Mapping crowdfunding in cultural and creative industries: A conceptual and empirical overview

The landscape of cultural and creative industries (CCIs) has been changing strongly because of new players who have entered the arena by reshaping financing strategies. This work represents a first attempt to describe and compare the European population of crowdfunding platforms used by firms and creatives to launch cultural and creative projects. Specifically, we provide an assessment of how and where cultural crowdfunding platforms emerge. We also explore the extent to which government expenditures on cultural services in the EU affect crowdfunding platform origin and development, finding evidence that cultural crowdfunding is more developed when public engagement in promoting CCIs is high. In contrast, we find evidence of a strong substitution effect when the attractiveness of a country for other alternative funding sources is low. The results reveal that the number of successfully funded projects is higher when the platform is not dedicated exclusively to cultural and creative projects. Finally, higher information transparency and the use of social networks foster the platform's operational performance.