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BOOK EXCERPT

Who's your city?

RICHARD FLORIDA

Globe and Mail Update

Latest comment posted at 11:24 AM EDT 18/03/08

Book Excerpt: How the Creative Economy Is Making Where To Live the Most Important Decision of Your Life ...Read the full article

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  1. John Deriso from Edmonton, Canada writes: Is there a good number figure for the percentage of people in any given city who did not choose to live there, they are just there by accident of birth? I imagine the percentage is rather high.

    Isn't this just a nature vs. nurture argument applied to populations, anyway?

    Still, a very interesting article.
  2. Alex MacLean from Toronto, Canada writes: These flashy new "insights" that psychology plays a role in shaping societies are not new and they are certainly not Richard Florida's to claim as his.

    Over a hundred years ago a German sociologist/economist by the name of Max Weber showed how a certain psychological predisposition that complemented Protestantism - an 'ethic' constituted of individualism, goal orientation, thrift, rigour and self denial - was a decisive factor in the more successful path of new capitalists in the expanding economies of northern Europe. "The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism" is a classic work by a brilliant social scientist. This 'creative class' drivel is just abject social science spun by some-one more interested in selling books to self-congratulatory yuppies than in understanding how society works and why certain groups of people behave in the way that they do.
  3. Pro Canada from Canada writes: This guy uses $1,000,000 words and concepts that essentially mean nothing. I wish he'd go away.
  4. The NeoCynic from Cayman Islands writes: The fundamental problem with "biz schools" and professors of "biz" is that the entire notion of merely making money is not a traditional, classical field of academic study and endeavour. Real academics snicker. Indeed, it is a fraud, intellectual quackery at its best. As is this author. One need only peruse this bizarre string of non sequitars, sloppy and lazy vocabulary, and tedious tautologies as an examplar to recogize the utter bankruptcy of "business scholarship", and its ultimate reduction to a type of prolix crypto-fascist apologia for its corporatist paymasters. Pity the intrepid reader who must wade through the first six paragraphs to learn that people, like birds, tend to hang together. This is the grist for the mill with which chairs are funded in our business academies. But alas, there is more: what you do is part of your personality. And better yet, careful people take care, and open people are open. As for the ultimate pearl of wisdom: geograhical locations also have "personalities". It is the combined personalities of the persons who live there. And what are the best personalities for "growth", i.e. economic exploitation? No, not merely those who care and are agreeable (indeed, a true innovator needs ten to 20 sycophants to succeed), but alas, those who are open-minded. If "leadership" deeply desires and covets growth, and all that it entails for their careers and bank accounts, especially "off the chart" growth, find and attract open-minded people, especially open-minded gay people. Hallejuah! Let the Pride Parade begin! It boggles the mind how such self-infatuated drivel sells. Much like the neocons and their warhype, such gospel is strictly for the abjectly converted in the cubicles of their minds. For us others, we can only stand back and marvel at the sheer chutzpuh of such shameless shills and their woefully gullible and illiterate fans. Richard "Florida" is Pat Roberts in pinstripes.
  5. Mike Sumners from Toronto, Canada writes: Richard Florida is not related to Leah McLaren, by any chance?
    They both spew meaningless drivel in desperate attempts to
    a.) sell books
    b.) come across as "serious social commentators"

    The Globe can do better.
  6. Albin Forone from Toronto, Canada writes: Neo, That comment is one hot knife through a buttery article - I don't disagree with much, but profoundly disagree that Florida probably wears pinstripes - lululemon rather.
  7. Alex MacLean from Toronto, Canada writes: Another of his favourite banalities, which hack politicians now parrot to sound learned, is that cities need to become centres of innovation and creativity. Again, not new - cities were always that. Even in the earliest societies, it was the urban form and the mixing of people that resulted which fuelled development of technologies, writing, farming, trade, accounting etc.
  8. garlick toast from Canada writes: yes, by shooting for ''pie in the sky'' goals like ''centres of excellence'',the leaders ignore such inconveniences as crime in the street,the homeless and the growing desperation of the ghetto.
    halifax city counsellors are in triple overtime on the topic of cat licensing while the city becomes the ''street stick-up'' capital of canada.they are a centre of excellence in that if you go there,you have an excellent chance of getting mugged.
    fluff merchants like florida offer a distraction for the willfully oblivious.
  9. Colin Campbell from Toronto, Canada writes: I would assume that political correctness is inversely related to open-mindedness since it precludes all debate--something that unfortunately now plagues our universities.

    Additionally, it worth noting that most research I am aware of shows that a high level of Agreeableness is negatively associated with management abilities since highly agreeable types are reluctant to make tough decisions for fear of offending someone.
  10. Normand LaBine from Winnipeg, MB, Canada writes: Obviously a book for the Learned. Back on the street of Life, though, it ignores the fact that the artist community usually starves to start off with. Most of our mid-Western artists are First nations and Metis, rising from the ashes of 'those schools' and expressing their views of life, their culture, the landscape we've lost, and they don't go 'bohemian'. They stay well-rooted in the pragmatic life they face daily. To reconstruct cities and towns on the basis of a new Cultural Fad, is escapism, fantasy, a specialty wish-list. You cannot export Bohemians, except to Bohemia. You can export, and therefore build more properous Cities, what markets will buy. One Painting or Sculpture will only enrich one artist, not the City.

    I will give the Authour his dues on his other stereo-typical profiles though. The analysis is logical, even though I don't agree with some.
  11. The NeoCynic from Cayman Islands writes:

    TO: We who read the Globe and Mail, 1 of 2
    RE: Richard Florida and The Suicide Bombers

    It is our sad fate that for those who of us who think deeply, feel deeply. I recall a warm autumn September night in 2004. The children were dreaming in their beds. The dog was snoozing at my feet, and the moan of a far off lawnmower was making me drowse in the cool night breeze. I was packing their backpacks in front of the TV with new school supplies: creamy fresh white copybooks awaiting an alphabet, a doodle, and for the smudge, perfumed pink erasers atop perfect pencils, a green lunchbox for a red thermos. And always my note: I love you. And then the news: 1,100 children and teachers taken hostage at Beslan, 334 killed, 186 being children. After watching the footage, I hurried to my children's bedroom, locked the door, and got into bed with my youngest baby to hold so tight. As the ivory light of the moon slowly crept across her blanket, I wept while she slept.

  12. The NeoCynic from Cayman Islands writes:

    ...2 of 2...

    I have no doubt that a Muslim mother, huddling with her children under a kitchen table in a blackout, loves them as much as we do here. By refusing to confront the politics that cause such misery, by allowing the cowardice of our politicians to deny what our hearts would affirm, we too, through callous indifference, add just a little more to her pain, destroy just a little more of her hope, and make more certain the death of her children. Guilt drives us to fix our steely gaze strictly upon our shopping malls, cars, TV soaps, and celebrity pratfalls.

    I can no longer tolerate Richard Florida with his glib inanities about catering to the rich, the well-fed, and the debauched in the name of economic growth. How convenient to ignore the blood-soaked political misery and injustice on which such growth is ultimately derived. How beyond his "academic" ken to deal with these issues which silently scream for our attention. Unmentioned is a planet choking to death on the exhaust of our economic growth. How inconvenient for he and his privileged entourage that the IT guys'n'gals he idolizes may write software to better screw people out of their money, target missiles on villages, or persecute political dissenters. How rude to point out that most of our high-tech growth springs from military spending.

    He shills on behalf of an economic growth that will doom us all if our political problems are ignored, or given his penchant for black shirts, violently suppressed. Beware the Richard Floridas of our day, they lead us lemmings towards the promised land of eternal growth and prosperity, where we all can be artsy, think witty thoughts, screw our brains out and sip lattes, playing on our Blackberries, as we drive our BMWs off a cliff.
  13. mynalee johnstone from saltspring island, Canada writes: Neocynic has said it all
  14. Jo Geoghegan from Canada writes: This treatise is the very epitome of Toronto life.
    Booooooooring!
  15. Anuradha Bose from ottawa, writes: Does Florida have nothing else to contribute? We are tired of hearing this same nostrum.
  16. John Smith from Canada writes: Excellent Neo-Cynic. As mynalee johnstone from saltspring island states, you have said it all.
  17. robert quinn from Japan writes: A stunning dearth of Florida fans here. Neo-Cynic has the steamroller in high gear. Hard to argue with most of what he said (and well-said it was), although there have been media profiles of a few Palestinian moms happy to wave off into the market one or more of their bomb-strapped brood. (One less hand fumbling for falafel, perhaps. Though to be even-handed, it is reputed some rather hard-hearted Spartan shrikes did likewise in days of yore.) Myself...shove the Beemers and the lattes, but I like black shirts. Something about them gives me goosesteps.
  18. Michael Sharp from Victoria, Canada writes:

    The trouble with really intelligent people is that you can't understand a word they say.
  19. S Armstrong from Toronto, Canada writes: I've never really been sure if I agree with Florida, but the lack of constructive criticism in forums like these make me wonder if there's actually something to his ideas.
  20. The NeoCynic from Cayman Islands writes: S Armstrong from Toronto:

    Only constructive ideas merit constructive criticism. Florida's thesis has long, long, long ago been debunked by the empirical data. Go, infidel, google and thou shalt see the Light.

    All of the cities Florida has described grandiloquently as economic "powerhouses", - because of their culturally "progressive" policies, i.e. extravagant subsidies for the arts and social "diversity" (read not inconveniently race, class, or ethnic affiliation, but firstly, sexual orientation, in recognition of Florida's constiutuency), -have underperformed the overall growth rate for the US economy.

    He and his laughably obtuse prose will quickly join in the garbage can of history with the likes of such other charlatans and false prophets whose buzz word-de-jour "electrifies' the stupid and the vulgar.

    Anyone recall Alvin Toffler and his "stunning" and "wildly popular" Future Shock schlock? He at least had the sense to plagiarize someone a tad more profound than himself, Heraclitus.

    Florida appears to be merely cribbing from an LBGT screed.
  21. John Smith from Canada writes: Good god, Toffler and Future Shock. I am afraid and have to date myself and admit I remember. Albeit, I was only 12 and therefore had some rationale for being bedazzled. In fairness to Tofler, he was a futurist and as the history of the future has taught us, most get it wrong. S. Armstrong, just what is unconstructive about Neo-Cynics comments? I would suggest he, in a rather devastating fashion, stips the much esteemed and praised Mr. Florida bare for all to see. If I was to quibble with Neo-Cynic, it is with regard to Richard Florida's concept of "tolerance". It is a fluffy concept aligned purely with notions of identify politics that is barren of any philosophy of social justice and equity. Interestingly, when David Hulchanski and others at U of T produced a map showing Toronto as "three cities" with increasing socio-economic segreation (ala U.S. at its worst), Mr. Florida responded with a column so lacking in substance I struggled to understand what he was attempting to say about a dangerous 30 year trend. I finally realized that the problem was not my incapacity to understand what Richard Florida was trying to say, but rather, that Mr. Florida was vacant of meaningful ideas and was hiding behind a veil of puffery. Richard Florida, the only man in Toronto who considers Rosedale to be a "nice family neighbourhood" rather than a historically exclusive socio-economic enclave (as he described it in his introductory G&M interview). He has taken what was a moderately interesting idea, sprinkled with pop culture, and spun it out into a small lucrative industry. He stroked the elite of Toronto/Ontario very nicely indeed.
  22. Barrie Ward from Weldon Saskatchewan, Canada writes: There are no words that I can come up with that would carry the weight and self-evident truth of what Neo-Cynic has so eruditely laid down..... So I won't!
  23. The NeoCynic from Cayman Islands writes:

    John SMith:

    "He stroked the elite of Toronto/Ontario very nicely indeed."

    LOL! Go read Tom Wolfe's "Radical Chic & Mau-Mauing the Flak Catchers", a hilarious and savage portrait of the so-called "politically progressive" in the 1970s. It is a true scream to read of New York's Limousine Liberals gamely hosting at Carl Bernstein's swank "pad" a soiree with a real live official Black Panther as guest of honour, "rapping" with Honkies about the pity of his continuing enslavement and their financial obligations.

    As always, the culturally clueless and insecure "elite" of Hog Town is ever in slavish imitation of an antiquated image of New York. Only today, I guess, it is a Pink Panther they are caught foolishly hosting, -so to speak.
  24. John Smith from Canada writes: Neo-Cynic, have indeed read it and agree. My only issue is Tom Wolfe so desparately wanted to be (and was) a part of what he accurately critiqued and satatized.

    Essential foundation reading is Veblen's "The Theory of the Leisure Class", with "The Rebel Sell" as a chaser. The latter faithfully updating the critical Veblian social economics planks of conspicuous leisure, conspicuous consumption and canons of good taste in 21st century "counter-culture" terms.

    One can never read the term "authenticity" again without holding back the laughter. It makes it amusingly difficult to walk along Queen Street West I might add.
  25. Frank Godfrey from Canada writes: Funny that most of the posters here, juiced by the incomparable neo-cynic, are merely regurgitating received ideas about Ontario and Toronto. Quite ironic that you folks rise up in indignation to lambast Florida for saying nothing new.
  26. James P from Spruce Grove, Canada writes: The people of Toronto must agree with most of what Florida writes. Starting with the mayor...High taxes and then spend on attracting the elitists . I'm not saying it works, since they overlook that the populists that are striving to be elitists can only hold on to that `dream`for so long until they realize that they are in fact just common and then go back to being populists.
  27. Michael Sharp from Victoria, Canada writes:

    Toronto sucks.

    And so endeth the debate.
  28. Don Micheals from Canada writes: Give it a rest Richard Florida! The Greeks espoused similar ideas, but much more eloquently, thousands of years ago. Except they called it the Agora as opposed to Toronto's Creative Class.
    The striking similarity is that what Florida and the ancient Greeks both describe is an elitist, class-based society that can only survive on the fruits of the labours of the uninitiated masses.
    HMMMmmm! Could that be why Toronto courts and supports him?
  29. Go Oilers Go! from Canada writes: "In this passage, he describes how this “geographic clustering” is dictated by five basic personality traits: openness to experience, conscientiousness, extroversion, agreeableness and neuroticism." Geographic clustering, or cities as we call them today, are dictated by the availability of work. No available work no city. The rest of Florida's garble is just space filler to justify his job.
  30. scamp the from Canada writes:
    I personally love his emphasis on praising the high-tech worker. The innovative mind. Yet he ignores reality.

    Somehow RIM was founded in waterloo, not Toronto.
    As a matter of fact, what innovative companies are in Toronto...my mind seems to draw a blank. They all seem to flee Toronto. Most now preferring Markham and the like?

    Perhaps a Canadian anomaly?
    Strange then how the high tech centers are in seattle (0% income tax), texas (0% state income tax), california (well fine they have a high tax rate...but they also have to import almost all their workers :P ).

    Somehow new york isn't on that list.
    Richard florida advocates a money playing society that has enough excess wealth to spend on the arts. The arts are wonderful, but they're hardly a driver of an economy.
  31. Michele K from Ottawa, Canada writes: " The arts are wonderful, but they're hardly a driver of an economy. " I'll say, Scamp. Here in Ottawa our debt-plagued city council has already pledged millions (together with federal and provincial money) to build our 'cultured' class their very own chamber music hall (right around the corner, don't you know, from the under-used NAC, but then this never was about needing a civic facility so much as needing an excuse to sell off the last prime city-owned chunk of downtown real estate to private developers, the music hall being but a face-saving afterthought). Trouble is, despite all that vaunted supposed support our elite class possesses couldn't muster a few million dollars of their own to support the venture, so now guess what - now it's back to our debt-plagued city council, who will no doubt see fit to make up the difference for our poor cultured class, raising taxes on us all so that these poor folks won't have to be seen at a national facility, but can retreat to their own Ottawa-branded (oops, did I say that? that was clearly in error, because despite the fact that the venue will almost certainly be 100% taxpayer-funded, they're still going to sell off naming rights to one of those bigwig private companies - you know - one of the group that wouldn't provide $$ through corporate sponsorship, but will be glad to fork over a few bucks to stamp their name on OUR building) salon. Yes, Ottawa (the city) has clearly bought into the Florida school of entitlement.
  32. Go Oilers Go! from Canada writes: Michele K from Ottawa, Canada writes: "" The arts are wonderful, but they're hardly a driver of an economy. " I'll say, Scamp. Here in Ottawa our debt-plagued city council has already pledged millions (together with federal and provincial money) to build our 'cultured' class their very own chamber music hall" You think that's bad? Two Calgary city councilors just proposed that Calgary requires a Poet Laureate.
  33. Michele K from Ottawa, Canada writes: Hee hee. I don't often agree with your politics, Go Oilers!, but having lived in Calgary (I'll take Edmonton any day), that's definitely worth a giggle. Not that Calgary doesn't have a vibrant cultural community - it does - but poet laureates while citizens struggle with everyday concerns like how to find a place to live does seem a bit 'rich'.

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