Prof. Dr. Dieter Haselbach on Innovation@Creative Industries conference

In a brief text, it is next to impossible to give justice to all the ideas that were exposed during a full conference day. So I want to highlight only a few threads that were going through the debate.

Although one may be critical to Richard Floridas main point that the economy follows creativity it still makes sense to ask, as did Senator Harald Wolf in his opening statement: How can a city foster innovation, how can it foster creativity? This far, Florida is right: Creativity is, indeed, a main source of economic development. The mechanism of growth in a market economy is, as Schumpeter stated as early as 1906, creative destruction, or, the creation of new combinations in the economy.

I want to summarise the conference findings in five points.

(1) What is the nature of creativity and innovation?

(2) What is the space of, and for, creativity and innovation?

(3) Which policies are available to foster creativity?

(4) Which action can be taken to foster innovation?

(5) What is the future of creativity going to be?

Ares Kalandides started with a useful definition. Creativity stands for new ideas and approaches. Innovation is the successful implementation of these ideas. Design paves the way from creativity to implementations. With this, the dilemma of any creativity policy is marked: How could one plan for something new? Only what is known can be planned. David Nordfors gave an interesting turn to this idea. For him, creativity is notabout new ideas, but it is the telling of new stories. This is close to Schumpeters new combinations. But Nordfors approach is richer: If creativity is in the (professional) telling of new stories then all sorts of new aspects can come into play. Consequently, Nordfors supports to merge industries and technology with the arts and humanities to make the most of creative impulses. Gesche Joost then provided a wonderful example of such a story when she stated that her design business was about developing user driven technologies. Of course, it is not. Technical devices are driven by companies that want to make a profit. But it is a good story to tell, and bringing the consumer in is a worthy cause indeed. Who tells the stories? There are stories from above, ideologies, and stories from below about empowerment or failure. But does this matter? We need good stories, and this is what creativity is about.

What is creativitys space? Maria Krautzberger presented a study on the spatial organisation of the creative industries in Berlin. The creative industries love cities. In particular, they love inner cities. In the light of these findings, the EU approach to utilise the creative industries for regional development, as a remedy for regional discrepancies, as reported by Dirk Ahner, does not sit easy.

What about a policy of creativity? The polity cannot bring about, steer, or make creativity. During the conference, many answers were given how to solve the paradox that, on the one hand, a creativity policy is needed and, on the other hand, making creativity isbeyond policys powers. What can policy do? It can provide for circumstances that support creative acts. Here are some of the answers that were given during the conference: A creativity policy can support creative networks (if they make economic sense), make a creative environment, provide for space for creatives (particular those who not yet economically successful), adjust bureaucratic regulations to the needs of creative people, rebalance the powers of technology and business with those of arts and humanities (for example: open research and development funds for non-technology-driven projects), allow for primadonnas (those strong minded, exhausting people that have so many good ideas). In other words: Allow. Deregulate. Be ready for the unexpected. This of course, is also the mantra of economic liberalism. Part of this was, if one listened closely, in the EU policies answer to the challenge of creativity. Of course, they state it in their language and that is the language of eurocracy. Interestingly, some important policy subjects were not discussed, if at all mentioned.

Currently, we are living through a severe economic crisis. What does the crisis do, what will it do with the creative industries? The last economic hiccup, the bursting of the internet bubble some years ago, had a strong impact here. For many years, growth was replaced by stagnation, if not decline. Another point missing was intellectual property, the field of copyright legislation. For many branches in the creative industries, digitalisation is a concern. In the digital age, intellectual property, the lifeblood of the creative industries, disappears. New solutions are needed to make property a again meaningful concept in this field.

Main parts of the session on action in innovation happened upstairs at a different meeting room. Up there, Berlin shared the experience it had gathered in creative industries policies for a wealth of sub-fields.

The projects presented downstairs also had lessons to teach: The living lab approach in Helsinki, city and economic development through closely administered experience building, demonstrated that bottom-up processes are needed for providing an environment in which creativity can bloom. Bottom-up processes often need a shielding hand from above. Stockholm reported the experience that bottom-up and top-down can be reconciled in creative industries development, but only with a lot of respect from both sides. Vilnius Republic of Uzupis is a living example on the powers of creatives in city development. Meeting places, periodic events, branding, in short: identity building, are supportive for creative industries development. Birminghams knowledge transfer partnerships work on the creative energy that comes from changing environments for productive people, from networking, from bridging worlds of experience, here: the worlds of industry and scholarship. The presentation from Tallinn showed that a well educated, innovate and young population, an administration with an easy hand on paperwork, and a pleasant environment with lots of WiFi access points makes a good starting point for creative things happening. This mirrors the spatial experience of Berlin reported earlier. Genghis Khan was successful in the art of war by shocking people. Aksel Kolstad from Oslo recommended for creative initiatives similar marketing approaches. Yet, it is very productive to know what the customers of culture want, what they do and what they wish. Volker Heller from Berlin reported on a project that is a great leap forward in cultural marketing research. A discussant had the idea that a tax office should be opened that caters particularly to the needs of young entrepreneurs. This might already meet the definition of a creative story. I feel the strong urge to suggest that this is a most splendid proposal.

As for the last topic of the conference, the future of creativity and creativity policy, the panel discussion provided some fine visions, indeed. The nature of creativity is to venture into unknown narratives. Likewise, the nature of the future is that it is yet unkown..

Yet, to conclude, maybe in the Creative Metropoles network, we are lucky in facilitating what is to come. It may help, if creativity finds its spaces, its policies, is supported by actions and projects.