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Spatial Fixes, Temporal Fixes and Spatio- Temporal Fixes.

Research output: Contribution in Book/Report/Proceedings - With ISBN/ISSNChapter

Published
Publication date01/2006
Host publicationDavid Harvey : A Critical Reader
EditorsNoel Castree, Derek Gregory
Place of PublicationOxford
PublisherBlackwell Publishing
Pages142-166
Number of pages25
ISBN (print)0631235108
<mark>Original language</mark>English

Publication series

NameAntipode Book Series
PublisherBlackwell Publishing

Abstract

It is especially productive to probe major thinkers on issues central to their work and widely regarded as their strong points. Accordingly, my contribution reviews Harvey�s concern with the spatialities and temporalities ofcapitalism and capitalist social formations. Harvey is famous for stressing the importance of spatiality for an adequate historical materialism. If one phrase symbolizes this, it is surely �spatial fi x�. He has also shown how capitalism rests on a political economy of time and has explored the dynamics of time- space compression in both modern and postmodern societies. More recently, he has introduced the term �spatio- temporal fix� to decipher the dynamics of capitalist imperialism and its grounding in the interaction between capitalist and territorial logics of power. These interests are reflected in his successive but overlapping accounts of three interrelated fixes: spatial, temporal and spatio- temporal. Each works in its own way todefer and/or displace capitalism�s inherent crisis- tendencies but does so only by subsequently intensifying these tendencies and their effects. My chapter affirms Harvey�s key contributions on these themes but also suggests that they have signifi cant ontological, epistemological, methodological and substantive limitations. It also proposes a potentially more productive reading of the spatio- temporal fix that is none the less consistent with and, indeed, inspired by his approach.