Lead Investigator: Research funded by the Centre for Cultural Policy Research (CCPR, University of Glasgow).
From January 2002 to December 2005, Dr Beatriz Garcia was the principal investigator of a research project on Cities and Culture, using Glasgow 1990 European City of Culture as a case study. The research was conducted at the Centre for Cultural Policy Research, University of Glasgow, with support from Matthew Reason (research assistant), Nicola Sneddon (CCPR Information and Resources Administrator), Adrienne Scullion (CCPR Academic Director) and Christine Hamilton (CCPR Director).
The main premise for the Cities and Culture project was a recognition of the predominance of the city as a cultural centre and the trend (emerging throughout the 1990s and fully established by 2004) to place the arts and culture at the heart of urban development. In particular, the project was set to explore the nature and effects of emerging bridges between areas such as urban regeneration, place marketing, city tourism and cultural policy.
The academic dedication to exploring these bridges was not exclusive to the CCPR. However, up to 2002, much of the existing research focused on studying their economic dimensions and short-term effects, while overlooking the analysis of potential long-term cultural and social legacies. The Cities and Culture project was designed precisely to address this caveat: a key focus of the research was the sustainability of cultural investment in cities.
The project was designed to co-ordinate a variety of academic disciplines and test new research methodologies. As such, it incorporated approaches to research drawn from social sciences and the humanities, in particular, urban, leisure, cultural and communication studies, politics and arts history.
More information about this project and its outcomes will be available soon. In the meantime, you can access a more detailed Research Description (2004) below, or can search for relevant blog entries within this site (eg. ‘Glasgow’, European Capital of Culture etc).