King's College London

Addressing the moment at which the ‘creative industries’ were defined and measured for the first time, The Birth of the Creative Industries Revisited report by Dr Jonathan Gross was published today by King’s College London.

The 1998 publication of the UK government’s Creative Industries Mapping Document marked a moment in history where a new sector of the UK economy was born. It changed the discourse around the creative and cultural sectors, and the ways in which they generate and deliver value.

This new report throws light on the creation and consequences of the Mapping Document, which has proven to be one of the most influential, far-reaching and controversial interventions of modern cultural policy.

Dr Gross, who is based in the Department of Culture, Media & Creative Industries, undertook oral history research to trace the origins of the Mapping Document, bringing together recollections of many of the people who were directly involved at the time – including via a witness seminar, held 20 years on from the original publication.

The research has broader implications for understanding how public policy is made, and the ways policy makers can succeed – and fail – to make a difference.

Baroness Bull, Vice President & Vice Principal (London) and Senior Advisory Fellow for Culture said::

‘I hope that returning to this key moment in cultural policy will generate renewed interest not only in this fascinating moment in history, but in what it might teach us about the future.’

Dr Jonathan Gross, the report’s author, reflects:

‘Whilst the 1998 Mapping Document is often treated as the archetypal piece of New Labour policy, I found that it was only by recognising the tensions between multiple factors that brought it into existence – macroeconomic transformations, the repositioning of a political party, the machinery of government, and the aims and ideas of individual people – that the specific characteristics and consequences of the document could be understood. A key implication of the research, for me, is the suggestion it makes for narrating public policy in new ways.

The report is available to download here.

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