Creativity Understandings, Evolution: from Genius to Creative Systems

The understanding of creativity in the social sciencies became more complex with the course of time. The concepts of creative individual, creative process and environment are discussed. Looking at the environment, distinction was made on three levels: macro, meso and micro. The impact of environments on creativity is analyzed, focusing attention on the collective creativity as the positive micro-environmental factor for innovations. Insights are gained about the tendency to move from an exclusive, elite, narrow concept of creativity, measured by the creation of products and their abundance, towards a broader, democratic concept of everyday creativity of the most people. The conclusion is that the creative industries of the exceptional creativity of genius or talent and mysticism are gradually transformed to broader creativity as the governed system, emphasizing creativity links with internal elements of the system and with the social context