Creative economy on local territories : Alibaba & Amazon in territorial competition, but in ideological symbiosis to overpass democratic governance

The Alibaba and Amazon groups now dominate the global e-commerce market. One developed its growth from Asia, the other from the USA. In recent years, both these groups have focused their investments on Europe, Middle East and Africa. Although their strategies partly differ, they both territorialise their activities, including IT and logistics, around hubs, sorting centers and warehouse networks. The location of these industrial players often creates tensions on local territories. On the one hand, institutions or public actors are pleased to associate with these economic dynamics, which are considered as an asset for the development and attractiveness of their territory, based on the concept of a bilateral contract. On the other hand, civil society and some elected officials refuse to support development strategies whose socio-economic impacts they consider to be disastrous in terms of environmental, cultural and social issues. They defend the notion of common property. This article presents the results of a research programme conducted in France and Belgium since 2019 to characterize the socio-economic and political economy dimensions of the strategies of these two major industrial players and their effects on territories. We analysed more than 300 press articles in order to analyse the discourse of local stakeholders concerned by projects of territorialisation of Amazon or Alibaba activities. Here, the paradigm of a creative, digitally-based economy and the notions of « ecosystem », « win/win », « attractiveness » appeared central. We then conducted interviews with about thirty of these players in order to understand their relationships to the reconfigurations and interdependencies that are taking place between local territories, states, continents and the world. We show that, beyond their competitive e-commerce and logistics activities and local territorialisations, both Amazon and Alibaba are more broadly aiming for a deep reconfiguration of the rules of international trade. This project is based on economic and customs corridors (including the « New Silk Roads »), but also on contracts with institutions (OECD, WTO), States and governments (eWTP). These contracts are covered by the seal of business secrecy. Their content escapes contradictory public debate. This excludes from any democratic process a set of decisions whose socio-economic impacts are considerable: evolution of the law and forms of work, a unique development model centred on the digital and creative economy, Public/Private partnerships, taxation and taxes, environmental impacts. Our thesis is that the impacts of the digital industrialisation of local and global trade therefore go beyond sales and logistics; the concentration of these markets by two ultra-dominant players defines unbalanced power relations, both material and symbolic, which reconfigure the modalities of governance, public decision-making and management of democracy, notably by obscuring the major challenges facing territories: environment, growing socio-economic inequalities, commoditisation of data. Considered as a dominant contemporary form of capitalism and raising major democratic and environmental issues, the concept of creative economy is based on the creation of market values through the digitalization of any information transfer ; digital platforms have a central role, not only technical but above all political and socio-economical.