Horizons in Human Geography Horizons in Human Geography

Edited by Derek Gregory and Rex Walford

~ MACMIllAN Introduction, selection and editorial matter © Derek Gregory and Rex Walford 1989

Individual chapters (in order) © Michael J. Clark, Alan Wilson, R. J. Johnston, Derek Gregory, John Eyles, Denis Cosgrove, Linda McDowell, Roger Lee, Keith Bassett and John Short, Richard Dennis, Ian Douglas, Doreen Massey and Richard Meegan, John Harriss and Barbara Harriss, Nigel Thrift and Michael Taylor, Peter Taylor, Graham E. Smith, Stuart Corbridge, Judith Rees, Tim O'Riordan, W. R. Mead 1989

All rights reserved. No reproduction, copy or transmission of this publication may be made without written permission. No paragraph of this publication may be reproduced, copied or transmitted save with written permission or in accordance with the provisions of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988, or under the terms of any licence permitting limited copying issued by the Copyright Licensing Agency, 90 Tottenham Court Road, London WIP 9HE. Any person who does any unauthorised act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages.

First published 1989 by MACMILLAN PRESS LTD Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire RG21 6XS and London Companies and representatives throughout the world

ISBN 978-0-333-39612-4 ISBN 978-1-349-19839-9 (eBook) DOI 10.1007/978-1-349-19839-9

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

14 13 12 II 10 9 8 7 6 03 02 01 00 99 98 97 96 95 Contents

Preface XIV Acknowledgements xvi Notes on the Contributors xvii Introduction: Making Geography 1 Derek Gregory and Rex Walford

PART I BEYOND THE QUANTITATIVE REVOLUTION 9 Introduction 11

1.1 Geography and Information Technology 14 Michael 1. Clark Information and a changing world 14 Geographical knowledge and information technology 16 Data acquisition - more of the same? 16 New scales, new worlds 17 Temporal resolution and the prospects for real time knowledge 19 Approaches to the creative handling of multivariate information 21 Some interim conclusions: what role for the geographer now? 21 Power from information 23 What price power? 25 A provisional balance sheet 26 Notes and references 28 Further reading

1.2 Mathematical Models and Geographical Theory 29 Alan Wilson Introduction 29 Location and interaction in geographical theory 30 The contribution of the classical theorists 31 Agriculture 32 Industrial location 32 Residential location 32 Services 32 vi Contents

Settlement patterns 32 The limitations of the classical theorists 35 Mathematical models and better theory 37 The range of methods 37 Spatial interaction and location 37 Application of spatial interaction concepts 38 Structure and dynamics 39 Applications in different fields of geographical theory 41 Implications for geographical teaching and research 41 Notes and references 47 Further reading 47

1.3 Philosophy, Ideology and Geography 48 R. J. Johnston Knowledge and society 48 A starting-point 49 From description to scientific explanation 50 Are physical and human geography commensurate? 53 The problem of membership laws 54 The problem of functional laws 56 The empirical, the actual and the real 57 And ideology? 61 Geographers in debate 64 Notes and references 65 Further reading 66

1.4 Areal Differentiation and Post-Modern Human Geography 67 Derek Gregory Post-modernism 67 Geography and political economy 72 The limits of capital 73 Spatial divisions of labour 75 The contours of political economy 76 Geography and sociology 78 The time-space constitution of social life 79 The dissolution of the social 83 Geography and anthropology 85 Ethnography and writing cultures 85 Experiments in ethnography 87 Post-modernism? 91 Notes and references 92 Further reading 95 Contents vii

PART II PEOPLE AND PLACES, SOCIETIES AND SPACES 97

Introduction 99

2.1 The Geography of Everyday Life 102 John Eyles The nature of everyday life 102 The parameters of everyday life 104 Change in everyday life 106 Place in everyday life 108 Time and space in everyday life 111 Behaviour and time-space routines 111 Meanings and symbolic landscapes 112 Context and constraints in everyday life 113 Conclusions 115 Notes and references 116 Further reading 117

2.2 Geography is Everywhere: Culture and Symbolism in Human Landscapes 118 Denis Cosgrove Meanings and landscapes 118 Landscape 121 Culture 122 Culture and consciousness 123 Culture and nature 123 Culture and power 124 Symbol 125 Reading symbolic landscapes 126 Decoding symbolic landscapes: some examples 127 Landscapes of dominant culture 128 Alternative landscapes 131 Notes and references 134 Further reading 135

2.3 Women, Gender and the Organisation of Space 136 Linda McDowell Hidden from geography? 136 Why now? 137 Add women and stir? 140 Welfare geography: access to facilities 140 Women and urban land use 142 Women and the changing shape of the labour market 144 Vlll Contents

Feminist geography 147 Doing feminist geography 149 Notes and references 150 Further reading 151

2.4 Social Relations and the Geography of Material Life 152 Roger Lee Down the Telegraph Road: a naive historical geography 153 Beyond the Telegraph Road 155 Social relations and societal development 155 Social relations and geography 157 Social relations and the state 162 The geographical shape of contemporary society 164 Industrialisation and urbanisation 164 The world-economy 167 Notes and references 168 Further reading 169

PART III EXPLORATIONS IN THE CITY 171

Introduction 173

3.1 Development and Diversity in Urban Geography 175 Keith Bassett and John Short Contexts of change 175 Theoretical approaches 1965-1985 176 The first wave 178 The ecological approach 178 The new urban economics 178 The behavioural approach 179 The second wave 180 Neo-Marxist approaches 180 The neo-Weberian approach 186 Humanist approaches 188 Which way for urban geography? 189 Growth and fragmentation 189 The excavation of philosophical underpinnings 190 Integration into the social science mainstream 190 The uncertain status of urban geography 190 The future: convergence or complementarity? 192 Notes and references 192 Further reading 193 Contents ix

3.2 Dismantling the Barriers: Past and Present in Urban Britain 194 Richard Dennis Introduction 194 The past in the present 196 Understanding the past 197 An example: housing and mobility 198 Experiencing the past 200 Social structure and spatial structure 202 Housing classes 206 Afterword 212 A note on sources 212 Notes and references 212 Further reading 214

3.3 The Rain on the Roof: A Geography of the Urban Environment 217 Ian Douglas The future urban geography 217 The urban habitat 218 Urbanisation and the environment 219 Control and the urban physical system 221 The evolution of the urban environment: the case of Manchester 224 Phases of system modification 228 A programme for urban physical geography 228 Micro-scale 229 Meso-scale 229 Macro-scale 232 Mega-scale 233 The historical dimension 233 Conclusion 236 Further reading 238

PART IV LANDSCAPES OF PRODUCTION 239

Introduction 241

4.1 Spatial Divisions of Labour in Britain 244 Doreen Massey and Richard Meegan Introduction 244 Spatial divisions of labour: some underlying principles 245 From industrialisation to decline 247 Industrial Revolution and sectoral spatial concentration 247 The Depression and uneven development 248 Post-war rounds of investment 249 x Contents

The last twenty years 251 Decline and decentralisation 251 Changing forms of inequality 255 Further reading 257

4.2 Agrarian Transformation in the Third World 258 John Harriss and Barbara Harriss Peasant production and economic development 258 Structural transformation and the dissolution of peasant production 259 Commercialisation and peasant production 260 The process of differentiation 262 The Green Revolution and the differentiation of the peasantry 263 The logic of peasant production and its survival in Western and Eastern Europe 267 Pauperisation and the peasantry in the Third World 269 Merchant capital 270 The economic growth linkages of agriculture 272 Production and reproduction 272 Food crises 273 Conclusion 274 Notes and references 275 Further reading 278

4.3 Battleships and Cruisers: The New Geography of Multinational Corporations 279 Nigel Thrift and Michael Taylor Introduction 279 Why are multinational corporations so important? 281 Economic power 281 Political power 283 The reactions of multinational corporations to the world economic crisis 284 How the war was won 286 Strategies 286 Outcomes 287 From battleship to cruiser: global corporations 289 The costs for local economies 291 Conclusion: export and survive? 294 Notes and references 294 Further reading 297 Contents xi

PART V REGIONAL GEOGRAPHIES AND GLOBAL PERSPECTIVES 299

Introduction 301

5.1 The Error of Developmentalism in Human Geography 303 Peter Taylor Geography and the global perspective 303 The world is not a ladder 304 Optimism and the social sciences 304 Developmentalism and modernisation 305 Critique and crisis in the social sciences 306 Ladders in human geography 308 Transport networks 309 Primate cities 310 The mobility transition 310 Neither snakes nor ladders but tadpoles 311 Wot, no ladders! 313 An example: urbanisation and world systems 314 Conclusion 317 Notes and references 318 Further reading 319

5.2 Privilege and Pla('e in Soviet Society 320 Graham E. Smith Regional geographies and world systems 320 Territorial power and the Soviet state 323 The transition to socialism 325 The territorial administration of privilege 328 Educational opportunities 332 Occupational opportunities 333 The creation of new socio-technical groupings 335 Implications for territorial stability 337 Conclusion 338 Notes and references 339 Further reading 340

5.3 Debt, the Nation-State and Theories of the World Economy 341 Stuart Corbridge Perspectives on global development 341 The economic right and the debt crisis 343 Brandt II: common crisis 346 Private capital markets 346 xii Contents

International monetarism 347 The debt crisis 350 Proposals 351 Parboni and inter-imperialism 352 American financial strategy 353 Towards a geopolitical economy 357 Notes and references 359 Further reading 360

PART VI POLITICISING THE ENVIRONMENT 361

Introduction 363

6.1 Natural Resources, Economy and Society 364 Judith Rees The nature of resources 365 Resource types 367 The resource scarcity debate 370 Physical scarcities 371 Physical scarcities: a Third World perspective 378 Geopolitically induced scarcities 380 The question of international distributive equity 389 Notes and references 392 Further reading 394

6.2 Politics, Practice and the New Environmentalism 395 Timothy 0'Riordan Introduction 395 A tale of two farmers 395 Commentary 397 The Tasmanian Wilderness and the Franklin Dam 400 Commentary 401 Nuclear waste and the politics of environmental risk 403 Commentary 404 The loss of tropical forest 407 Commentary 407 Geography and the new environmentalism 412 Notes and references 412 Further reading 414 Contents xiii

EPILOGUE 415 Bill Mead

Author Index 419 Subject Index 424 Preface

It is now more than twenty years since Richard Chorley and Peter Haggett compiled their path-breaking survey of Frontiers in Geographical Teaching (1965), which, together with Models in Geography published just two years later (1967), did so much to consolidate the foundations of what had come to be called the 'New Geography'. The intervening two decades have seen further (and, on occasion, dramatically different) developments in the discipline. Indeed, one of the lasting contributions of both Frontiers and Models was to recognise and welcome change as the very life-blood of intellectual inquiry. To be sure, many of these changes collided awkwardly with individuals, institutions and even governments which, in their various ways, sought to impose some sort of stability or direction - a semblance of order- on the shifting kaleidoscope of discovery and debate. But there can be no doubt that since 1965 geography has continued (and is continuing) to change, and Horizons in Human Geography and Horizons in Physical Geography are intended to introduce some of the most exciting challenges of the contemporary subject to a wider audience. Like Frontiers, the Horizons volumes are directed primarily at teachers, although we naturally hope for a wider readership. We regard geography in the schools and geography in the colleges, polytechnics and universities as parts of a corporate project. Their aims and audiences are of course different, and it would be quite wrong to think of school geography as no more than a conveyor belt into further and higher education. But each has a measure of responsibility for the other, and we hope that the contributions of these volumes will help to promote a sustained dialogue between them. For all that they have in common, however, these two books depart from the original volumes in a number of ways which we want to signpost in advance. In the first place, we have accepted that geography is a bipolar subject - like so many others - and we have therefore divided the contribu• tions into human geography and physical geography. Some will no doubt regard this as a betrayal of the integrity of the subject, others as a mere convenience which reflects little more than the conventions of teaching and research. We see it, rather, as a way of drawing attention to the substantial differences between a human geography modelled on the humanities and the social sciences and a physical geography modelled on the natural sciences. This is not to say that there are no contacts or connections between the two, xiv Preface xv and we have attempted to chart some of the most important in both volumes. But we believe that the differences which remain - between a human geography which, as one of its central tasks, has to make sense of a 'preinterpreted' world which is intrinsically meaningful to the people who live within it, and a physical geography which seeks to explain a shifting, changing but none the less 'object' world - are of vital significance to the future development of both human and physical geographies. That some of the most exciting developments in geography lie now, as they have for the past century, at the point where these two worlds and their different intellectual traditions intersect strengthens rather than weakens the case for a bipolar approach. The integrities of each must be respected, not erased by the casual translation of one into the other. In the second place, and in addition to these differences between the two volumes, there are differences within them. Neither has been conceived as a manifesto for some new orthodoxy. Each essay is of its author's making, and although we have drawn contributors' attention to cross-references and cross-connections, we have deliberately made no attempt to ensure uniform• ity of viewpoint. Common threads do emerge, but these have not been imposed by editorial design. One of the hallmarks of geography today, and a sign of its maturity, is its diversity. For this reason we have not aimed at an encyclopaedic coverage, but have preferred instead to identify a series of key topics and themes to be approached by different authors from different perspectives. These themes, and the structures that they create, are of course editorial artifacts, and should not be taken to represent a fixed or self-evident map of geography's intellectual landscape. It is, after all, a characteristic of a kaleidoscope that its component parts can build an infinite number of different but often equally satisfying patterns. The result, we believe, is thought-provoking testimony to the continuing power of that deep-rooted 'concern' for geography which Haggett and Chorley accentuated in the 1960s, and of their own reminder that 'to stand still is to retreat'.

Cambridge, Southampton and Michael Clark British Columbia Kenneth Gregory Derek Gregory Angela Gurnell Rex Walford Acknowledgements

The authors and publishers wish to thank the following who have kindly given permission for the use of copyright material:

Edward Arnold (Publishers) Ltd for figure 5.7 of Locational Models by P. Haggett, A. D. Cliff and A. Frey, 1977 (Figure 1.2.5). Associated Book Publishers (UK) Ltd for figures 2.1 (p.13), 2.3 (p.23), 2.7 (p.32), 2.8 (p.36), 3.5 (p.81), Table 3.7 (p.95) from Natural Resources: Allocation Economics and Policy by Judith Rees, Methuen and Co. (Figures 6.1.1, 6.1.5, 6.1.6,6.1.8,6.1.9 and Table 6.1.2). Blackwell Publishers Ltd, Oxford, for a diagram from The Limits to Capital by D. Harvey (Figure 3.1.3). W. H. Freeman & Company for illustration by Jerome Kuhl from 'The Carbon Dioxide Question' by George M. Woodwell, Scientific American, 238 (I) January 1978 (Figure 6.1.4). International Energy Agency for diagram on changing trends of oil and gas imports, production and consumption, 1974-83, from Quarterly Oil and Gas Statistics of OECD Countries, lEA Paris, 1984 (Figure 6.1.7). Museum of London for Plate 3.2.2, 'Peabody Square'. Ohio State University Press for figures 5A, 5C and 10D from 'Dynamic models of agricultural location in a spatial interaction framework' by A. G. Wilson and M. Birkin, Geographical Analysis, vol. 19, no.l, January, 1987. Copyright © 1987 by the Ohio State University Press (Figures 1.2.6 and 1.2.7). Regional Science Research Institute for figure 2 from 'Dynamics of Urban spatial structure: progress and problems' by M. Clarke and A. G. Wilson, Journal of Regional Science, 23, 1983 (Figure 1.2.8) Rondor Music (London) Ltd for 'Telegraph Road' by Mark Knopfler, Rondor Music (London) Ltd Chariscourt Ltd (in Chapter 2.4). Every effort has been made to trace all the copyright-holders, but if any have been inadvertently overlooked the publishers will be pleased to make the necessary arrangement at the first opportunity. xvi Notes on the Contributors

Bassett, Keith Lecturer in Geography, University of Bristol Clark, Michael Lecturer in Geography, University of Southampton Corbridge, Stuart Lecturer in Geography, University of Cambridge Cosgrove, Denis Lecturer in Geography, Loughborough University of Technology Dennis, Richard Lecturer in Geography, University College, London Douglas, Ian Professor of Physical Geography, University of Manchester Eyles, John Associate Professor of Geography, McMaster University, Ontario Gregory, Derek Professor of Geography, University of British Columbia at Vancouver Harriss, Barbara Lecturer in Agricultural Economics, University of Oxford Harriss, John Senior Lecturer in Development Studies, University of East AngJia Johnston, R. J. Professor of Geography, University of Sheffield Lee, Roger Senior Lecturer in Geography, Queen Mary College, London Massey, Doreen Professor of Geography, The Open University McDowell, Linda Lecturer in Geography, The Open University Mead, Bill Emeritus Professor of Geography, University College, London Meegan, Richard CES Ltd. O'Riordan, Timothy Professor of Environmental Studies, University of East Anglia Rees, Judith Lecturer in Geography, London School of Economics Short, John Lecturer in Geography, University of Reading Smith, Graham Lecturer in Geography, University of Cambridge Taylor, Michael Bureau of Transport and Communications Economics, Canberra Taylor, Peter Senior Lecturer in Geography, University of Newcastle upon Tyne Thrift, Nigel Reader in Geography, University of Bristol Walford, Rex Lecturer in Education, University of Cambridge Wilson, Alan Professor of Urban and Regional Geography, University of Leeds

xvii Derek Gregory is Professor of Geography at the University of British Columbia and was formerly Lecturer in Geography at the University of Cambridge and a Fellow of Sidney Sussex College. His teaching and research interests are in social theory and human geography and in the historical geography of Britain and North America. He is the author of Ideology, Science and Human Geography, Regional Transformation and Industrial Revolution and The Geographical Imagination, and co-editor of Social Relations and Spatial Structure (with John Urry) and The Dictionary of Human Geography (with R. J. Johnston and David M. Smith).

Rex Walford was both a schoolteacher and a lecturer in a teacher education college before becoming University Lecturer in Geography and Education at the University of Cambridge. He is a Fellow of Wolfson College, Cambridge. When the Council of British Geography was formed in 1988, he became the first Chairman. He is a Vice-President of the Royal Geographical Society, Chairman of the RGS Education Committee, and a Past President of The Geographical Association. He edited both New Directions in Geography Teaching and Signposts For Geography Teaching and has written several books about the use of games and simulations as a teaching technique. He chaired the Geographical Association Working Party which produced the Report, Geographical Education for a Multi-Cultural Society.