Beyond Territory

The main purpose of the book is to discuss new trends in the dynamic geography of innovation and argue that in an era of increasing globalization, two trends seem quite dominant: rigid territorial models of innovation, and localized configurations of innovative activities. The book brings together scholars who are working on these topics. Rather than focusing on established concepts and theories, the book aims to question narrow explanations, rigid territorializations, and simplistic policy frameworks; it provides evidence that innovation, while not exclusively dependent on regional contexts, can be influenced by place-specific attributes. The book will bring together new empirical and conceptual work by an interdisciplinary group of leading scholars from areas such as economic geography, innovation studies, and political science. Based on recent discussions surrounding innovation systems of different types, it aims to synthesize state-of-the-art know-how and provide new perspectives on the role of innovation and knowledge creation in the global political economy.

Provides a focus on the planet’s elements, environments, and edges, to extend our understanding of territory to the dynamic, contentious spaces of contemporary politics.

Topologies of Power amounts to a radical departure in the way that power and space have been understood. It calls into question the very idea that power is simply extended across a given territory or network, and argues that power today has a new found ‘reach’. Topological shifts have subtly altered the reach of power, enabling governments, corporations and NGOs alike to register their presence through quieter, less brash forms of power than domination or overt control. In a world in which proximity and distance increasingly play across one another, topology offers an insight into how power remains continuous under transformation: the same but different in its ability to shape peoples’ lives. Drawing upon a range of political, economic and cultural illustrations, the book sets out a clear and accessible account of the topological workings of power in the contemporary moment. It will be invaluable for both students and academics in human geography, politics, sociology, and cultural studies.

How should we think about politics in a world where ecological problems - from the deforestation of the Amazon to acid rain - transcend national boundaries? This is the timely and important question addressed by Thom Kuehls in Beyond Sovereign Territory. Contending that the sovereign territorial state is not adequate to contain or describe the boundaries of ecopolitics, the author reorients our thinking about government, nature, and politics. Kuehls argues that changes in technology and the scope of governmental aims have rendered conventional ecological and internationalist aims anachronistic - and ultimately ineffective - in the face of impending environmental collapse. He questions the process by which land is transformed into an object of sovereignty - into "territory" - demonstrating how representations of political space that are premised on territorial sovereignty fail to come to terms with much of what is involved in ecopolitics. Ultimately, Kuehls critiques an orientation that privileges a certain utilitarian relationship between humans and nonhuman nature, one in which the earth is largely interpreted as given to humans. Deeply humanistic and challenging conventional wisdom, Beyond Sovereign Territory will be of interest to readers of environmental politics, geography, international politics, and political theory.

In this volume, ten anthropologists and geographers critically address traditional Mathusian discourses in essays that attempt to move 'beyond territory and scarcity'.

In this groundbreaking exploration of in-flight cinema, Stephen Groening traces the history of this transnational cinematic practice. At once a history of exhibition and an inquiry into changing forms of media and spectatorship, this interdisciplinary book opens up new directions in the history of cinema, visuality, travel and cultural geography.

An analysis of international human rights law's applicability and effectiveness in geographic areas where the State has lost territorial control.

Advancing a new relationship between architecture and nature, Territory emphasises the simultaneous production of architectural objects and the environment surrounding them. Conceptualised within a framework that draws from physical and human geographical thought, this title of Architectural Design examines the possibility of an architecture that actively produces its external, ecological conditions. The architecture here scans and modifies atmospheres, arboreal zones, geothermal exchange, magnetic fields, habitats and toxicities – enabling new and intense geographical patterns, effects and sensations within architectural and urban experience. Territory charts out a space, a territory, for architecture beyond conceptualisations of context or environment, understood as that stable setting which pre-exists the production of new things. Ultimately, it suggests a role for architecture as a strategy of environmental tinkering versus one of accommodation or balance with an external natural world.