Resource peripheries that are geographically remote from ''core economies'' are also peripheral to contemporary theorizing in economic geography, and requires higher profile within economic geography's research agenda. The restructuring qua remapping of resource peripheries is collectively shaped by institutional forces unleashed by postFordism and globalization that are fundamentally different from the restructuring of cores. As industrial regions, resource peripheries must negotiate the imperatives of flexibility and neoliberalism from vulnerable, dependent positions on geographic margins. For many resource peripheries, neoliberalism has been perversely associated with trade protectionism. As resource regions, the restructuring of resource peripheries has been further complicated by resource-cycle dynamics and radically new social attitudes toward the exploitation of resources that have helped spawn the politics of environmentalism and aboriginalism. Trade, environmental, and aboriginal politics have clashed around the world to contest vested industrial interests and remap resource peripheries in terms of their value systems. British Columbia's forest economy illustrates this contested remapping. For two decades, the powerful forces of neoliberalism, environmentalism, and aboriginalism have institutionalized a ''war in the woods'' of British Columbia that is sustained by shared criticism of provincial policy and disagreement over how remapping should proceed. The authority of the provincial government, which controls British Columbia's forests, has been undermined, but it remains vital to socially acceptable remapping. Meanwhile, the enduring war in the woods testifies that geography matters on the periphery.
Theorizing in economic geography has focused on core regions, industrial and non-industrial, old and new. Indeed, contemplation of the idea of globalization has reinforced this quest. This paper disputes this blinkered thinking that peripheralizes resource peripheries, and seeks to re-position and emphasize resource peripheries within economic geography's theoretical agenda, specifically that associated with the new 'institutional' approach. A truly 'global' economic geography cannot afford to ignore resource peripheries. In particular, we argue that characterizing resource peripheries, and making them distinct from cores, is the intersection of four sets of institutional values or dimensions which we summarize in terms of industrialism (economic dimension), environmentalism (environmental dimension), aboriginalism (cultural dimension) and imperialism (geopolitical dimension). This admittedly preliminary framework underlies our hypothesis that resource peripheries around the world have become deeply contested spaces, much more so than those found in cores.
B A R N E S T. J . and HAYTER R. (1992) 'The little town that did': flexible accumulation and community response in Cheniainus, British Columbia, R q . Studies 26, 647-663. As a result of corporate restructuring within the forest products corporation of MacMillan Hloedel, the sawmill at Chemainus, British Columbia, closed down in 1983 resulting in over 650 workers being laid-off. When the new mill reopened over two years later, computerized sawmill technology had been installed, and just over 140 workers were employed. During the same period the town itself was transformed as a series of giant murals depicting local historical events were painted which, in turn, precipitated what has beconic a vcry successful tourist industry. The purpose of the papcr is to show that these two events arc linked, that they are the result of the same wider changes within the international economy, namely, thc advent of flexible accuniulation. More generally, drawing upon the works of David Harvey and Harold Innis we argue that different types of accumulation produce specific geographies. The changes occurring in Chernainus over the last forty years perfectly illustrate the geographical consequences inherent in the move from a Fordist regime to one based on flexibility. Single industry towns Forestry Restructuring Murals B A R N E S T. J . et H A Y T E R R . (1992) 'La petite v i k qui l'a fait': l'accumulation souple et la rtponsc de la communautC i Chemainus, dans le British Colunibia, R q . Studies 26, 647463. Suite i la rcstructuration d'entreprisc au sein de la socit-tt-MacMillan Bloedel, chantier de bois, la scieric situCe i Chemainus dans le British Columbia a fermC ses portes en 1983. I1 en a risulti 650 licencicments. A la rkouverture de la nouvelle scierie plus de deux am plus tard, Ies installations comportaient la nouvelle technologie i coniniande numtrique et un peu plus de 140 salaries avaient PtC embauchts. Sur la mCme piriode la ville ellemime a subi une transformation sous fornie d'une sPrie de gigantesqucs pcinturcs niurales illustrant des ivinements historiques locaux, cc qui a entrain6 P son tour I'essor du tourisnie. Cct article chcrchc i d h o n t r e r que ces deux Cvtnements sont lies I'un, I'autre, qu'ils remontent aux m&mes transformations au sein de I'iconomie internationale dont la portke est plus grande, P savoir la naissance de I'accumulation souple. Tout en se rCf6rant au travail de David Harvey et Harold Innis cet article raisonnc de faqon plus gtntrale que des giographies particuliPres remontent aux types d'accumulation diffkrcnts. Les transformations qui sc sont produits 1 Cheniainus au cows des quarante dernitres anndcs montrent parfaitement les retombies geographiques qui s'attachent au changement d'un systkme du type Fordiste P celui fondt sur la souplcssc. Ville mono-industrielle Sylviculture Restructuration Pcinturcs niurales B A R N E S T. J . und H A Y T E R R . (1992) 'Die Kleinstadt, die's geschafft hat': Flexible Akkumulation iind koniniunale Reaktion in Chemainus, Britisch Columbia, R q ....
This paper endorses recent pleas for an 'institutional turn' within economic geography. In particular, it reveals and connects the coherence and distinctiveness of dissenting institutional economics as a way of thinking for economic geography. Economic geographers have recognized this tradition but its continuity and compass is not fully appreciated. To provide such an appreciation, this paper argues that the paradigmatic distinctiveness of dissenting institutionalism rests especially on its recognition that real world economies are embedded, have histories or evolve, and are different. The discussion is based around these three cornerstone principles of embeddedness, evolution and difference. For the future, greater attention to the region as an institution, albeit a complex one, along with greater attention to the synthesis of multi-dimensional processes that are normally analyzes as separate conceptual categories, is encouraged.
Key words: neoliberalism geographic limits friction remapping stakeholder model forest economy abstract Recently, a number of economic geography studies have emphasized that when neoliberalism is grounded in particular places, it takes on hybrid forms, a result of local contingencies that are found at those sites. This article contributes to this literature by explicating the processes by which hybridization occurs by drawing on a comparative study of neoliberalism in three contemporary forest-based regions in the Global North: British Columbia, Canada; Tasmania, Australia; and the North Island, New Zealand. A key term for us is geographic limits, by which we mean regionally specific constellations (assemblages) of institutional and material forms that resist; hybridize; or, at junctures, even offset neoliberalism with alternative agendas. In turn, our idea of geographic limits is derived from our larger conceptual framework that integrates Anna Tsing's (2005) concept of friction with the notion of remapping and a four-leg stakeholder model that consists of different, albeit overlapping, institutional agencies that represent the political, the industrial, the environmental, and the cultural. These institutions provide the animus for a remapping that variously implements, modifies, and occasionally counters neoliberalism.e cge_1143 197..221 197ECONOMIC GEOGRAPHY 88(2):197-221.
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