The cities project conference: Creativity and partnerships for cities urban regeneration

Neil McInroyChief Executive

Centre for Local Economic Strategies

Resilient Cities: the Role of the Creative Economy

What is CLES?

Independent UK based charity. No commercial sponsor or government grants

Economic development but with social fairness and within limits of environment

Most of work in UK, but also increasingly international

Established 1986 Planners, geographers, local government, environmental scientists, economists

Hybrid; research, consultancy, Local government members

What is CLES?

Run online magazine: NewStart

Climate change, peak oil, peak water, peak soil, energy insecurity

Places need to adapt, new ways of sustainable living

Ageing and migration

Challenge to find the public resources

Economic turbulence

Global interdependency but local economies matter more

Development of place is getting harder.

The need for creativity: A new era for place making

Challenging times!

New economies

Importance of capital

Networks

Creativity and Innovation

The ingredients to success

The I Ching (Classic chinese text)

‘Look at what connects and separates people’

=

Exploring Ill health, deprivation and the economy

Source: London Health Observatory

Need to work at success?

GDP and Life Satisfaction 1973 - 2002

0%

20%

40%

60%

80%

100%

120%

140%

160%

180%

200%

1973 1975 1977 1979 1981 1983 1985 1987 1989 1991 1993 1995 1997 1999 2001

GDP

Life Satisfaction

Scare planners and economic developers!

But we all want some material progress!

Human Capital

Human CapitalHUMAN CAPITAL

Social Capital

Private/Physical CapitalPrivate Capital

Public Capital

Environmental CapitalEnvironmental Capital

Harnessing the capital and assets

Resilience v sustainability

Key:

Public

Private

Academic

Charity/ NFP

Image & analysis by Daniela D’Andreta

Nick Crossley, Poetics, Volume 37, Issue 1, Pages 1-98 (February 2009)

Resilience

Resilience is not about the passive maintenance of a situation

Its more active, its about:

being ready to take on opportunities.

responding to shocks

dealing with change

being adaptable and creative

taking a punch and bouncing back

making our places and cities go...............

Resilience

Resilience

Maggie Leininger 2004

“Creativity is a mental and social process involving the generation of new ideas of concepts, or new associations of the creative mind between existing ideas or concepts, creativity is fuelled by the process of conscious or unconscious insight.”

and

“creativity as an assumptions breaking process”

Creativity assisting resilience

Resilience

Lu Xinjian

Need to understand and harness the ‘dna of place’

We need to search for and nurture qualities in place (the conditions) which harness creativity and adaptability to huge, economic, environmental, social, and cultural change

The ‘capitals’, assets and cultures of place are of great importance

The importance of understanding and building creative networks and partnerships

Need to build resilient place based relationships.

Creation of place resilience

Governance

Health and wellbeing

Environment

Identity history and context

The local economy

Stages of resilience

The local economy

The resilience work

CLES piloted work in six cities around the world (Portland, Yokkaichi, Haiphong, Culiacan, Gdansk, Coimbatore and now worked in:

Northumberland

Ashfield and Mansfield

Cambridgeshire and West Suffolk

Cherwell

Gloucester, Cheltenham and Tewkesbury

ManchesterSouthern Staffordshire

Dandenong, Australia

Blackburn with Darwen

The resilience scale

Resilient – Compelling evidence of robust relationships between the different spheres in the economy

Stable – Evidence of sound relationships between the different spheres.

Vulnerable – Relationships between the different sectors are significantly underdeveloped.

Brittle – Little evidence of relationships between different sectors.

PUBLIC

COMMERCIAL

SOCIAL

BROAD ECONOMIC CONTEXT

GOVERNMENT

WORKING WITHIN ENVIRONMENTAL LIMITS

LOCAL ECONOMIC TERRITORY

LOCAL IDENTITY AND CONTEXTHISTORY AND CULTURE

Very resilient. With balance between sectors

Creativity between sectors

Public sector and economy enables

Urban growth boundary

Strong ‘green’ identity, percolating through place and activity

Portland-Oregon, USA

PUBLIC

COMMERCIAL

SOCIAL

BROAD ECONOMIC CONTEXT

GOVERNMENT

WORKING WITHIN ENVIRONMENTAL LIMITS

LOCAL ECONOMIC TERRITORY

LOCAL IDENTITY AND CONTEXTHISTORY AND CULTURE

Stable to Vulnerable.

Bolstered by EU funds

Public sector interaction with the social and commercial sector is weak.

Competition –V - Cooperation in wider city region

Some creativity within rather than between sectors

Gdansk, Poland

PUBLIC

COMMERCIAL

SOCIAL

BROAD ECONOMIC CONTEXT

GOVERNMENT

WORKING WITHIN ENVIRONMENTAL LIMITS

LOCAL ECONOMIC TERRITORY

LOCAL IDENTITY AND CONTEXTHISTORY AND CULTURE

Brittle.

Lack of connection between the sectors.

Dominated by ‘fragile’ US Investment.

State-level strategy, dominated by business

Environment degraded.

Culiacan-Sinaloa, Mexico

PUBLIC

COMMERCIAL

SOCIAL

BROAD ECONOMIC CONTEXT

GOVERNMENT

WORKING WITHIN ENVIRONMENTAL LIMITS

LOCAL ECONOMIC TERRITORY

LOCAL IDENTITY AND CONTEXTHISTORY AND CULTURE

Vulnerable to stable

An entrepreneurial culture.

Local government providing little more than services

Genuine philanthrocapitalism, filling the gaps with NGOs

Creativity through ‘absence’ of public sector

Coimbatore-Tamil Nadu, India

PUBLIC

COMMERCIAL

SOCIAL

BROAD ECONOMIC CONTEXT

GOVERNMENT

WORKING WITHIN ENVIRONMENTAL LIMITS

LOCAL ECONOMIC TERRITORY

LOCAL IDENTITY AND CONTEXTHISTORY AND CULTURE

Vulnerable to stable

Strong drive from government, from national down to city

Starting to embrace the free market

A strong entrepreneurial spirit

Planned creativity?

Haiphong, Vietnam

PUBLIC

COMMERCIAL

SOCIAL

BROAD ECONOMIC CONTEXT

GOVERNMENT

WORKING WITHIN ENVIRONMENTAL LIMITS

LOCAL ECONOMIC TERRITORY

LOCAL IDENTITY AND CONTEXTHISTORY AND CULTURE

Resilient. Despite ongoing recession from 90’s

Public sector key actor

A strong focus on innovation –a ‘technological and innovation DNA’ –running through the place

Strong collective, place based culture

Yokkaichi and Mie Prefecture, Japan

TIME

An opportunity or a shock/negative change

Resilient

Vulnerable

Stable

Brittle

Timeline following an event or opportunity

Partnerships in BLackburn

Informal Networks: Who are your 3 closest work colleagues, people you would go to solve a work problem, to talk something through or to have a creative conversation with?

Let’s assume some change: Does it matter?

Conclusions

Successful places are predicated on creative relationships, and innovative interactions between public, commercial and social sectors

Place shielding

Existing economic development models have failed to factor in wider role of culture, capitals and assets

Our places are dependent upon complex connections

Vulnerable to small disturbances

Creativity is key connecting element

Conclusions from Pilot areas to date

What are the danger signs for an un-resilient place?

Poor blend of sectors

Great plans but not based on an understanding of functioning and malfunctioning relationship

Simple assumptions that cause and effect is linear.

Narrow definitions of ‘success’

Poor consideration of the cultural condictions

Poor understanding of local/global connections

Rigid governance - hierarchical

Conclusions on resilience

Centre for Local Economic Strategies

Email - neilmcinroy@cles.org.uk

Web - www.cles.org.uk

Magazine - www.newstartmag.co.uk

Twitter - @nmcinroy

Phone - (0044) 161 236 7036

Centre for Local Economic Strategies