Abstract

This chapter offers an account of the relationship between hubs and networks in the creative economy. Reflecting on ethnographic research conducted by the authors in the UK and Italy, the chapter contends that hubs have emerged as heterotopic spaces that fulfil the need of a space where social commitment and entrepreneurial attitude can be nurtured to facilitate social and professional collaboration among workers. Yet, this is often an idealised form of collaboration, which ultimately serves individual rather than common or shared goals. The chapter discusses the irredeemable interaction and intersection between hubs and networks and identifies the emergence of a mode of action that we call ‘collaborative individualism’, which expands the practices of ‘network sociality’ (Wittel, 2001) of creative workers by adding to them in an imaginary communitarian element.