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This paper focuses on the conditions that gave rise to tourism as a tool of urban economic development. By the 1960s and 1970s, an emerging economy of recreation and tourism was gaining steam as many manufacturing city centers were undergoing significant fiscal stress and social deterioration due to suburbanization and deindustrialization. In an effort to reverse the tide, American cities began to embrace a new strategy, most visible in the last three decades, focusing on urban reimaging through the utilization of cultural strategies to improve urban identity and translate that image into economic development opportunities and growth. Sport, entertainment and tourism proved central to this new, culturally based policy agenda. Museums, festivals, revamped public spaces, tourism hubs, sports stadiums, theatre districts, ethnic precincts, convention centers and even urban beautification programs are some of the infrastructural and related tools utilized to advance this new strategic direction. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Following caterpillar fungus as it travels from the Tibetan Plateau to wealthy Chinese consumers, this article makes several interventions into geographical studies of commodity chains. First, it argues for an expansion beyond the usual call to connect the political economy of production with cultures of consumption; the cultural politics of production and political economies of consumption must also be considered. Second, it argues for bringing together political economy and more-than-human analytical approaches to commodity chains, showing how nature and the nonhuman play a key role in an assemblage that has allowed Tibetans to navigate livelihoods in a rapidly changing economy. This challenges a tendency to assume a universal figure of ‘the human’ in more-than-human geographies. Third, by connecting the erasure of Tibetans from representations of various natures used to sell caterpillar fungus with the broader politics of Tibetans within the People's Republic of China, we show that commodity fetishism can conceal not just labor relations, but also political struggles not reducible to class. Finally, we show that following a small fungus can shed light on the unevenness of China's capitalist development obscured in monolithic narratives of China's rise, demonstrating the value of expanding commodity chain studies beyond those that end with Western consumers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article examines the conceptual referents of the term 'creative' as used in the terms 'creative industries', 'creative class' and 'creative city'. The way in which these conceptually divergent usages can be conflated, and the difficulties this poses for policy, is considered with a particular focus on the deployment of the term within the current 'Liverpool Cultural Strategy'. It is argued that both within and without the purview of this strategy, multiple aims for policy intervention are obscured by the use of this single term. It is also argued that this obfuscation is encouraged by a Floridian conception of creativity as a single, unified entity, but that the adoption of such a Floridian conception is not followed through to Florida's ultimate conclusions regarding the potential for the adoption of the creative agenda to exacerbate social problems. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Arts festivals, framed within an array of neo-liberal, culture-led urban regeneration strategies, are now a mainstay of urban tourism and urban policy-making. As such, they face growing competitive pressures and competing agendas, and the need for a set of coherent goals and policy frameworks is vital. While a review of the literature clearly shows that arts festivals can deliver a series of benefits that separately meet cultural policy and urban tourism policy objectives, there is little to suggest that cities normatively engage in comprehensive, integrated policy-making for urban arts festivals. With a particular focus on recent developments in Ireland, this paper critically reviews a range of literature to investigate how arts festivals further cultural policy and tourism policy objectives in urban contexts. It argues that current conceptualisations of arts festivals within urban policy frameworks are imbalanced. While the proliferation of arts festivals signals expansion for the sector, the ready transferability of arts festivals into tourist attractions and city image-makers raises the prospect of a new dichotomy within a city's supply of artistic offerings, with the visible and instantly appealing, being more likely to prosper through a variety of public funding, public-private ventures and private sponsorship arrangements, than other cultural organisations with less potential for spectacle. The paper concludes, by arguing, that common bases for collaboration need to be identified between the arts festivals and tourism sectors, and that these need to be conceptualised within the broader cultural and urban policy arenas in which arts festivals are now firmly implicated. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recent academic work on European Capital of Culture (ECoC) has fallen into two broad categories: either evaluative, based on assessing the effectiveness of hosting ECoC for policy agendas; or critical, questioning the rationale behind ECoC and its impact on the cities that have held the title. However, little attention has been paid to the role ECOC has played in the 'modernisation' of urban governance, particularly in the UK. This article seeks to explore ECoC's role in city governance by examining the specific case of Liverpool, ECoC 2008 and the related local government agencies in the city, particularly Liverpool City Council (LCC). A narrative of the history of cultural policy within LCC, using institutionalist theory, shows that cultural policy has had a difficult evolution within a city that was initially reluctant to devote institutional capacity and resources to cultural matters. Problems in the build up to 2008 reflect the influence of 'institutions' in Liverpool's political culture and history. The influence of these institutions is at the root of the uncertainty surrounding the long-term viability of cultural policy in the city. As a corollary to the exploration of the role of institutions in Liverpool, a concluding discussion of ECoC's role in city governance offers prospects for the cultural policy settlement within Liverpool in the post-ECoC 2008 era, particularly focusing on the role of Liverpool's cultural sector as a motivator for cultural policy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Lepawsky J. Clustering as anti-politics machine? Situating the politics of regional economic development and Malaysia's Multimedia Super Corridor, Regional Studies. This paper addresses the formation of an 'intentional cluster' in Malaysia called the Multimedia Super Corridor. In this context, 'clustering' is a spatial fix and a development discourse that is as much about political expediency as it is about economic development. This paper suggests the utility of theorizing clusters as 'anti-politics machines' in terms of their instrumental utility for depoliticizing the reproduction and expansion of state bureaucracy and capital accumulation. [image omitted] Lepawsky J. Le regroupement comme une machine contre-politique? Le positionnement de la politique d'amenagement du territoire et de l'Autoroute Multimedia en Malaysie, Regional Studies. Cet article cherche a aborder l'etablissement d'un 'regroupement voulu' en Malaysie appelle l'Autoroute Multimedia. Dans ce contexte, la notion de 'regroupement' constitue une fixation geographique et un discours de developpement qui concerne autant l'opportunisme politique que le developpement economique. Cet article propose l'utilite de theoriser les regroupements comme 'machines contre-politique' vu leur utilite de depolitiser la reproduction et l'elargissement de la bureaucratie d'Etat et l'accumulation de capital. Regroupement Politique culturelle Malaysie Lepawsky J. Clusterbildung als antipolitische Maschine? Untersuchung der Politik zur regionalen Wirtschaftsentwicklung und des Multimedia Super Corridor von Malaysia, Regional Studies. In diesem Beitrag wird die Bildung eines 'beabsichtigten Clusters' namens Multimedia Super Corridor in Malaysia untersucht. In diesem Zusammenhang stellt die Clusterbildung eine raumliche Korrekturmassnahme und einen Entwicklungsdiskurs dar, bei dem es nicht nur um Wirtschaftsentwicklung geht, sondern auch um politischen Eigennutz. Im Artikel wird der Nutzen einer Theoretisierung von Clustern als 'antipolitischen Maschinen' nahegelegt, was ihre zentrale Rolle bei der Entpolitisierung der Reproduktion und Ausdehnung der staatlichen Burokratie und Kapitalanhaufung anbelangt. Clusterbildung Kulturpolitik Malaysia Lepawsky J. ¿Aglomeracion como maquina antipolitica? Situacion de la politica del desarrollo economico regional y el Super Corredor Multimedia de Malasia, Regional Studies. En este articulo analizo la formacion de una 'aglomeracion deliberada' en Malasia denominada el Super Corredor Multimedia. En este contexto, la 'aglomeracion' es un remedio espacial y un discurso de desarrollo que trata sobre la conveniencia politica pero tambien sobre el desarrollo economico. En este articulo sugiero la utilidad de la teorizacion de las aglomeraciones como 'maquinas antipoliticas' en cuanto a su utilidad instrumental para despolitizar la reproduccion y expansion de la burocracia estatal y la acumulacion de capital. Aglomeracion Politica cultural Malasia [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]