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Imaginative Construction of a Global City as a Strategy for the Growth of Knowledge-based Economies: A Critical Evaluation of the Place-marketing in Singapore  

Park, Bae-Gyoon (Department of Geography Education, Seoul National University)
Publication Information
Journal of the Korean Geographical Society / v.42, no.2, 2007 , pp. 280-294 More about this Journal
Abstract
This paper aims to examine the ways in which the Singaporean government has promoted the "global city" imaging strategy as a means for marketing Singapore. Since the 1990s, Singapore has pursued a place-marketing strategy that aims at imaging itself as a "creative", "culturally vibrant" and "cosmopolitan" global city by utilizing various cultural, tourist and spatial policy measures. It argues that the Singaporean government has promoted this particular imaging strategy under a broader economic resoucturing program, aiming at transforming the Singapore's economy into a "knowledge-driven" one, under which the attraction of international knowledge workers is seen as crucial for the competitiveness and innovation. This paper also discusses the limitations of this strategy, focusing on growing tensions between the global and the local in the Singaporean society and the ways in which the authoritarian and top-down nature of governance have restricted the genuine development of the "culturally vibrant" environment in Singapore.
Keywords
global city; place marketing; creative class; knowledge-based economy; Singapore;
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