State‐centered Social Science and the Anarchist Critique: Ideology in Political Geography

Laughlìn, Jim Mac

doi:10.1111/j.1467-8330.1986.tb00351.x

Cited by 24 publications

(8 citation statements)

References 29 publications

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“…In recent years, geography and its related disciplines have seen a resurgence of anarchist and what could broadly be called postanarchist approaches (e.g., White and Kossoff ; Cudworth and Hobden ; Springer et al ; Springer ; Springer ; Springer ; Wald ; Hammond ) As a discipline, geography's history is deeply entwined with anarchism thanks in part to the works of Élisée Reclus and Petr Kropotkin who are heralded as foundational thinkers in both circles, even if their anarchist contributions have been historically disregarded within geographic thought (MacLaughlin ; Springer ). Anarchist approaches to geography see the earth as an integrated whole that requires recognition of all of the relationships that make up that whole (Springer ).…”

Section: The Postanarchist Geographical Imaginationmentioning

confidence: 99%

Resilience, Political Ecology, and Power: Convergences, Divergences, and the Potential for a Postanarchist Geographical Imagination

Mullenite

2016

Geography Compass

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Over the past three decades, resilience has emerged as an ecological concept that has transformed the way international development is conceptualized. However, it is only recently that the topic has been approached within the geography literature. In this article, I trace the linkages between resilience as an ecological concept and an emerging framework in political geography, its relationship to the field of political ecology, and the potential of a postanarchist geography in bridging the extant gap between these areas of study. To do this, I focus on the different conceptualizations of power prevalent in resilience scholarship and political ecology and offer a postanarchist conceptualization as a potential bridging point that can address the concerns of both of the fields.

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Section: The Postanarchist Geographical Imaginationmentioning

confidence: 99%

Resilience, Political Ecology, and Power: Convergences, Divergences, and the Potential for a Postanarchist Geographical Imagination

Mullenite

2016

Geography Compass

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“…One of the most fundamental and enduring lines of scholarly enquiry in human geography and the social sciences at large has been the functioning of the state in economic and social developments in various spatial‐temporal contexts (Nettl 1968; Skocpol 1985; Jessop 1990; Appelbaum and Henderson 1992; Taylor 1996; Evans 1997; Brenner 1999; Hakli 2001; Peck 2001, 2003). The “state‐centered” assumption was prevalent initially in mainstream social sciences in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries (MacLaughlin 1986, 16). This assumption remained fundamental to the social sciences after the end of World War II as the state was widely considered to be the preeminent vehicle of social development and “progress” (Hakli 2001, 411).…”

Section: The State and Land Development Processesmentioning

confidence: 99%

The State, Land System, and Land Development Processes in Contemporary China

Lin

2005

Annals of the Association of American Geographers

492

332

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In the era of state socialism under Mao, land in China was treated as a means of production and was allocated administratively by the state free of charge. To accommodate the interests of foreign investors without violating the socialist principle of public ownership, the Chinese state has, since the 1980s, separated land use rights from land ownership and opened up a new market track for the conveyance of land use rights to commercial users. The result has been a distinct dual-track land system in the new political economy, characterized by significant asymmetry for arbitrage. Discrepancy between the state's intention and actual outcome has been a consequence of the internal diversity of power relations concerning land development. Our data analysis reveals that the loss of farmland to nonagricultural developments has slowed down in recent years, that the state's intention to increase land use efficiency has been severely compromised by the socialist legacy, and that illegal activities are pervasive. The Chinese socialist state is better seen as a dynamic, complex, heterogeneous, and self-conflictual institutional ensemble in and through which the forces and interests of different levels of the state are contested, negotiated, and mediated.

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“…The early promise of the Kropotkin‐inspired anarcho‐communism of the 1970s gave way to a decade that saw only one publication on anarchism in the pages of Antipode . Jim Mac Laughlin (1986) critiqued the state‐centricity of both geographers and the social sciences more generally, lamenting the influence that ethnocentrism had on the discipline of geography and its enduring prevalence thanks to the influential writings of leading historical figures such as Halford Mackinder, Ellen Churchill Semple, Ellsworth Huntington, Thomas Holdich, and Isaiah Bowman. In once again invoking Kropotkin and Reclus, Mac Laughlin called upon geographers to abandon the nationalistic historiography and statist imaginations that they had inherited to explore antithetical alternatives.…”

Section: A Whirlwind Tour Of Anarchist Geographiesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Reanimating Anarchist Geographies: A New Burst of Colour

et al. 2012

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The late nineteenth century saw a burgeoning of geographical writings from influential anarchist thinkers like Peter Kropotkin andÉlisée Reclus. Yet despite the vigorous intellectual debate sparked by the works of these two individuals, following their deaths anarchist ideas within geography faded. It was not until the 1970s that anarchism was once again given serious consideration by academic geographers who, in laying the groundwork for what is today known as "radical geography", attempted to reintroduce anarchism as a legitimate political philosophy. Unfortunately, quiet followed once more, and although numerous contemporary radical geographers employ a sense of theory and practice that shares many affinities with anarchism, direct engagement with anarchist ideas among academic geographers have been limited. As contemporary global challenges push anarchist theory and practice back into widespread currency, geographers need to rise to this occasion and begin (re)mapping the possibilities of what anarchist perspectives might yet contribute to the discipline.In the late 1970s Antipode published issues on the environment and anarchism which, in retrospect, were the last bursts of colour in the fall of its 1960s-style radicalism (Richard Peet and Nigel Thrift 1989:6).

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State‐centered Social Science and the Anarchist Critique: Ideology in Political Geography

Cited by 24 publications

References 29 publications

Resilience, Political Ecology, and Power: Convergences, Divergences, and the Potential for a Postanarchist Geographical Imagination

Resilience, Political Ecology, and Power: Convergences, Divergences, and the Potential for a Postanarchist Geographical Imagination

The State, Land System, and Land Development Processes in Contemporary China

Reanimating Anarchist Geographies: A New Burst of Colour

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