nep-cul New Economics Papers
on Cultural Economics
Issue of 2015‒11‒01
fourteen papers chosen by
Roberto Zanola
Università degli Studi del Piemonte Orientale “Amedeo Avogadro”

  1. Regional Distribution of Creative and Cultural Industries in Indonesia By Fikri Zul Fahmi
  2. Digitization of Heritage Collections as Indicator of Innovation By Karol J. Borowiecki; Trilce Navarrete
  3. Change in access after digitization: Ethnographic collections in Wikipedia By Trilce Navarrete; Karol J. Borowiecki
  4. Is Opera Attendance Fashionable? The Case of Perm Opera and Ballet Theatre By Iuliia O. Papushina
  5. Tourist Tax and Heritage Cities By Guo Ji
  6. Media see-saws: Winners and losers on media platforms By Anderson, Simon P.; Peitz, Martin
  7. Effects of Cultural Diversity on Economic Performance in Russian Regions By Marina Nesena; Leonid Limonov
  8. INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY. By Igerta Bengu; Brunela Kullolli
  9. Measuring allocative efficiency in cultural economics: The case of Fundacion Princesa de Asturias By Victor Fernandez-Blanco; Ana Rodriguez-Alvarez
  10. Religious Tourism in Greece and regional development: The case of Samos Island By Chrysanthi Balomenou; Panoraia Poulaki; Dimitrios Lagos
  11. The Concept of Intercultural Competence and the Fulbright Exchange as a Model of Intercultural Communication By Reny Radkova
  12. Economic, social and cultural problems in the district of Tirana, after 90 years, as a result of internal migration By Manjola Xhaferri; Mirela Tase
  13. The Effects of Tangible Immovable Cultural Heritage on Residential Property Values: Evidence from Lisbon, Portugal By Jacob Macdonald; Sofia Franco
  14. The More Religiosity, the Less Creativity Across US Counties By Okulicz-Kozaryn Adam

  1. By: Fikri Zul Fahmi
    Abstract: This study examines the degree to which creative industries fit regional economic settings in the developing world. In so doing, we examine the characteristics of regions where clusters of these industries are found, particularly in Indonesia. Our findings show that creative industries develop in particular regions in this country, but the characteristics of these industries and spatial settings are different from developed countries. In the literature, it is well-established that creative industries are most likely to concentrate in large urban regions, where innovation and cross-fertilization of ideas take place with the support of talent pooling and relatedness among niche producers. This argument is valid for explaining the clustering of ?innovative? creative industries in Indonesia. However, the same conclusion cannot be drawn for long-established ?traditional? cultural industries, which are promoted as creative industries by the government, although they rather focus on preserving heritage values. In this respect, we suggest that policy strategies for creative industries would be applicable to fairly advanced regions with sufficient human capital and economic diversification. Meanwhile, regions specialized in traditional cultural industries can apply a different strategy to optimize the impact of these industries.
    Keywords: creative industries; cultural industries; regional distribution; Indonesia
    JEL: R10 R12 Z11 Z18
    Date: 2015–10
    URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:wiw:wiwrsa:ersa15p914&r=cul
  2. By: Karol J. Borowiecki (Department of Business and Economics, University of Southern Denmark, Odense,Denmark); Trilce Navarrete (Department of Business and Economics, University of Southern Denmark, Odense,Denmark)
    Abstract: Heritage institutions house cultural and research content, which is the key source to stimulate innovation. Despite the potential, heritage collections are mostly inaccessible via digital mediums. We analyze the macro, meso and micro conditions of heritage organizations across Europe to identify the key determinants that foster innovation as reflected by the share of collection digitization and online publication. We find that organizations respond positively to an environment of high consumer digital literacy and sustainable resource allocation that enables slack, skilled staff and long-term strategic planning. Innovation is thus, in fact, enhanced by digital literacy from both producers as well as consumers.
    Keywords: innovation; digitization; heritage collections; cultural institution
    JEL: O3 Z1
    Date: 2015–09
    URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cue:wpaper:awp-08-2015&r=cul
  3. By: Trilce Navarrete (Department of Business and Economics, University of Southern Denmark, Odense,Denmark); Karol J. Borowiecki (Department of Business and Economics, University of Southern Denmark, Odense,Denmark)
    Abstract: The raison d’être of memory institutions revolves around collecting, preserving and giving access to heritage collections. Increasingly, access takes place in social networked markets characterized by communities of users that serve to select and rank content to facilitate reuse. Publication of heritage in such digital medium transforms patterns of consumption. We performed a quantitative analysis on the access to a museum collection and compared results before and after publication on Wikimedia. Analysis of the difference in access showed two main results: first, access to collections increased substantially online. From a selection of the most viewed objects, access grew from an average of 156,000 onsite visitors per year (or 15.5 million in a century) to over 1.5 million views online per year (or 7.9 million in five years). Second, we find a long tail in both mediums, where 8% of objects were exhibited onsite and 11% of available objects online were used in Wikipedia articles (representing 1% of the total collection). We further document differences in consumer preference for type of object, favouring 3D onsite and 2D online, as well as topic and language preference, favouring Wikipedia articles about geography and in English. Online publication is hence an important complement to onsite exhibitions to increase access to collections. Results shed light on online consumption of heritage content by consumers who may not necessarily visit heritage sites.
    Keywords: Heritage consumption, Museums, Digital heritage, Access, Exhibition history, Wikipedia
    JEL: L31 D12 N30 Z11
    Date: 2015–10
    URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cue:wpaper:awp-10-2015&r=cul
  4. By: Iuliia O. Papushina (National Research University Higher School of Economics)
    Abstract: This paper considers fashion as a factor of theatre attendance. The research setting is the industrial city Perm with approximately one million citizens. Perm opera and ballet theatre found in 1870 is “Russia’s third ballet Mecca, after Moscow and St. Petersburg”. Series of in-depth interviews, content-analysis and analysis of discourse provide “corroborative evidence”. The research is based on fashion value framework, which regards fashion guided behaviour as a function of shared values called fashion values. The literature review generates insights about the role of fashion in high culture consumption and arguments pro applicability of the fashion values framework for theatre attendance. The data comes from 23 in-depth interviews with visitors and non-visitors of Perm opera and ballet theatre. The research develops the set of indicators of fashion awareness in context of theatre attendance. The results shows that institutionalized cultural capital and occupation in cultural industries matter for fashion awareness of a particularly participant. So far, it is supposed education and occupation play more important role as an explanation of fashion awareness than class does. The ways for future investigations are discussed
    Keywords: high culture, consumption, fashion, audience, cultural capital
    JEL: Z11
    Date: 2015
    URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hig:wpaper:107hum2015&r=cul
  5. By: Guo Ji (Beijing Normal University)
    Abstract: Cities, especially those with cultural heritage, attract a large proportion of the world’s tourists each year. A large body of literature studies the sustainability of cultural tourism. It is shown that the excessive visitation of heritage cities strongly affects sensitive urban areas (Russo 2002). The costs of congestion caused by tourism include pressure and damage on urban facilities and premises, typically, historically and culturally important buildings, monuments and artifacts which have variable degrees of “non-excludability” and “non-rivalry” and thus are, at least partly, public goods. Furthermore, the congestion drives citizens and firms to abandon central locations, hampering local development. Spatially differentiated taxation aimed at visitors and tourists is adopted in parts of the world which may promote a more equitable allocation of costs of tourism. However, there is a surprising lack of analytical analysis on either the impacts of tourism on heritage cities or the efficiency of tourist taxation.This paper studies the interactions between tourist tax, local public good provision, which includes protection and restoration of urban facilities/cultural heritage, and the number of tourists in a scenario of multi-regional tax competition between governments of cultural heritage cities. On the one hand, tourism has a positive effect on private income in the heritage cities, as well as government tax revenue. On the other hand however, there is a tourism-related social cost which is equivalent to “congestion” of regular public goods. We believe that the efficiency of tourist taxation is the key to balancing the income and costs brought about by tourism.
    Keywords: tourist tax; city infrastructure; tourism externalities; tax competition
    JEL: H21 H23 R00
    URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:sek:iacpro:3104783&r=cul
  6. By: Anderson, Simon P.; Peitz, Martin
    Abstract: We customize the aggregative game approach to oligopoly to study asymmetric media markets. Advertiser, platform, and consumer surplus are tied together by a simple summary statistic. When media are ad-financed and ads are a nuisance to consumers we establish see-saws between consumers and advertisers. Entry of a lower-quality platform increases consumer surplus, but decreases advertiser surplus if industry platform profits decrease with entry. Merger decreases consumer surplus, but advertiser surplus increases when the profits of the higher-quality platform within the merger increase. By contrast, when platforms use two-sided pricing or consumers like advertising,advertiser and consumer interests are often aligned.
    Keywords: media economics , mergers , entry , advertising , aggregative games
    JEL: D43 L13
    Date: 2015
    URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:mnh:wpaper:39750&r=cul
  7. By: Marina Nesena; Leonid Limonov
    Abstract: Cultural diversity in modern Russian society is determined, first, by the composition of the ethnic and cultural space, sometimes historically rooted in the distant past, and, second, by migration. Given the spatial characteristics of Russia, cultural diversity of cities and regions is driven not only by international, but also by internal migration. When studying the topic of cultural diversity, economic researchers are primarily interested in assessing its effects on economic performance. Over the past decades, the topic has been explored by a wide range of researchers. ?Is a culturally diversified community more successful than a homogenous one?? is one of the major questions addressed in such research. Conclusions from theoretical models offered by M. Berliant and M. Fujita with respect to the impact of cultural diversity on economic growth and its role in the creation of new knowledge suggest that productivity of knowledge creation in a region with a homogeneous culture is lower than where cultures are diverse and R&D workers are heterogeneous. The empirical literature on effects of cultural diversity offers both positive and negative evidence. The authors of this study aim to explore the cultural diversity of Russia and assess its economic value. This paper presents the first outcomes of the study. To assess cultural diversity the Simpson?s index was used. Empirical research was conducted using an open system of cities modeled by G. Ottoviano and G. Peri in which ?diversity? has impact on both performance of firms and satisfaction of customer needs through localized externalities. Preliminary evaluation of correlation between growth of income, wages and increase in the share of foreign migrants, and the share of non-native population shows that regardless of the characteristics of a region, significant correlation is only observed between growth of income, wages and share of international migration. Econometric estimation of the theoretical model used regressions of wages and rent. Per capita income and average monthly wage were alternately used as dependent variables in the regression of income. Explanatory variables were indices reflecting cultural diversity: the Simpson?s index based on country of origin, the Simpson?s index among foreign migrants and the share of foreign migrants in the population of a region. Control variables in the regressions were a set of standard control variables used in regressions of income and growth [Temple.1999; Bellini et al. 2009] that reflect differences between regions in human capital, the share of agricultural employment in total employment in the region, population density and market potential of the region.
    Keywords: Cultural diversity; migration; productivity; regional economy
    JEL: O4 R1
    Date: 2015–10
    URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:wiw:wiwrsa:ersa15p165&r=cul
  8. By: Igerta Bengu (The District Court of Fier); Brunela Kullolli (“Aleksander Moisiu” University of Durres)
    Abstract: This article analysis the historical perspectives of copyright – The first part gives, the birth and development of copyright in Albania. The birth and development of copyright in Europe(The copyright in France and Dhe copyright in Italy) The second part is concentrated to the concept of copyright began to focus particularly on the study of the constituent elements of copyright, the object, subject and content.-The third part gives, legislative responses to copyright. The legal protection of copyright offered by the Albanian laws, the legal protection in civil terms, the legal protection in administrative terms and the legal protection in criminal terms.- The Fourth part treats copyright in the light of the European union. Conventions and agreements on international plan. Approximation of Albanian legislation in the area of copyright.The Stabilisation and Association process- preparation for integration in EU and the Stabilization and Association Agreement of Albania with EU.Conclusions Copyright and related rights, as objects of law, specifically regulated by legal norms, are relatively new, not only inAlbania, but also in the world. The copyright is protected in international law for more than 200 years. It provides the economic basis for the creation and distribution of musical works,literary, artistic, movies, computer programs and other forms of expression creative. The law of copyright is part of wider legislation, known as intellectual property. Intellectual property rights protect the interests of creators by giving them property rights over their creations. The legal regulation of copyright is not only an aspect of the national law of each State, but is also subject to the codification of international agreements between the States that have signed these agreements. In this way the legal regulation of copyright has taken international dimensions.
    Keywords: copyright, comparative law, development of copyright, Stabilisation, European union concept of copyright
    JEL: K11
    URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:sek:iacpro:3105473&r=cul
  9. By: Victor Fernandez-Blanco (Departamento de Economia, Facultad de Economia y Empresa, Universidad de Oviedo); Ana Rodriguez-Alvarez (Departamento de Economia, Facultad de Economia y Empresa, Universidad de Oviedo)
    Abstract: Literature on Cultural Economics gives us some examples about how to measure technical efficiency. But there is a lack in the case of allocative efficiency analysis. Our aim is to fill this gap incorporating a methodology that analyzes both technical and allocative efficiency. We use the Shepard’s distance function, particularly suitable when we face non-profit firms or institutions that are not interested in cost minimization. As an empirical application, we analyze the efficiency of Fundación Princesa de Asturias (PAF), a Spanish non-governmental organization devoted to promote cultural, scientific and humanistic values of universal heritage, during the period 1988-2012. Our findings suggest that PAF could have use 7% less inputs to achieve the same level of outputs. On the other hand, there is no allocative efficiency. Other expenditures input has been over-utilized related both to labor and current assets inputs, and labor has been over-utilized related to current assets. Moreover, our results indicate that both technical and allocative efficiency have clearly improved during the analyzed period. In summary, our empirical application shows how distance function methodology can be successfully implemented to measure allocative efficiency in cultural firms and institutions.
    Keywords: technical and allocative efficiency, stochastic frontier analysis, input distance function, non-profit institutions
    JEL: L82 D24 Z10
    Date: 2015–10
    URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cue:wpaper:awp-09-2015&r=cul
  10. By: Chrysanthi Balomenou; Panoraia Poulaki; Dimitrios Lagos
    Abstract: Religious tourism and tourism in general helps in the development and intensification of social and cultural relations. The issue of religious tourism comes under the general and sustainable development of alternative tourism, special interest and respect for holy places. Religious tourism is an emerging form of tourism which aims to quality and sustainable development. It places special emphasis on preservation, revival and development of religious and historical monuments for the creation of tourist flows. The pilgrimage was and it will continue to be an important motivation movement of people and this often associated with religious and historical value of monasteries or churches, religious celebrations and various historical events. Religious tourism can be further strengthened internationally if the areas of the tourist destination dispose various tourist resources apart from religious monuments. The religious and historical monuments are attractive tourist destinations internationally and in Greece. Samos is one of the richest islands in Greece as far as the religious and historical monuments are concerned and for this reason is one of the most suitable for the development of religious tourism. It disposes important religious attractions that are an integral part of the national heritage and attract tourists who may be part of propellant development of religious tourism. Samos for a long time has been distinguished for piety of its inhabitants and for its intense ecclesial life. This is testified by the many parish churches, its chapels, its private temples, and many of the monastic churches. Samos is distinguished for its very important and interesting cultural heritage with many Byzantine monuments, many remarkable archaeological finds, rich exhibits at museums, castles, monasteries, churches, et al. Samos has important religious sites, monasteries and churches, which are part of the national heritage and attract tourists. The main aim of this paper is to explore the prospects for the development of religious tourism of the island of Samos and to gauge its contribution to the regional development in Greece. Samos has the ability to develop religious tourism because the island has important religious and historical sites. In order to investigate the possibilities and prospects of development of religious tourism in Samos it was conducted a survey concerning the status quo and recording problems that hinder its development. For this purpose quantitative research conducted by using a closed questionnaire and the method of stratified sampling. This investigation showed that Samos as a religious destination has not been developed enough, but it has many prospects of growth. It is required to provide a framework of tourism policy at local level, which will include a number of selected actions for the planning and management of religious tourism.
    Keywords: Religious Tourism; Samos; Religious Monuments; Monasteries; Churches; Sanctuarie
    JEL: L83 O18
    Date: 2015–10
    URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:wiw:wiwrsa:ersa15p618&r=cul
  11. By: Reny Radkova (University of Sofia St. Kliment Ohridski)
    Abstract: The focus in the suggested research is on the role of intercultural communication in English language education and the program of English teacher assistant (ETA), which is part of the international Fulbright educational exchange in Bulgaria, for the enhancement of intercultural competence. It will present not only the context of English language acquisition in Bulgaria, but also the development of multicultural awareness and tolerance in the language classroom. The new concepts of teaching intercultural communication and competence promote the idea that they are not free from language learning and language-in-culture. The main goal of the ETA program is to improve the quality of English language teaching and learning in Bulgaria by assigning native speakers with adequate academic credentials to (English) language high schools all over the country and especially in underdeveloped regions. This model has real importance as it represents training by native speaker who functions as an intercultural moderator.The main goals of the research are:•To promote the Fulbright program •To strengthen educational advising.•To promote cultural sensitivity among Americans and Bulgarians.English language skills and intercultural communication should better be taught by native speakers. It is not only because they are a priceless tool and a natural way for learning English, but meanwhile they teach intercultural communication and intercultural competence. Also they use interactive and productive methods of teaching and presenting American and British culture and conversational English. As a part of the Fulbright program ETA gives the students, mentor teachers, teacher stuff, and the local community the possibility to stay in touch with English and American language and culture, thus imperceptibly enhancing intercultural competence.
    Keywords: English; Bulgarian; intercultural communication; intercultural competence; Fulbright educational exchange;
    URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:sek:iacpro:3105472&r=cul
  12. By: Manjola Xhaferri (University of\); Mirela Tase (University of\)
    Abstract: - The political changes that took place after the 90s created the possibility for a free movement of the inhabitants from different regions that can be grouped as follows: - Movement or emigration outside Albania;- Movement from the villages around the city or from the administrative centers of the respective district;- Movement toward the suburbs of big centers such as: Tirana, Durrësi, Vlora, Elbasani, Shkodra etc.In our paper we have focused on the movement toward the Capital City. We have especially concentrated on the grouping of inhabitants arriving from the Northern and Southern areas of Albania and who have settled in Bathore, Baldushk, Sauk, Selite, Farke. The inhabitants have been mainly canvassed (questioned) in relation to these problems: a.Reasons of movingb.Problems of adaptation in the new environment (confrontation with the new mentality of the Capital City, employment, education etc.)c.Cohabitation with the natives (found there, including here maritial and social relations etc.) These are problems which willingly or unwillingly these new comers have had to face and will face in the future, up to the moment when they will be fully integrated in a metropolitan city such as Tirana. Here we will take into consideration the changes they have had to undergo due to the living conditions they have left behind and from which they are still affected.
    Keywords: Economic, Social, Cultural, Problems, Tirana
    JEL: Z10
    URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:sek:iacpro:3104565&r=cul
  13. By: Jacob Macdonald; Sofia Franco
    Abstract: Real estate prices in cities, especially in historic central areas, are influenced by the quality and character of their neighbourhoods. Many cities are identifiable by iconic historic features such as their buildings or monuments. This paper examines the impact of historic amenities on residential housing prices in the city of Lisbon, Portugal. Our study is directed towards identifying spatial variation of amenity values for churches, palaces, lithic (stone) architecture, and other amenities through the housing market. We develop a theoretical model to guide the empirical specification and establish a bid price function allowing for a spatial pattern of housing prices more complex than the monocentric city model. As such the willingness to pay may no longer be a monotonically decreasing function of distance to the CBD. A novel feature of our model is the introduction of herd behaviour in the housing market to capture underlying spatial interaction between property values. Empirically we estimate two global spatial hedonic models, a spatial lag and spatial error, to capture the effect of concentration of historic amenities on residential prices and correct spatial dependence. A locally weighted regression model investigates spatial non-stationarity and generates local estimates for individual historic landmarks. Results show significant spatial autocorrelation and there are benefits to modeling this behaviour through spatial hedonic models with reduced SSE up to 4% relative to OLS models. Direct proximity to any type of monument yield premiums of around 2% on housing prices however increased landmarks overall decrease prices by 0.7%, and different types of historic and individual landmark amenities induce varying housing premiums. Higher concentrations of non-landmark churches within 1,000 meters yield negative effects of 0.1% on housing prices with landmark churches having a larger impact around 4%. In contrast, lithic structures and palaces have positive effects with premiums in the order of 5% and 12% respectively and stronger effects for historic amenities located near open spaces. The impact of these historic amenities are assumed different since they are primarily aesthetic whereas churches provide services and a congregation point for the community. Our results highlight the capacity of the LWR model in explaining price differentials for proximity to individual landmarks. We see localized effects for being located near specific landmarks from approximately 130 ? to be further from the Castle and Church of Saint Anthony in downtown to 200 ? and 800 ? respectively to be located closer to the Palace of Necessidades and Monastery of Jeronimos - both characterized by large gardens. From a policy perspective, these findings highlight the importance of conceptualizing the amenity value not just in terms of structural characteristics but how those characteristics interact with or are conditioned by social, economic and other local contextual features.
    Keywords: Hedonic; Spatial analysis; Historic amenities
    JEL: C21 H23 P25
    Date: 2015–10
    URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:wiw:wiwrsa:ersa15p657&r=cul
  14. By: Okulicz-Kozaryn Adam
    Abstract: It is not an overstatement to say that creativity is the single most important ingredient for broadly understood progress (technological, economic, social, academic, and so forth). Rapid automation makes creativity increasingly important, because non-creative tasks can and will be automated. It is striking that there are hardly any studies about the link between religiosity and creativity. Religion is a powerful and persistent force shaping human society. This study investigated the relationship between religiosity and creativity across US counties. Religiosity was measured as adherence and church density. Creativity was measured as a proportion of people in occupations classified as creative and patents per capita. Results indicate that religious counties are less creative, even controlling for education, income, political orientation, urban-rural continuum, and prevalent industry. Directions for future research are discussed
    Date: 2015–10
    URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:wiw:wiwrsa:ersa15p153&r=cul

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