Relationships in Creative Networks: a comparison between Florence and Paris.

The paper aims to analyze creative networks within the framework of place marketing. It focuses on creativity within organizations as creation of a valuable useful new product, service, idea, procedure, or process by individuals working together in a complex social system. The organization’s creativity is not the quantity of creativity present within the organization itself, but rather the way in which the interactions among individuals and the other components generate the proper conditions to allow the organization to create something which is truly innovative. The paper aims to answer at the following questions: When a network can be considered creative? When territorial networks produce creativity? Which is an analytical model for territorial creative networks useful to reconstruct and represent the nodes of the network? Which are qualitative- quantitative descriptors of relationships in creative networks? Empirically the paper presents a preliminary verification of the theoretical hypothesis through an analysis of the Florentine and Parisian creative network. The study will focus on two territories distinguished by the presence of production systems for goods with a high symbolic value. The methodology is mainly based on qualitative tools such as in-depth interviews with opinion leaders of the territory and semi-structured protocol with indirect qualitative tests.