Home Issues Articles Artistic creative clusters in Fra The Knowledge economy stresses the importance of localised knowledge as immaterial factor in the new competitive world. In this sense, creativity is considered to be a crucial element of our innovation capacity, while innovation is one of the main determinants of growth and competitiveness in modern economies.
However, the territorial dimension is not always given due attention. Indeed despite the emphasis put in the literature on the lack of uniform distribution of creativity throughout space, some analytical work appears to be still necessary regarding the patterns of distribution of different types of creative industries in France. Given the relation between culture and local development a particularly interesting creative industry is the artistic sector.
The initial hypothesis that the localisation of artistic industries is more concentrated than the localisation of total employment, has been confirmed,as shown for instance in Paris and its surrounding area.
The relevance of this paper is two-fold. Nowadays, knowledge is a crucial competitive element not only for companies but also for the territory in which they are located Lazzeroni, The OECD stated that local development should not be reduced to the modernisation of the export base but should also be based on the appropriate organisation of the relations between different actors at the local level.
At the same time, an important debate on the role of culture and creativity as central elements to local development is emerging in academic studies of urban and economic development Power and Scott, ; Ginsburgh and Throsby, ; European Commission, According to this idea, the European Commission established as the European Year of Creativity and Innovation in order to increase awareness of the relevance of making Europe more creative and innovative. Scott a highlights that cities have played a fundamental role as generators of cultural and economic activity.
