Creative industries in “developing” countries: Questioning country classifications in the UNCTAD creative economy reports

Creative Industries and Regional Productivity Growth in the Developing Economy: Evidence from Indonesia

“…In conclusion, creative industries are more likely to be an indicator, than a driver, of regional productivity growth in a developing country, such as Indonesia (see also De Beukelaer ). Creative industries are situated in relatively advanced regions and it is impossible to disentangle their economic impacts solely, as these industries are interrelated with other sectors.…”

“…Meanwhile, creative industries in developing countries are still rather small. It is thus possible that these industries are not a driver, but rather an “indicator” of economic development (De Beukelaer ). Furthermore, it is unknown whether creative industries in developing countries are able to take advantage of agglomeration economies.…”

“…Creative industries generally use and generate new ideas or designs and thus potentially yield larger economic value. However, in a developing country such as Indonesia, these industries are still quite small and therefore, their impact might not be significant (see also De Beukelaer ). Creative industries might not yet be a leading economic segment that coordinates the creation and diffusion of knowledge (cf.…”

“…E conomic activities that utilise individual creativity and talent, such as creative industries, are considered a relatively new instrument for urban and regional economic development in the context of "developing" countries (Barrowclough and Kozul-Wright 2008;De Beukelaer 2014;Fahmi, McCann, and Koster 2017;UNESCO and UNDP 2013). Various policy strategies are designated to promote these industries so as to stimulate economic development.…”

The location of creative industries in a developing country: The case of Indonesia

“…Although we use the 'developing country' shorthand to classify the Indonesian context, it is clear that 'developing countries' consist of a heterogeneous group of nations with a range of levels of socioeconomic development, and that this might be reflected in the characteristics of their creative industries (De Beukelaer, 2014). Indonesia clearly has a different context to higher income countries in Asia that Cities 59 (2016) [66][67][68][69][70][71][72][73][74][75][76][77][78][79] have gone further in the development of creative industries, such as South Korea, Japan and also China, which is still categorised as a developing country, but it is actually the largest exporter of creative products in the world (De Beukelaer, 2014, 2015. Despite the specific aspects of the context, there are at least two aspects shared between Indonesia and other similarly ranked countries that will enable this study to extract lessons for other lower-middle income countries that are currently implementing a creative economy policy.…”