Rethinking the Creative City

Abstract

This article engages with the current research and debate about the creative city and the importance of cultural infrastructure in contemporary cities. It argues that much of the focus has been around the investment of cities in specific regeneration projects or flagship developments rather than addressing the nature of the infrastructure, networks and agents engaging in the city’s cultural development. The complexity theory and its associated principles can provide a new understanding of the connection between the urban space and the systems of local cultural production and consumption. Drawing on interviews with creative practitioners in the North East region of England, the paper argues that the cultural development of a city is a complex adaptive system. This finding has implications for both policy-makers and academic research. It emphasises the importance of micro interactions and networks between creative practitioners, the publicly supported cultural sector and the cultural infrastructure of the city.