Creative city: Challenging concept

Abstract

Culture and creativity were always an essential part of city growth, but today they are integrated in the life of cities as a part of official strategies or as an action of a group of artists and people, working in the cultural and creative industries. Culture and creativity form part of many concepts of urban development promoted as an acceptable response to the challenges of globalization. As a part of urban development policy, they are expected to enable sustainable development, and they rely on human potential, local comparative advantages and development of technologies. The main principles of these concepts are communication, social networks, technology, adaptability, concentration, synergy and inclusion. As any paradigm, creative cities are challenged on many levels, in theory and in practice. Using culture and creativity as a resource and marketing value should be thoughtful, since it can have a significant impact on society. This paper will present some arguments about policies and critics of creative cities, as well as the required preconditions, organizational forms, their development path and relation to inclusion. This paper will present the case study of Savamala, as an example of urban regeneration through creating a cultural and creative quarter in Belgrade, and within a method of multicase study, include two more examples of cultural and creative strategies, the cases of Shanghai and Copenhagen, and by analyzing top-down and bottom-up initiatives, some conclusions about potentials and risks of those strategies will be drawn.