Location decision-making of \u27creative\u27 industries: the media and computer game sectors in Dublin, Ireland

摘要

There has been significant research undertaken examining the \u27creative class\u27 thesis within the context of the locational preferences of creative workers. However, relatively little attention has been given to the locational preferences of creative companies within the same context. This paper reports on research conducted to qualitatively analyse the location decision making of companies in two creative sectors: media and computer games. We address the role of the so-called \u27hard\u27 and \u27soft\u27 factors in company location decision making within the context of the creative class thesis, which suggests that company location is primarily determined by \u27soft\u27 factors rather than \u27hard\u27 factors. The study focuses upon \u27core\u27 creative industries in the media and computer game sectors and utilises interview data with company managers and key elite actors in the sector to investigate the foregoing questions. The results show that \u27hard\u27 factors are of primary importance for the location decision making in the sectors analysed, but that \u27soft\u27 factors play quite an important role when \u27hard\u27 factors are satisfactory in more than one competing city-region.