OECD Culture and Local Development.pdf - PACA

3. PROMOTING LOCAL DEVELOPMENT BY CREATING CULTURAL PRODUCTS
Suppose that, at the outset, the district finds itself in situation A, with a great number
of firms producing a wide variety of products (even if they are of the same type and
meet the same kind of needs). This is the typical case of the arts and crafts industry,
where many establishments produce goods that are differentiated while respecting
common quality standards.
- Initially, the district remains at A. Despite potential problems of coordination
and governance, as discussed below, the district is essentially sustainable as
it is.
- The district may then shift towards point 1. One factory begins to dominate the
market, but it still produces a great variety of goods, thereby preserving the
existing craft skills (Wedgwood in Great Britain, Baccarat or Bernardaud in
France, Rockwood in the United States). In managing their dual nature, which
is both capitalistic and artistic, they stress the quality of their products by
entering them regularly in major international competitions and fairs, or by
organising museums (Burton, 1976). They will refresh their product line in
keeping with historic artistic standards in order to position their products
successfully in buyers’ eyes: Wedgwood’s Etruria collection remains the best
example. They arrange for newspaper articles and critical reviews and thereby
make their new series seem like works of art 92 . They have their artisans sign the
works to reinforce their unique nature.
- With a certain inevitability, the district may move on to situation 2, where
product standardisation and industry concentration are gathering momentum.
This can be seen in the glass and porcelain industries, for example, where
some firms are seeking to capture ever greater market share in order to defray
fixed costs that are themselves ever higher.
-While situation 1 is sustainable only with difficulty, and situation 2 is hardly
desirable, the best thing may be to control the trend and try to maintain a situation
of type 3, which leaves open the possibility of rationalising production without
degenerating into an assembly line operation. Controlled concentration might also
be pursued to some degree through technological and marketing investments, without
standardising the product to the point where the specific know-how is useless.
Enabling factors
The sociological components
In her 1961 book, The Death and Life of Great American Cities, Jane Jacobs drew a
connection between economic creativity, urban vitality, and population diversity
(Jacobs, 1961). Other geographers have in turn found a link between a certain artistic
112 CULTURE AND LOCAL DEVELOPMENT - ISBN 92-64-00990-6 - © OECD 2005