Platform Spaces: cultural entrepreneurship, regional development and open innovation in the Italian context

Italy is currently experiencing a particularly rich period regarding the development of cultural creative entrepreneurships based on social innovation processes both in terms of organization management and the outcomes of local development activities. This contribution intends to overview and frame a new conceptual model for Cultural and Creative Enterprise (CCE) that we call Platform Spaces, distinguished by their capacity to include diverse local actors and the local community, representing a spatial formalization of Open Innovation processes. Following the contextualization and the definition of the problematic dimension of innovation policies and strategies for CCEs in Italy, the paper shows how this model is particularly relevant in delivering support for these activities in an open and inclusive way. From this perspective, the contribution describes how three examples of Platform Spaces have facilitated multi-stakeholder cooperation mechanisms and the engagement of local communities ensuring high accessibility of the activities promoted. With this analysis we want to show how this new conceptual framework can be relevant both in theory and in practice, identifying policy recommendations that can be useful to address the creation of platform spaces.