This essay aims to generate reflections on the role of governance and placemaking in fostering responses between the State, society, and territorial development, based on creative cities seeking this distinction. The research is qualitative, and for this purpose, bibliographic reviews of an interpretative nature were carried out on the themes: territorial development; governance; creativity; and placemaking. When discussing development, especially in creative cities, two types of orientation stand out. One that reproduces the traditional capitalist model and another that is based on solidarity. As one of the results, it was observed that the technological transformations of the contemporary environment demanded entrepreneurial and innovative actions, involving the cooperation of local actors for territorial development through governance and placemaking. The conclusions indicate that to understand territorial development, it is necessary to understand the dynamics and articulations among local actors. In addition, they show that governance and placemaking are relevant tools nowadays to deal with different issues, such as socio-spatial inequalities in cities that are (or seek to be) creative in terms of effectiveness in their respective territories.

Original paper published in: https://revista.ioles.com.br/boca/index.php/revista/article/view/801/552 Acknowledgments to the Research Support Foundation of the State of Minas Gerais – FAPEMIG (Process APQ-04471-22), the National Council for Scientific and Technological Development of Brazil - CNPq (Processes 404606/2021-0; 04193/2022-6; 20194 /2022-3; 312764/2022-7; 403139/2022-8), and the Coordination for the Improvement of Higher Education Personnel (CAPES), Code Financing 001, Ministry of Education, Brazil.