Governance in innovative cities and the importance of branding.

The importance of image: Making useful mental maps

An innovative city with opportunities in the knowledge economy is, whatever else, a densely populated and diverse city with sufficient opportunity for the happenstance to occur. A reasonably large number of cities match this profile. And yet not every city has an equal chance of growing into a creative knowledge city. Even if a particular location possesses the basic ingredients for creativity, in the end the place is innovative only if recognised as such. This has everything to do with what psychologists call 'perception'. Because citizens, entrepreneurs and tourists cannot know everything when they take decisions, they use whatever knowledge they may happen to possess. That knowledge is always selective and is formed out of experiences from the past and by outside sources, such as information gleaned from the media. Using this perception, people construct for themselves an image of reality. In this context geographers speak of 'spatial cognition' or 'mental maps': the knowledge people have of spatial unities such as regions and cities (Pred 1967; Gold & Ward 1994). That image seems to be of major importance for the choices people make when deciding on where to work, live or spend their free time. Such decisions are not made on the basis of the objective characteristics of an area but on the subjective perception people hold.

We all have a more or less well defined image of certain cities, whether based on correct information or prejudices. Research shows that a city's image is influenced positively by the extent to which the city is known, or 'unknown, unloved' and 'known, loved' (Anholt 2007). Einstein's famous statement that 'It is easier to split an atom than a prejudice' applies to the image forming of cities in the knowledge economy. This explains why metropolises such as New York, Los Angeles and London are often seen by outsiders as more innovative than they really are. At the same time, cities that are relatively unknown to the wider public, such as places in the German Ruhr Area, including Essen, Oberhausen and Bochum, and America's Midwest (such as Pittsburgh), have a traditional image, though all the ingredients necessary for creativity are present there. Here the history of such regions often plays a decisive role and these have been burdened for years with a traditional, dull and smokestack image. In promoting such urban areas as knowledge regions, they lose out to large, vibrant cities that are already seen as 'cool'.

Most cities in the highly developed world seem to realise that apparently minor details such as the city's image can be decisive for (knowledge-intensive) companies who may wish to settle in the city and for people looking for a place to live or visit. More and more cities are therefore finding it insufficient merely to invest in the provision of urban facilities: they make serious efforts to communicate their attractiveness and creativity inside and outside the city. This strategy of positive image-forming is known as 'city marketing' or 'branding' (Anholt 2007). Cities make extensive use of promotion campaigns to put themselves on the map. Though the effect of this city marketing is difficult to measure, it would seem that some cities really have succeeded in developing a 'strong brand' (Anholt 2007). There are telling examples of this, such as 'Sydney--City of Celebrations', 'Minneapolis--City of Waters', 'Munich Loves You' and 'I Amsterdam'.

Some cities are better at branding to differentiate themselves than others. For instance, the American cities of Siketon (Missouri), Webb City (Missouri) and Davison (Michigan) have all adopted the moniker 'City of Flags'. The same copycat behaviour can be observed in Europe: the Dutch cities of Eindhoven, Enschede and Delft, all hosting technical universities, qualify themselves as 'innovative cities' without placing any emphasis on their own uniqueness. The result is vague slogans imparting little information, such as 'Eindhoven: Leading in Technology' and 'Knowledge City' (Delft and Enschede). None of the three cities make it clear how they differ from one another nor do they show what they have to offer to the knowledge worker looking for a place to work and live. In this way, the three university cities undermine their own competitiveness when real competitive edge can be gained from building on and emphasising their particular local conditions--in other words, a strategy of 'trend through tradition'.

Does policy matter?

There is no recipe for cities to ensure that they flourish in the knowledge economy. Innovative cities show big differences. Despite their differences, however, generally speaking innovative cities possess a number of basic ingredients: a high concentration of people, a dose of happenstance and luck and--definitely not unimportant--a positive image familiar to the outside world. Local policy as an essential condition for urban innovativeness does not appear in this list because history suggests that policymakers have played scarcely any part in the emergence of innovative cities. It has often been only when a city had grown and problems were occurring, for instance in transport and housing, that the city authorities proposed innovative solutions. London and Paris, Stockholm and Rotterdam, for example, can thank the prescient local authorities for their underground train systems and original housing projects respectively. At present, our cities are facing totally different problems, such as how to cope with maintaining their momentum on a global level in the inter-city knowledge race. In principle it ought to be possible for policymakers to come up with innovative solutions in this case--even if the question of urban innovativeness is rather less tangible than the more fundamental problems that cities are used to wrestling with.

When making the city more attractive in the knowledge economy, city local authorities can invest in the creativity of their own population. But innovative cities cannot be constructed from scratch. The roots of innovation, in fact, always lie in the existing, historically developed urban environment. In their enthusiasm, local authorities sometimes tend to forget this. Inspired by success stories such as Silicon Valley, they hope to make their city a technopolis of similar stature. Terms such as Silicon Forest (Portland), Silicon Glen (Glasgow), Silicon Kashba (Istanbul) and Silicon Prairie (Dallas) speak volumes in this regard. That sort of copycat behaviour is far from creative (Hospers 2006a). The local authority would do better to base its policies on the city's specific characteristics, using them as the underpinning for urban creativity ('localisation').

Creating a better underpinning for innovation is not the same thing as blueprint planning--local authorities will have to be content with much smaller measures that do no more than increase the chances of urban innovation developing. Scale may be important for smaller cities' development and local authorities can begin by seeking collaboration with a neighbouring city in the fields of infrastructural, educational and cultural facilities (inter-urban networking), increasing the scale (and with that its critical mass) of their city. It is also possible to increase the diversity of the city with targeted policies, for instance by mixing residential and work locations or increasing their city's visibility by holding a major event or organising a new project, such as a competition for residents or the business community. Although this type of measure does not lead directly to urban innovation, it does increase the chances of it appearing.

In addition to creating the framework conditions for innovation, the local authority can play a useful role in promoting the city with a targeted 'branding strategy' (Anholt 2007). A particular place may fulfil all the conditions for innovation but it becomes an innovative city only when perceived as such by the outside world. Because the 'unknown, unloved' principle also applies to cities, local authorities can do well by investing in making the name of their city known and improving its reputation provided that a realistic image is projected. A small, sleepy, rural town that presents itself to the outside world as a cool technopolis tests credibility. Partnerships are also critical here. Work on a positive urban image requires collaboration by stakeholders from the entire city, particularly entrepreneurs, who may be expected to have wide-ranging experience of marketing products. Moreover, local authorities and the business community have a common interest in ensuring that the city remains attractive in the inter-city competition.

One conurbation where a result-targeted and broadly supported branding strategy has borne fruit is the German Ruhr Area (Hospers 2006b). In this 'Rust Belt' of coal and steel, local stakeholders (the regional and local government, large firms, universities) have invested heavily in the integration of new technologies and trends into the existing local economic structure. Young, technologically high-value companies ('technostarters') are housed in former factories and warehouses. The industrial heritage is being recycled as exhibition halls, concert halls or restaurants. These symbols underpin the Ruhr Area brand as a place where trend and tradition get along fine together. With campaigns such as 'The Ruhr Area: a Strong Piece of Germany' and 'The Ruhr Area is Hard to Beat' the local authorities and entrepreneurs have together succeeded in dragging the traditional industrial area into the era of the modern knowledge economy. The lesson here is the working together of different partners.

Branding may seem to be a trivial tool in the hard world of competition for a city's growth and success in the knowledge economy but its power is revealed in the case examples outlined below.

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