Creative And Cultural Economy Series 2 Mapping The .

2   The Creative IndustriesBefore exploring the toolkit in detail, thecreative industries/creative economyconcept will be discussed, and thereasons why it has become increasinglyprominent in economic debatesexamined.2.1 The Creative Industries in BritainThe term ‘creative industries’ originatedin the mid-to-late 1990s and wasfirst taken up at a national level bythe UK’s government. The conceptwas an attempt to change the termsof the debate about the value ofarts and culture. While the arts weresupported to some degree or otherby most governments, they tendedto be seen as marginal to economiclife and dependent on public subsidy.Advocates of the creative industriesidea believed that this was too narrowa view – the totality of economicactivity stemming from creativity andculture, including their commercialforms, needed to be considered tounderstand their true contribution. Thisactivity included not just the traditionalart forms, such as theatre, music andfilm, but service businesses such asadvertising (which sell their creativeskills mostly to other businesses),manufacturing processes that feedinto cultural production, and the retailof creative goods. It was argued thatthe industries with their roots in cultureand creativity were an important andgrowing source of jobs and wealthcreation.14The adoption of the creativeindustries concept was very muchassociated with the election of theNew Labour government in 1997 andthe creation of the, then Departmentfor Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS),now Department for Culture, Olympics,Media and Sport (DCOMS), whichbuilt upon the functions of the earlierDepartment of National Heritage. Oneof the new department’s first acts wasto set up the Creative Industries TaskForce, which was responsible for thelandmark Creative Industries MappingDocument in 1998 and a follow-upreport in 2001.The 1998 mapping documentwas the first systematic attempt todefine and measure the creativeindustries. It was designed both tocollect data on the industries and topromote a deeper understanding ofthe sector by telling its story in a waythat politicians, journalists, investors,academics and government officialscould immediately understand. Itrevealed, to the surprise of some,just how economically significant thecreative industries were. It calculatedthat they accounted for almost a millionjobs and 4 per cent of GDP in Britain,and earned 7.5bn from exports. Italso showed, though, that the sectorwas polarised between a myriad ofvery small firms and sole traders and ahandful of very large, often multinationalcompanies.Creative and Cultural Economy series 2 – Mapping the Creative Industries: A Toolkit15

The idea of the creativeindustries soon started to catch on as itwas seen as encapsulating a truth aboutBritain’s changing economic landscape.In particular, the definition adoptedby the DCMS and the list of creativeindustries derived from it soon becameinfluential.The DCMS regards the creativeindustries as: ‘those activities whichhave their origin in individual creativity,skill and talent and which have apotential for wealth and job creationthrough the generation and exploitationof intellectual property1.’In its first mapping document in1998, the DCMS went on to define thefollowing industries as creative: AdvertisingIn Britain, employment in advertising,which includes marketing and somepublic relations activities, is dominatedby multinational agencies, and is heavilycentred on London: it and New York arewidely regarded as the capitals of theadvertising world. The London-basedcommunications group, WPP, is theworld’s largest by revenue, employingalmost 140,000 people in more than100 countries. ArchitectureLike many creative industries, thearchitecture sub-sector is made up ofa handful of big firms and a very largenumber of small ones. The sub-sector’sfortunes are closely linked to those ofthe construction industry. A numberof British architects have achievedinternational reputations, includingNorman Foster, Richard Rogers andDavid Chipperfield. Art and antiques marketThis sub-sector includes dealersand auctioneers of antique jewellery,16paintings, sculpture, furniture, maps,drawings and prints. In Britain, mostsuch businesses are small but some,notably Sotheby’s and Christie’s, areinternationally important. CraftsThe DCMS includes textiles, ceramics,wood, metal, glass, graphic and leathercrafts in this category. Businessesin this field are mostly tiny: 75 percent are sole traders. The majority ofcraftworkers are women and, perhapssurprisingly, are mainly based in urbanareas. DesignThis sub-sector is hard to assessas much of it is hidden within otherindustries. The DCMS therefore lookedat design consultancies and designersworking in industry. It found that 70 percent of British design companies wereactive abroad. London in particular hasa strong reputation in this field, basedon its excellent design schools. Designer FashionFashion design is a relatively smallsub-sector, but is highly integrated intothe international market – even smallfashion businesses look to export theirproducts. Britain’s fashion schools havehelped train numerous internationallyrenowned designers, from John Gallianoto Stella McCartney. Film and videoThis sub-sector includes filmproduction, distribution and exhibition.Although the UK has a number ofsuccessful home-grown producers,such as Working Title, the Hollywoodstudios dominate the British market.The number of films produced in Britain,and their box-office returns, fluctuatesconsiderably from year to year. Interactive leisure softwareThis sub-sector principally consistsof computer and video games, butalso includes some educational andreference material. British gamingfirms have a reputation for innovation,but many of the games they developare sold by foreign-owned softwarepublishers. DMA Design, a Scottish firmresponsible for the initial developmentof the Grand Theft Auto series ofgames, is now ultimately owned byTake-Two, an American publisher. MusicThis includes both live and recordedmusic, music publishing and theadministration of music copyright.Britain excels in most forms of music,from rock and pop to classical, and itsconsumers spend more per head onmusic than almost any other country.EMI, one of the music industry’s ‘majors’,is based in London. Performing ArtsTheatre, dance, ballet, musicals andopera performances all fall into thiscategory. These art forms usuallydepend on a mix of public subsidy andprivate ticket sales and funding. Someparts of the sub-sector are nonethelessbig revenue earners: London’s West Endtheatre, with its wide variety of musicalsand plays, is a major tourist attraction. PublishingThe publishing of books, newspapers,magazines and electronic informationis one of the largest employers amongthe creative industries. The widespreaduse of English internationally meansthat book publishing in particular is aglobally connected industry. Software and Computer ServicesThe biggest creative industry of allin the UK is software and computerservices. It covers the creation,production and supply of toolsand applications and of softwareproducts, including web design. Thelarge majority of employment in thissub-sector is based outside London.American multinationals tend todominate in this field, but some Britishcompanies do well in niche markets,including Autonomy and Sage inbusiness software. Television and radioThis sub-sector covers all publicservice, commercial, cable and satelliteTV and radio, including the productionand broadcasting of programmes. TheBBC dominates the British market, butmany independent companies havedevised formats which have beensuccessfully sold abroad. Who Wantsto Be A Millionaire?, which has beenshown in more than 100 countries,was developed by the independentcompany, Celador.The DCMS’s definition and list ofthe creative industries both provokedconsiderable debate. It has beenargued, for example, that almost all newproducts have elements of creativityand intellectual property embeddedwithin them. Separating off a handfulof industries and labelling them as‘creative’ is, according to this view,rather arbitrary.More specific criticisms of thelist have also been made. The inclusionof the computer software sub-sectorhas often been questioned. It is a largeemployer in many parts of Britain, yetmuch of it consists of conventionalbusiness software and consultancyrather than the more creative elementssuch as computer games developmentCreative and Cultural Economy series 2 – Mapping the Creative Industries: A Toolkit17

or interactive media. The presence ofthe antiques trade on the DCMS list hasalso been challenged, on the groundsthat there is no fresh act of creationinvolved, merely the retail of preexisting ones.Although some minoradjustments have been made to thelist in response to these and othercriticisms, the 1998 definition isstill essentially the one used by theDCMS today. It is often used by othercountries as the basis for developingtheir own definition.The idea of the creativeindustries as set out in the DCMSmapping documents was quicklyembraced not just by Britain’s nationalgovernment but also by its cities,regions and local government, partlyencouraged by the work of the DCMS’sRegional Issues Working Group3 . Ahost of initiatives and programmes waslaunched by many public bodies, and‘creative’ became a new economicdevelopment buzzword. At one time orother in the last decade, for instance,the creative industries have beena priority sector for all of England’sregions. This enthusiasm coincidedwith sharp rises in employment in thecreative industries in Britain in the late1990s, which lent weight to the newmodel.As time has gone on, however, ithas increasingly been recognised thatthe creative industries cannot be seenin isolation. They have a number ofimportant, wider dimensions, including: adding value to other industries,notably through design, advertising andbranding being major employers of highlyskilled people, thus being part of the18‘knowledge economy’ – that part ofthe economy which employs graduatetalent contributing to the regeneration oftowns and cities connecting and working with furtherand higher education bringing communities and peopletogether through shared experiences.In 2006, the UK governmentformally adopted the term ‘creativeeconomy’ to capture this sense ofthe wider contribution of the creativeindustries to economic and social life.This toolkit is concerned with mappingthe creative industries themselves, somany of these broader connectionsand relationships fall outside its scope.Nevertheless, these connections aresignificant, and might well be thesubject of further research once aninitial mapping exercise is complete4 .The timeline on the right gives asense of the way in which the creativeindustries concept has developed andbeen translated into evidence andpolicy in the UK since 1997.The decision to produce the firstCreative Industries Mapping Documentin 1998 turned out to be a momentousone. It was the first systematic attemptanywhere to measure the creativeindustries on a national scale. It drewattention to a sector which, with its mixof technology and a long and complexcultural heritage, is unlike any othersector of the economy.Although the mapping documentfocused just on the creative industries,it was the trigger for a series ofdevelopments which have rippled outacross the British economy, leading toKey events in the evolution of the creative industries concept and policiesCreative Britainreport 2008Creative IndustriesEconomic Estimates firstpublished 20022nd DCMS CreativeIndustries MappingDocument 2001Creative EconomyProgramme 2005-07British Council’s CreativeIndustries (now Economy)Unit set up 19991997 DCMS established1st DCMS CreativeIndustries MappingDocument 1998Establishment ofCreative Industries TaskForce 1998DCMS Regional IssuesWorking Group set up1999Creative Londonlaunched 20042001Digital Britainreport 20092005(London) Mayor’sCommission on CreativeIndustries 2002WIPO establishesCreative IndustriesDivision 2005UN’s Creative EconomyReport 2008‘Creative economy’ termformally adopted by UKgovernment 2006Department for Culture, Olympics, Media and Sport (previously dcms)Since the publication of the mapping documents in 1998 and 2001, theDepartment for Culture has continued to carry out research into the creativeindustries. From 2002 onwards it has produced annual Creative IndustriesEconomic Estimates bulletins, which provide a detailed analysis of the creativeindustries in Britain and are available online. The most recent figures show thatthe creative industries in Britain employed more than 1.1 million people (in2008), and accounted for 16.6bn of exports and 6.2% of GVA (in 2007). TheDCOMS has built up considerable expertise in mapping, and is happy to shareits knowledge with other countries. It is particularly interested in encouragingmore accurate comparisons between countries. If you want to learn more aboutthe DCOMS’s work, or wish to explore the idea of collaborating on developingcomparative data, the British Council can help facilitate such discussions.Creative and Cultural Economy series 2 – Mapping the Creative Industries: A Toolkit19

a greater recognition of the importanceof creativity across the economy andsociety as a whole. It has led to a richerunderstanding of the creative sectorand has helped to shape policy both inthe UK and internationally.The work of the Regional IssuesWorking Group helped encouragelower-level tiers of government inBritain to take up the idea early on.In 2002 London’s then mayor, KenLivingstone, established a Commissionon the creative industries, to assesstheir value and potential contributionto the city’s economy. As a worldcity, London’s creative industries areunusually strong; in 2001 they werefound to be second only to the financialsector in importance to London’seconomy. The Commission led to theestablishment of Creative London,which aimed both to promote the city’screative industries and to use them topursue the mayor’s broader ambitionsof regenerating some of the more rundown parts of the city and enhancingLondon’s brand.More recently, governmentstrategies have increasingly beenconcerned with strengthening the20economic performance of the creativeindustries. Between 2005 and 2007the DCMS launched a major researchproject, the Creative EconomyProgramme, which resulted in 2008 inCreative Britain 5, a report which set outa support programme for the creativesector that touched on education, skills,innovation and intellectual property. Afurther landmark was the publication ofDigital Britain 6 in 2009, which sets outthe country’s ambitions for the digitalage. One striking aspect of the DigitalBritain report is its focus on the creativeindustries: it is evidence of the extentto which the digital and creative sectorsare merging due to technologicalchange. Indeed, many public bodiesin Britain now refer to these two as asingle economic grouping.Britain’s example, then, as thefirst country to take up the idea of thecreative industries, is a helpful one toexplore. It has a wealth of experienceon which to draw. However, it is byno means the only country to haveadopted the concept. The followingsection discusses the creative industriesin their international context.2.2 The Creative Industries:International ContextThe UK’s decision to produce the firstCreative Industry Mapping Documentin 1998 turned out to be an importantmilestone internationally too. Thedefinition and list of industries itcontained were soon noticed and takenup, particularly in East Asia. Hong Kong,Singapore, Taiwan, Korea and China alldeveloped analyses of their creativeindustries, based to a greater or lesserextent on the UK model. In most cases,the model has been adapted to fit localneeds. Singapore, for instance, hasproduced a classification frameworkwhich groups the creative industriesunder three broad headings: arts andculture, design, and media.Other parts of the world, notablyAustralia, New Zealand and Scandinavia,took up the notion too, thoughsometimes with significant differencesfrom the UK’s approach. Sweden, forexample, talks about the ‘experienceeconomy’ which, while including thecreative industries, also embraces thelikes of the restaurant business. In India,the definition includes lifestyle productsand services, like yoga and Ayurvedicmedicine.Creative industries mappingexercises have now been carried outin many parts of the world. The BritishCouncil has been involved in such workin Colombia, Estonia, Indonesia andSouth Africa, among others.International agencies,too, have adopted the idea of thecreative industries or the creativeeconomy. UNCTAD (the UN’s trade anddevelopment body) has led the way,being the lead agency responsiblefor the UN’s Creative Economy Report2008 7.UNCTAD notes in its report that‘the creative economy has becomea topical issue of the internationaleconomic and development agenda,calling for informed policy responsesin both developed and developingcountries 8’ . UNCTAD statistics reveal itaccounts for a significant and growingslice of the world’s economy. TheCreative Economy Report 2008 quotessome impressive figures for the size ofthe creative industries. It calculates theyaccount for: 3.4 per cent of world trade (in 2005) 424 billion of exports (in 2005),growing at an average annual rate of8.7 per cent between 2000 and 2005.Source: UN Creative Economy Report 2008, p5Singapore’s classification framework for the creative industriesArts and culture PhotographyVisual artsPerforming artsArts and antiquestrade, CraftsDesign SoftwareAdvertisingArchitectureInterior designGraphic designIndustrial designFashionCreative and Cultural Economy series 2 – Mapping the Creative Industries: A ToolkitMedia PublishingTV & radioDigital mediaFilm and video21

The creative industries areimportant both to developed nationsand developing ones. They matter toricher countries because they dependfor their success on the creativity oftheir workforces and, as such, theircompetitiveness relies less on pricethan on the quality and imagination oftheir work. In turn, this suggests thatthey are less likely to lose out to theprice-led competition which has causedmany manufacturing and service jobs tobe outsourced to emerging economies.However, the creative industriesalso offer potential benefits to emergingeconomies. These countries also oftenwish to move away from competingsolely on price, and are looking toidentify new sources of competitiveadvantage and cultural recognition.Creative businesses, driven as theyare by ideas and creativity, do notnecessarily need access to largesums of capital or natural resources.For countries with rich cultures anda pool of local creative talent, thecreative economy offers a way to buildeconomic value. The CommonwealthFoundation argues that for many of itssmaller members in particular, whichlack the capacity to exploit economiesof scale, the creative industries offerbetter prospects for growth than manyother sectors 9 .Organisation (WIPO), which has deviseda ‘copyright’ model that divides thecreative industries up into threecategories: core, interdependent andpartial copyright industries. This

14 Creative and Cultural economy series 2 – Mapping the Creative industries: a toolkit 15 Before exploring the toolkit in detail, the creative industries/creative economy concept will be discussed, and the reasons why it has become increasingly prominent in economic