ABSTRACT
This chapter explores whether the cultural economy is a drain on, or a contributor to, the economy as a whole. It analyzes two different institutional perspectives of United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) and United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) to the cultural economy, that of UNESCO and UNCTAD. UNESCO advocates for the formalisation of informal practices while UNCTAD focuses on measurement and advocacy. The chapter discusses why it matters that different countries continue to use different terms to describe the cultural economy, often without realising the implications of their discursive choices. It argues that the cultural economy– much like culture itself – has globalised, but it has not become homogeneous in the process. The chapter also discusses the way in which UNESCO has opted to approach the cultural economy. The global cultural economy forms the basis in exploring existing diversities of cultural consumption, circulation, and consumption, without presuming the primacy of one model over another.
