian, “Rethinking the Creative City: the Role of Complexity, Networks and Interactions in the Urban Creative Economy,” p. 1174.

Dynamics in the ”creative milieu” – example of Montreal

Patrick Cohendet et al, “Places, Spaces and the Dynamics of Creativity”, Regional Studies 47 (10): 1- 14, January 2012. (On the learning portal)

Cohendet et al argue that in clusters, it is not only the existence of formal structures (institutions, agencies, companies) that matter, there is an “informal world” that is “deeply rooted in the local milieu” that is equally important.

Dynamics in the ”creative milieu” – example of Montreal

Cohendet et al look at the culture cluster of Montreal to see how the formal and informal worlds interrelate. They consider not only those genres or products we usually view to be ‘commercial’, but also genres are more ‘cultural’ and perhaps locally-specific (eg. Circus, visual art)

The clusters comprise many small organisations and smaller players, as well as large institutions and companies – all networked to one another

Dynamics in the ”creative milieu” – example of Montreal

Most importantly, they identify distinctive creative/artistic spaces which explain and illustrate how creative products are brought ”to market”:

• The “underground” – where creativity first emerges• The “upper ground” – the institutional structures, companies, etc where the

creativity is consolidated and brought to market• The “middle ground” - the networks and sites which link between the underground

and middle ground, eg. Festivals

References• Cohendet, P., D. Grandadam, L. Simon. “Places, Spaces and the Dynamics of Creativity.”

Paper presented at the International Conference on Organizational Learning, Knowledge and Capabilities (OLKC), Amsterdam, The Netherlands, 26-28 April 2009.

• Cohendet, P., D. Grandadam, L. Simon. “Rethinking Urban Creativity: Lessons from Barcelona and Montreal.” City, Culture and Society, 2011, vol. 2, pp. 151 – 158.

• Comunian, Roberta. “Rethinking the Creative City: The Role of Complexity, Networks and Interactions in the Urban Creative Economy.” Urban Studies, 2011, vol. 48 no. 6, pp. 1157 – 1179.

• Flew, Terry. “Beyond Ad-hocery: Defining Creative Industries.” Paper presented to Cultural Sites, Cultural Theory, Cultural Policy, The Second International Conference on Cultural Policy Research, Te Papa, Wellington, New Zealand, 23-26 January 2002.

• Florida, Richard. The Rise of the Creative Class. Basic Books, 2002.

References

• Hall, Peter. “Creative Cities and Economic Development,” Urban Studies, vol. 37 no. 4, 2000, pp. 639 – 649.

• Meanjin, David. ”The Creative City.” Meanjin Quarterly, Summer 1988. https://meanjin.com.au/essays/the-creative-city/

• Landry, Charles. The Creative City. Earthscan Publications, 2000. • Pumhiran, Nolapot, “Reflection on the Disposition of Creative Milieu and its Implications for

Cultural Clustering Strategies”, paper at the International Society of City and Regional Planners (ISOCARP) Congress, 2005. http://www.isocarp.net/Data/case_studies/682.pdf

• Smith, R. and Warfield, K. “The Creative City: A Matter of Values,” in Creative Cities, Cultural Clusters and Local Economic Development, edited by P. Cooke and L. Lazzaretti, Elgar, 2008. Reprinted in Research Papers in Economics, https://econpapers.repec.org/RePEc:elg:eechap:12738_12.