2009 - The European Year of Creativity and Innovation sets out to inspire a general rethinking of what creativity and innovation mean and how they contribute to our personal, economic and social development. The idea is a broad one, the words hard to define and, although the field is drawing ever more researchers, for now the results remain difficult to quantify. Yet there is no doubt that if the EU wishes to stay competitive and foster the values shared by its Member States, these issues require exploration.