Cultural Economics Debates

What is cultural economics and what can an understanding of it add to the discussion of the creative economy? From neo-liberal policies to expand the market and reduce government intervention the creative economy gained ground within the swell of new capitalism in the 1990’s. It was as much a rhetorical concept that re-positioned cultural policy from a spending ‘frill’ as it was an economic response to the Post-Fordist economy. With a focus on arts, cities and people the creative economy is primarily concerned with the economic aspects of creativity. This thesis makes a link between cultural economics and the creative economy through a theoretical approach that constructs a new model for understanding cultural economics and then applies it to the notion of the creative economy. New questions arise from this and point to how the creative economy can benefit from further links to cultural economics in tapping into other conversations such as the cultural benefit of government subsidies or the tensions between the private and public aspects of the creative economy. The constructed model represents these different sides of the conversation through the framing of: Dualism, Positivism, and Moralism. The aim of the thesis is to advance the cultural economics discussion by contemporizing its debates and to push the creative economy discussion towards an enhanced criticality apart from political or economic ambitions.