Geography Reference
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involves more interaction, in which the visitor has an educational, emotional, social, and
participative interaction with the place, its living culture, and the people who live there.
(UNESCO 2006 , p. 2)
Such a key aspiration is achieved through specific marketable designations. The
UNESCO designations are summarized in Table 10.1 . It shows that Edinburgh is
one of the cities described as a City of Literature, whereas Santa Fe is a City of
Craft and Folk Art, and Shanghai is identified as one of the Cities of Design. This
list indicates that some towns and cities are now being defined by an authoritative
international body according to particular types of cultural activity, profiling spe-
cialisms within their urban economies. Yet the list has been criticised, as it is hard
to see how Milan and Paris especially were not designated in the Design categories,
and how other places get their designation over others. Nevertheless, the overall
goal of this programme is to make culture more accessible through a 'less museums,
more squares' approach to innovation and creativity, but one that also provides a
very useful branding tool for promotional strategies. The Creative City Network of
Canada (CCNC) provides another example of how culture and arts is appropriated
for urban development in a country. The network provides a forum for municipal
staff working on arts, culture and community development to share their expertise
and experience and develop tools for the community of practice in Canada.
The overarching assumption made by both of these networks is that the arts and
culture are important for urban vitality, and that cities have an internal creative
capacity that needs to be harnessed to make them more interesting and attractive
places. Similar ideas have underpinned the work of urban theorists such as Pe-
ter Hall ( 2000 ) who has argued that creativity is essential for urban and regional
economic development. Charles Landry ( 2006 ) has also suggested that the shift in
economic focus from “brawn to brain” provides new opportunities for cities to think
anew, although this does undervalue the creative abilities that existed in many an
industrial city that created new machines and products. Landry sees creative cities
as those that have the capacity to grow through harnessing their existing cultural
and social capital in new ways—a capital that goes beyond just the arts and cul-
tural sectors. Indeed Landry's original work ( 2000 ) maintains that creativity goes
beyond the economic to embrace all aspects of urban development, including its
governance. Rather than providing a solution to a particular economic problem,
creativity is seen as an approach to urban development. He argues that every city
has a latent internal creative capacity to facilitate growth and development through
inventiveness and inclusivity, so the convergence of innovation and creativity can
be facilitated through enlightened governance (Landry 2006 ). Drawing on the ear-
lier work of Tornqvist ( 1983 ) and Andersson ( 1985 ), Landry suggests that a creative
institutional and economic context is critical to the emergence of an urban cultural
milieu that enables cities to grow successfully. Bayliss ( 2007 ) has discussed this at
length in relation to the city of Copenhagen where he argues that public policy has
provided a favourable framework to facilitate, rather than impose or import, creativ-
ity. This is in direct contrast to policymakers in other places who have interpreted
the work of writers such as Richard Florida ( 2002a ) in a more prescriptive way. This
has led to the suggestion that there are two approaches to providing the necessary
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