 It was standing room only on January 25th at a Monieson Centre seminar on The Creative Economy given by Dr. Betsy Donald, Queen’s Geography. With about 60 attendees, plus two remote sites linked in by videoconference, it was abundantly clear this is an enduringly hot topic. In fact, the subject proved attractive not only to professors and grad students from planning, business and geography, but also to municipal economic developers, consultants, provincial and federal government officials, CFDCs and sustainability activists.
This was the first of five Creative Economy seminars hosted monthly this winter by The Monieson Centre and sponsored by the Prince Edward/Lennox and Addington CFDC.
The Creative Economy (CE) is an idea, a model and a field of intellectual inquiry that has stimulated a vast array of academic and policy literature and critiques, and provides ample content for semester-long graduate courses. Remarkably, Betsy managed to compress all of that into a succinct, one-hour presentation. I can’t cover all of her points in this brief blog, but want to share some of the key points I took away from the seminar.
- CE has a long academic/policy history in local/regional economic development, centered around the question: Why do some regions flourish and not others?
- CE inquiry extends far beyond Richard Florida’s (and Kevin Stolarick’s) high profile research on the creative class and the 3Ts: technology, talent and tolerance
- “Creativity” is fundamentally subjective, “fuzzy” and ambiguous: selecting certain measures of creativity can lead to potentially misguided conclusions about a place
- Flawed CE policies include investing only in cosmetic aspects of creativity or typical creative infrastructures (theatres, art districts) at the expense of other infrastructure investments
- Diversity and tolerance are not the same; having many ethnic restaurants does not necessarily reflect an absence of ethnic discrimination
- Rural areas and smaller cities may not appear “creative” or “cool” using 3T indicators, but can still be hotbeds of creativity and growth
- An alternative CE model could consider a place’s livability and sustainability, valuing relationships of trust and proximity, green space and instant recreation (à la Jane Jacobs), secure livelihoods, inclusiveness and ecological sustainability
[For more on CE measures appropriate for smaller urban centers, check out Nathaniel Lewis and Betsy Donald’s new article in Urban Studies, “A New Rubric for ‘Creative City’ Potential in Canada’s Smaller Cities.”]
Dr. Donald shared perspectives from her extensive research on Ontario’s “creative food” sector, linking it to the Fresh Food Revolution now spearheaded in the U.S. by Michelle Obama. The creative food economy features a high level of innovation geared towards better nutrition and taste, but also a lower carbon footprint, fewer synthetic ingredients and, ultimately, more pleasure. We have previously reported on Prince Edward County’s impressive achievements in “green economic transformation” highlighted by its award-winning artisan cheese companies and exceptional web-marketing savvy.
Some additional, excellent points arose in a discussion period following the seminar:
- The Monieson Centre is working to connect rural stakeholders in Eastern Ontario with salient information on the Creative Economy through various vehicles, including this blog, as well as a database of community-based reports on CE.
- Growth in the creative economy has been encouraging, but it will not offset losses in manufacturing, which is still a critical sector to support, especially highly creative, innovative and clean types of manufacturing (“advanced manufacturing”). Professor Susan Christopherson at Cornell University has recently published some fascinating research on “phoenix” industries, advanced technology sectors that have “risen from the ashes” of older, traditional manufacturing. See her recent article in Democracy Journal, or listen to a Monieson Centre lecture she gave this past November.
- Dan Taylor, Prince Edward County’s creative economy “guru”, encouraged seminar participants to take a look at “Canada’s Creative Corridor” an August 2009 report by the Martin Prosperity Institute available on the PELA CFDC website, or in our Research Database.
Dr. Donald’s lecture will be posted on our YouTube page in the coming weeks. Also, be sure to mark your calendars for our next Creative Economy Seminar:
The Rural Creative Economy: Issues and Challenges, February 16, 2010
Presenter: Dr. Kevin Stolarick, Martin Prosperity Institute
Time: 12 - 1 pm
Location: 304 Goodes Hall
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