Urban tourism and the politic of creative class: a study of the chefs in Macao

Creative people are now defined as a new emerging collective, the creative class. In the context of destination tourism discussion of creative class is usually interpreted as being about a special consumer group. On the other side, an emerging body of tourism literature reveals the primacy of foodservice to the broader tourism experience as ‘the growth engine of the post-industrial city.’ This study identified that the creative class, the human resource in city area, positively influences local society and economic development. And this study affirms that chefs as one of the creative people in tourism development are an important resource. For further research into the creative class, the authors invite studies which are relative to the occupation of cookery from the perspectives of both the producers themselves and their consumers that may yield further interesting theoretical and practical applications. Investigating creativity, which contains dimensions with various antecedents and determinants, including creativity requirements in job description and design, may highlight the gap between the perceptions held towards the occupation of cookery and the reality of working within it.