Subjugated in the Creative Industries: The Fine Arts in Singapore (original) (raw)

‘Creative industries’: Economic programme and boundary concept

Journal of Southeast Asian Studies, 2011

On 31 December 1985, Singapore left the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), turning against the 'New International Information Order' demanded by UNESCO at that time. In October 2007, after 22 years of absence, Singapore rejoined UNESCO, looking for an intensification of cultural and scientific exchange. Taking this example of reviving co-operation between Singapore and UNESCO, this paper assesses the concept of 'creative industries' as a boundary concept that allows for increased co-operation between players with generally opposing knowledge conceptsas manifested in their respective knowledge and cultural politics. The paper starts with a conceptual discussion on the crossing of boundaries. This is followed by an assessment of first, UNESCO's and second, Singapore's gradual repositioning towards culture. While UNESCO turned from distinctly separating 'culture' and 'market' in the 1970s and 1980s to an increased openness for profit-oriented conceptualisations of culture today, Singapore identified the economic potential of culture, creativity and the arts, and therefore the need to foster these as part of its development into a knowledge-based economy. The underlying differences in interests and the orientation of content, expressed by the traditionally opposing conceptualisations of knowledge and culture, are still valid today, yet the concept of 'creative industries', adopted by both sides, seems to offer a common meeting ground. It acts clearly as a bridge, and hence a boundary concept, allowing for an intensification of mutual co-operation. This is discussed in the final part of the paper.

Creativity, the arts and toxic institutions

2007

In 1997, Singapore mandated creativity in all schools in an effort to increase national entrepreneurial activities in a resource-poor nation. Despite Asian/Western cultural differences, Howard Gardner too, although a structuralist, assumes that creativity has little to do with the artistic process ...

International Journal of Cultural Policy Global aspirations and local talent: the development of creative higher education in Singapore

This paper explores higher education development and policy shifts in Singapore over the last decade, within a landscape of an increasingly globalised creative economy and international cultural policy transfer. Using qualitative interviews with key players in policy and higher education institutions, the paper aims to explain the push and pull factors behind investment in creative higher education. It considers the emerging dynamics and diverse patterns, embedded in a society where higher education interactions with economic development have a long history and pragmatic rationale. While still in the early days of these investments, the paper argues that there are some global policy lessons to be learnt from the case of Singapore and the role that higher education can play in developing a creative economy, while striving to overcome issues of over-supply and innate vulnerability of creative careers.

MAKING CREATIVE INDUSTRIES POLICY: THE MALAYSIAN CASE

With the launch of the Dasar Industri Kreatif Negara (DIKN) document in 2009, the creative industries have become a policy focus area for the Malaysian government in line with Wawasan 2020 (Vision 2020). By critically analysing the institutional background of the DIKN and creative industries policies implemented to date, this paper shows how the DIKN has been translated into subsequent policy. This paper argues that creative industries policy has largely narrowed to funding schemes and resulted in a proliferation of government agencies. Due in part to the legacy of the Multimedia Super Corridor (MSC) and Multimedia Development Corporation (MDEC), "digital" has increasingly come to be synonymous with "creative". We argue that this raises questions as to how the creative industries are perceived and supported and ultimately the meaning of creativity in the Malaysian creative industries policy context.