Creative exports

Abstract

The article draws on research and policy experience surrounding the development of a cultural industries agenda for St. Petersburg. It tries to explain the reason for some of the resistance to the “internationalization” of the cultural industries agenda. It suggests, first, that this agenda is implicated in tensions around “modernization”; second, that the United Kingdom's “independents‐led” ’ approach might have real limitations in other contexts; and third, that the idea that cities are able to compete within an ever more global cultural market might ignore some very real problems faced by the “losers” or “outsiders” in this process.

Keywords:

• cultural and creative industries
• Russia and transition
• globalising cultural markets
• local and urban studies

Notes

Throughout this article I use the term “cultural industries”. I am aware that the term “creative industries” is now widely used in the United Kingdom, Australia and North America; and we did begin to use the term in the Petersburg project as having a less dissonant meaning in Russian. However, not wishing to get involved in the terminological debate, I do have grounds for preferring “cultural” over “creative” (O’Connor 2004a; and see Hesmondhalgh and Pratt's introduction and Garnham's article in this issue); and until recently the term “cultural industries” was in common use.