Already in the first half of the twentieth century the term ‘cultural industry’ was coined. Theodor Adorno and Max Horkheimer, two scholars from the so-called Frankfurt School, heavily criticised the rise of a standardised mass culture, which in their eyes played down all oppositional expressions, styles and cultural practices. Today, the cultural or creative industries are usually thought of in a much more positive way. Many scholars and policy makers believe that in contemporary urban economies the creative industries are just the growth sector that cities need.

However, the cultural or creative industries are not a self-evident economic sector. Allen Scott’s definition prevails in economic geography. He specifies the cultural economy as

“represented by sectors (equivalently, cultural-products industries) that produce goods and services whose subjective meaning, or, more narrowly, sign-value to the consumer, is high in comparison with their utilitarian purpose”.

Richard Caves comes up with a similar, but less pronounced definition of creative industries, stating that those industries

“supply goods and services that we broadly associate with cultural, artistic, or simply entertainment value. They include book and magazine publishing, the visual arts (painting and sculpture), the performing arts (theatre, opera, concerts, dance), sound recordings, cinema and TV films, even fashion and toys and games”.

Andy Pratt brings together different definitions in the circumscription of the cultural industries as

“the part of the economy concerned with the production of cultural artefacts: film, television, music, publishing, dance, theatre, painting and sculpture”.

To Ruth Towse

“a unifying feature of the cultural industries is that at their core is creativity protected by copyright”.

The British Creative Industries Task Force tells that creative industries are

“those industries that have their origin in individual creativity, skill and talent and which have a potential for wealth and job creation through the generation and exploitation of intellectual property”.

The Task Force introduced the following classification of creative industries:

- Advertising
- Architecture
- Crafts and designer furniture
- Fashion clothing
- Film, video and other audiovisual production
- Graphic design
- Educational and leisure software
- Live and recorded music
- Performing arts and entertainments
- Television, radio and internet broadcasting
- Visual arts and antiques
- Writing and publishing

Despite ongoing debates about the definition and classification of creative industries, many cities, regions and nation-states are actively developing project and policies to strengthen the creative industries.