The Future of the ‘Culture and Trade Debate’: A Legal Outlook

Abstract

Throughout the twentieth century, the culture and trade debate evolved in parallel with related concepts, such as cultural industries, cultural specificity and cultural diversity. Traditionally, the dominant regulatory method in approaching the relationship between cultural concerns, on the one hand, and of trade concerns, on the other, consisted in the formulation of general or particular exceptions aimed at separating culture from trade. Gradually, and backed by drastic technological advances transforming the nature of economic offerings particularly in the area of the pioneering cultural industries, the traditional regulatory method shifted towards a more inclusive approach using so-called integration clauses. In practical terms, however, the dominant regulatory approach changed from 'exclusive inclusion' to 'inclusive exclusion', given that the greater integration of cultural concerns in commercial contexts at the level of substantive law was, at the international level, not matched by a major shift towards greater institutional coherence. As a possible remedy, the recent emergence of the concept of the 'creative economy' can be regarded as a new opportunity to rethink not only the scope and content of the cultural and trade debate but also the principal features of the role of law in tackling the important governance challenges that lie ahead.