Contentious Geographies


Book Description

The human-environment relationship - intimately intertwined and often contentious - is one of the most pressing concerns of the 21st century. Explored through an array of critical approaches, this book brings together case studies from across the globe to present significant cutting-edge research into political ecologies as they relate to multi-form contestations over environments, resources and livelihoods. Covering a range of issues, such as popular discourses of environmental 'collapse', climate change, water resource struggles, displacement, agro-food landscapes and mapping technologies, this edited volume works to provide a broad and critical understanding of the narratives and policies more subtly shaping and being shaped by underlying environmental conflicts. By exploring the power-laden processes by which environmental knowledge is generated, framed, communicated and interpreted, Contentious Geographies works to reveal how environmental conflicts can be (re)considered and thus (re)opened to enhance efforts to negotiate more sustainable environments and livelihoods.




The New Geographies of Energy


Book Description

The New Geographies of Energy: Assessment and Analysis of Critical Landscapes is a pioneering collection of new geographic scholarship. It examines such vitally important research topics as energy dilemmas of the United States, large trends and patterns of energy consumption including China’s role, "peak oil", energy poverty, and ethanol and other renewable energy sourcing. The book offers advances in key emerging areas of energy research, each distinguished in the following sections: (i) geographic approaches to energy modeling and assessment; (ii) fossil fuel landscapes; (iii) the landscapes of renewable energy; (iv) landscapes of energy consumption; and (v) an overview of the new geographies of energy (Karl Zimmerer, Annals Nature-Society and Energy issue editor) and an essay on America’s oil dependency (Vaclav Smil, renowned energy geographer). In addition there is a specially commissioned book review. This book was published as a special issue of the Annals of the Association of American Geographers.




The Ashgate Research Companion to Critical Geopolitics


Book Description

Since the late 1980s, critical geopolitics has gone from being a radical critical perspective on the disciplines of political geography and international relations theory to becoming a recognised area of research in its own right. Influenced by poststructuralist concerns with the politics of representation, critical geopolitics considers the ways in which the use of particular discourses shape political practices. Initially critical geopolitics analysed the practical geopolitical language of the elites and intellectuals of statecraft. Subsequent iterations have considered the role that popular representations of the international political world play. As critical geopolitics has become a more established part of political geography it has attracted ever more critique: from feminists for its apparent blindness to the embodied effects of geopolitical praxis and from those who have been uncomfortable about its textual focus, while others have challenged critical geopolitics to address alternative, resistant forms of geopolitical practice. Again, critical geopolitics has been reworked to incorporate these challenges and the latest iterations have encompassed normative agendas, non-representational theory, emotional geographies and affect. It is against the vibrant backdrop of this intellectual development of critical geopolitics as a subdiscipline that this Companion is set. Bringing together leading researchers associated with the different forms of critical geopolitics, this volume produces an overview of its achievements, limitations, and areas of new and potential future development. The Companion is designed to serve as a key resource for an interdisciplinary group of scholars and practitioners interested in the spatiality of politics.




The SAGE Handbook of Economic Geography


Book Description

"This timely volume comprehensuvely summerises the various approaches to research that have come to constitute contemporary economic geography. Expert assessments provide a lively sense of the research frontier making this essential reading for all who seek to understand and appreciate the field." - Eric Sheppard, University of Minnesota "One of the best economic georgraphy texts in recent years, covering both the history of the discipline and outlining areas for future research... The quality of the chapters remains high throughout and many can and should remain as future reference for research and/or teaching." - Pedro Marques, Journal of Economic Geography What difference does it make to think about the economy in geographical terms? The SAGE Handbook of Economic Geography illustrates the significance of thinking the ′economy′ and the ′economic′ geographically. It identifies significant stages in the discipline′s development, and focuses on the key themes and ideas that inform present thinking. Organised in sections with multiple chapters, The SAGE Handbook of Economic Geography is a complete overview of the discipline that critically assesses: Location, the quantitative revolution and the ′new economic geography′ Geographies of globalization and capitalism Geographies of scale/place and the local/global Geographies of nature, agriculture, sustainable development and the political ecology Geographies of uneven development, economic decline, and money and finance Geographies of consumption and services Geographies of regulation and governance, neo-liberalism and welfare. Placing the discipline in vivid historical and contemporary context, The SAGE Handbook of Economic Geography is a timely, essential work for postgraduates, researchers and academics in economic geography.




Spaces of Contention


Book Description

As social movements have become more complex, geographers are increasingly studying the spatial dynamics of collective resistance and sociologists and political scientists increasingly analyzing the role of space, place and scale in contentious political activity. Occupying a position at the intersection of these disciplinary developments, this book brings together leading scholars to examine how social movements have employed spatial practices to respond to and shape changing social and political contexts. It is organised into three main sections: (1) Place, Space and Mobility: sites of mobilization and regulation, (2) Scale and Territory: structuring collective interests, identities, and resources, and (3) Networks: connecting actors and resources across space. It concludes by suggesting that different spatialities (place, scale, networks) interlink within one another in particular instances of collective action, playing distinctive yet complementary roles in shaping how these actions unfold in the political arena. By mapping state of the art conceptual and empirical terrain across Geography, Sociology, and Political Science, 'Spaces of Contention' provides readers with a much needed guide to innovative research on the spatial constitution of social movements and how social movements tactically and strategically approach and produce space.




Geographical Information Systems Theory, Applications and Management


Book Description

This book constitutes the thoroughly refereed proceedings of the 4th International Conference on Geographical Information Systems Theory, Applications and Management, GISTAM 2018, held in Funchal, Madeira, Portugal, in March 2018. The 7 revised full papers presented were carefully reviewed and selected from 58 submissions. The papers are centered on urban and regional planning; water information systems; geospatial information and technologies; spatio-temporal database management; decision support systems; energy information systems; GPS and location detection.




Regional Worlds: Advancing the Geography of Regions


Book Description

A key concern in the debate and empirical research on the geography of regions is the evolution of the conceptualizations and practical uses of the idea of ‘region’. This idea prioritises both the intellectual and the practical development of regional studies. This book drives the discussion further. It stresses the complex forms of agency/advocacy involved in the production and reproduction of regional spaces and space of regionalism as well as the importance of geohistory and context. The book moves beyond the territorial/relational divide that has characterized debates on regions and regional borders since the 1990s. The contributors answer key questions from different conceptual and concrete-contextual angles and to motivate readers to reflect on the perpetual significance of regional concepts and how they are mobilized by various actors to maintain or transform the contested spatialities of societal power relations. This book was based on a special issue of Regional Studies.




Worldwide Knowledge?


Book Description

Putting forward a comprehensive view of knowledge with a specific perspective on place and space, this book provides a new perspective on the globalisation of knowledge. Crossing disciplinary boundaries, the principal agenda of this volume is to open up a perspective ’beyond knowledge’ - i.e. beyond the interpretation of knowledge as scientific-technical knowledge. Author Martina Fuchs introduces further kinds of knowledge and interpretation which influence managements’ perception of globalisation and therefore the knowledge which is going global. She refers to knowledge in the sense of experiences, competencies in the production and labour process, as well as mutually shared mental constructs which are embedded in a context of understanding and interpretation. Exploring beyond the meaning of worldwide knowledge as general open access knowledge, this book also discusses barriers to knowledge, problems of transfer, and the influence of governance and control.




Geography and the Political Imaginary in the Novels of Toni Morrison


Book Description

This book examines Toni Morrison’s fiction as a sustained effort to challenge the dominant narratives produced in the white supremacist political imaginary and conceptualize a more inclusive political imaginary in which black bodies are valued. Herman Beavers closely examines politics of scale and contentious politics in order to discern Morrison's larger intent of revealing the deep structure of power relations in black communities that will enable them to fashion counterhegemonic projects. The volume explores how Morrison stages her ruminations on the political imaginary in neighborhoods or small towns; rooms, houses or streets. Beavers argues that these spatial and domestic geographies are sites where the management of traumatic injury is integral to establishing a sense of place, proposing these “tight spaces” as sites where narratives are produced and contested; sites of inscription and erasure, utterance and silence.




Land Use Competition


Book Description

This book contributes to broadening the interdisciplinary knowledge basis for the description, analysis and assessment of land use practices. It presents conceptual advances grounded in empirical case studies on four main themes: distal drivers, competing demands on different scales, changing food regimes and land-water competition. Competition over land ownership and use is one of the key contexts in which the effects of global change on social-ecological systems unfold. As such, understanding these rapidly changing dynamics is one of the most pressing challenges of global change research in the 21st century. This book contributes to a deeper understanding of the manifold interactions between land systems, the economics of resource production, distribution and use, as well as the logics of local livelihoods and cultural contexts. It addresses a broad readership in the geosciences, land and environmental sciences, offering them an essential reference guide to land use competition.