The New Urban Success: How Culture Pays
Urban economists have put forward the idea that cities that are culturally interesting tend to attract “the creative class” and, as a result, end up being economically successful. Yet it is still unclear how economic and cultural dynamics mutually influence each other. By contrast, that has been ext...
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doaj-1f7f1ed7fade43ef8723c22547917c542020-11-24T23:17:56ZengFrontiers Media S.A.Frontiers in Physics2296-424X2018-04-01610.3389/fphy.2018.00027346636The New Urban Success: How Culture PaysDesislava Hristova0Luca M. Aiello1Daniele Quercia2Computer Laboratory, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, United KingdomNokia Bell Labs, Cambridge, United KingdomNokia Bell Labs, Cambridge, United KingdomUrban economists have put forward the idea that cities that are culturally interesting tend to attract “the creative class” and, as a result, end up being economically successful. Yet it is still unclear how economic and cultural dynamics mutually influence each other. By contrast, that has been extensively studied in the case of individuals. Over decades, the French sociologist Pierre Bourdieu showed that people's success and their positions in society mainly depend on how much they can spend (their economic capital) and what their interests are (their cultural capital). For the first time, we adapt Bourdieu's framework to the city context. We operationalize a neighborhood's cultural capital in terms of the cultural interests that pictures geo-referenced in the neighborhood tend to express. This is made possible by the mining of what users of the photo-sharing site of Flickr have posted in the cities of London and New York over 5 years. In so doing, we are able to show that economic capital alone does not explain urban development. The combination of cultural capital and economic capital, instead, is more indicative of neighborhood growth in terms of house prices and improvements of socio-economic conditions. Culture pays, but only up to a point as it comes with one of the most vexing urban challenges: that of gentrification.http://journal.frontiersin.org/article/10.3389/fphy.2018.00027/fullculturecultural capitalPierre Bourdieuhysteresis effectFlickr |
collection |
DOAJ |
language |
English |
format |
Article |
sources |
DOAJ |
author |
Desislava Hristova Luca M. Aiello Daniele Quercia |
spellingShingle |
Desislava Hristova Luca M. Aiello Daniele Quercia The New Urban Success: How Culture Pays Frontiers in Physics culture cultural capital Pierre Bourdieu hysteresis effect Flickr |
author_facet |
Desislava Hristova Luca M. Aiello Daniele Quercia |
author_sort |
Desislava Hristova |
title |
The New Urban Success: How Culture Pays |
title_short |
The New Urban Success: How Culture Pays |
title_full |
The New Urban Success: How Culture Pays |
title_fullStr |
The New Urban Success: How Culture Pays |
title_full_unstemmed |
The New Urban Success: How Culture Pays |
title_sort |
new urban success: how culture pays |
publisher |
Frontiers Media S.A. |
series |
Frontiers in Physics |
issn |
2296-424X |
publishDate |
2018-04-01 |
description |
Urban economists have put forward the idea that cities that are culturally interesting tend to attract “the creative class” and, as a result, end up being economically successful. Yet it is still unclear how economic and cultural dynamics mutually influence each other. By contrast, that has been extensively studied in the case of individuals. Over decades, the French sociologist Pierre Bourdieu showed that people's success and their positions in society mainly depend on how much they can spend (their economic capital) and what their interests are (their cultural capital). For the first time, we adapt Bourdieu's framework to the city context. We operationalize a neighborhood's cultural capital in terms of the cultural interests that pictures geo-referenced in the neighborhood tend to express. This is made possible by the mining of what users of the photo-sharing site of Flickr have posted in the cities of London and New York over 5 years. In so doing, we are able to show that economic capital alone does not explain urban development. The combination of cultural capital and economic capital, instead, is more indicative of neighborhood growth in terms of house prices and improvements of socio-economic conditions. Culture pays, but only up to a point as it comes with one of the most vexing urban challenges: that of gentrification. |
topic |
culture cultural capital Pierre Bourdieu hysteresis effect Flickr |
url |
http://journal.frontiersin.org/article/10.3389/fphy.2018.00027/full |
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