The city of marvels? Multiple endeavours towards competitiveness in Barcelona Pathways to creative and knowledge-based regions ISBN: 978-90-75246-56-8 Printed in the Netherlands by Xerox Service Center, Amsterdam Edition: 2007 Cartography lay-out and cover: Puikang Chan, AMIDSt, University of Amsterdam All publications in this series are published on the ACRE-website http://www2.fmg.uva.nl/acre and most are available on paper at: Dr. Olga Gritsai, ACRE project manager University of Amsterdam Amsterdam institute for Metropolitan and International Development Studies (AMIDSt) Department of Geography, Planning and International Development Studies Nieuwe Prinsengracht 130 NL-1018 VZ Amsterdam The Netherlands Tel. +31 20 525 4044 +31 23 528 2955 Fax +31 20 525 4051 E-mail: [email protected] Copyright © Amsterdam institute for Metropolitan and International Development Studies (AMIDSt), University of Amsterdam 2007. All rights reserved. No part of this publication can be reproduced in any form, by print or photo print, microfilm or any other means, without written permission from the publisher. The city of marvels? Multiple endeavours towards competitiveness in Barcelona Pathways to creative and knowledge-based regions ACRE report 2.2 Montserrat Pareja Eastaway Joaquin Turmo Garuz Marc Pradel i Miquel Lídia García Ferrando Montserrat Simó Solsona Maite Padrós (language revision) Accommodating Creative Knowledge – Competitiveness of European Metropolitan Regions within the Enlarged Union Amsterdam 2007 AMIDSt, University of Amsterdam ACRE ACRE is the acronym for the international research project Accommodating Creative Knowledge – Competitiveness of European Metropolitan Regions within the enlarged Union. The project is funded under the priority 7 ‘Citizens and Governance in a knowledge-based society within the Sixth Framework Programme of the EU (contract no. 028270). Coordination: Prof. Sako Musterd University of Amsterdam Amsterdam institute for Metropolitan and International Development Studies (AMIDSt) Department of Geography, Planning and International Development Studies Nieuwe Prinsengracht 130 NL-1018 VZ Amsterdam The Netherlands Participants: Amsterdam (Amsterdam institute for Metropolitan and International Development Studies, University of Amsterdam, the Netherlands) Marco Bontje ~ Olga Gritsai ~ Heike Pethe ~ Bart Sleutjes ~ Wim Ostendorf ~ Puikang Chan Barcelona (Centre de Recerca en Economia del Benestar – Centre for Research in Welfare Economics, University of Barcelona, Spain) Montserrat Pareja Eastaway ~ Joaquin Turmo Garuz ~ Montserrat Simó Solsona ~ Lidia Garcia Ferrando ~ Marc Pradel i Miquel Birmingham (Centre for Urban and Regional Studies, University of Birmingham, UK) Alan Murie ~ Caroline Chapain ~ John Gibney ~ Austin Barber ~ Jane Lutz ~ Julie Brown Budapest (Institute of Geography, Hungarian Academy of Sciences, Hungary) Zoltán Kovács ~ Zoltán Dövényi ~ Tamas Egedy ~ Attila Csaba Kondor ~ Balázs Szabó Helsinki (Department of Geography, University of Helsinki, Finland) Mari Vaattovaara ~ Tommi Inkinen ~ Kaisa Kepsu Leipzig (Leibniz Institute of Regional Geography, Germany) Joachim Burdack ~ Günter Herfert ~ Bastian Lange Munich (Department of Geography, Ludwig-Maximilian University, Germany) Günter Heinritz ~ Sabine Hafner ~ Manfred Miosga ~ Anne von Streit Poznan (Institute of Socio-Economic Geography and Spatial Management, Adam Mickiewicz University, Poland) Tadeusz Stryjakiewicz ~ Jerzy J. Parysek ~ Tomasz Kaczmarek ~ Michal Meczynski Riga (Stockholm School of Economics in Riga, Latvia) Anders Paalzow ~ Diana Pauna ~ Vjacheslav Dombrovsky ~ Roberts Kilis ~ Arnis Sauka Sofia (Centre for Social Practices, New Bulgarian University, Bulgaria) Evgenii Dainov ~ Vassil Garnizov ~ Maria Pancheva ~ Ivan Nachev ~ Lilia Kolova Toulouse (Interdisciplinary Centre for Urban and Sociological Studies, University of Toulouse-II Le Mirail, Toulouse, France) Denis Eckert ~ Christiane Thouzellier ~ Elisabeth Peyroux ~ Michel Grossetti ~ Mariette Sibertin-Blanc ~ Frédéric Leriche ~ Florence Laumière ~ Jean-Marc Zuliani ~ Corinne Siino ~ Martine Azam Milan (Department of Sociology and Social research, University degli Studi di Milan Bicocca, Italy) Enzo Mingione ~ Francesca Zajczyk ~ Elena dell’Agnese ~ Silvia Mugnano Dublin (School of Geography, Planning and Environmental Policy, University College Dublin, Ireland) Declan Redmond ~ Brendan Williams ~ Niamh Moore ~ Veronica Crossa ~ Martin Sokol Table of Contents Executive summary.......................................................................................................................... 1 1 The Spanish context ................................................................................................................... 7 1.1 Political overview ................................................................................................................... 7 1.2 Economic development........................................................................................................... 7 1.3 Socio-demographic and cultural development........................................................................ 9 1.4 Urban policies and housing................................................................................................... 11 1.5 Economic development with mention of creative industries and knowledge economy policy .................................................................................................................................... 12 1.6 Conclusions........................................................................................................................... 14 2 Introduction to the Barcelona Metropolitan Region (BMR)................................................ 17 2.1 Geographical / Demographical context................................................................................. 17 2.2 Main economic specializations............................................................................................. 19 2.3 Conclusions: Main challenges and position in European networks and hierarchies............. 21 3 Historic development path....................................................................................................... 25 3.1 Barcelona before 1950: Industrial development, social struggles and civil war................... 25 3.2 From 1950 to 1990s: Economic development and the arrival of democracy ....................... 28 3.2.1 From 1950 to 1975: Industrial development and urban growth .......................................... 29 3.2.2 From 1975 to 1992: Crisis, democracy and new events...................................................... 31 3.3 From 1990 to 2000: Great transformations........................................................................... 34 3.4 The historical tradition of tolerance in Barcelona................................................................. 38 3.5 Conclusions........................................................................................................................... 40 4 New economic trends and recent social changes (2001-2005) .............................................. 43 4.1 Introduction: Recent changes in the BMR............................................................................ 43 4.2 Population composition, recent dynamics and social polarisation........................................ 44 4.3 Growing and declining economic activities and evolution of the labour force .................... 47 4.4 Economic profile and new specialization activities: Towards a knowledge-based society? ................................................................................................................................. 53 4.5 Housing market and infrastructure: Changes in the territorial model of the BMR............... 58 4.6 Conclusions and main challenges ......................................................................................... 61 5 The state of the creative knowledge sectors ........................................................................... 65 5.1 Creative industries in the BMR: Towards a new model of economic growth ...................... 65 5.1.1 The importance of the transformation of traditional sectors ............................................... 67 5.1.2 The importance of soft factors for creative business location in BMR ............................... 68 5.2 The quinary sector in BMR: Composition and development................................................ 72 5.2.1 Cultural industries: The hard core of creative industries in BMR....................................... 75 5.2.2 ICT ...................................................................................................................................... 77 5.2.3 Financial services in the BMR ............................................................................................ 78 5.2.4 Law and other business services ......................................................................................... 79 5.2.5 R&D and higher education activities in the BMR............................................................... 79 5.3 Conclusions: The future path of economic development in the BMR.................................. 82 i PATHWAYS TO CREATIVE AND KNOWLEDGE-BASED REGIONS 6 Analysis of policy applied over the past decade (1996-2006) aimed at improving competitiveness............................................................................................................................... 87 6.1