These actors may or may not be purposefully bent on devising regional schemes, but they do partake in decision-making through which regional patterns emerge, are reproduced, and disappear. They are not given or self-evident, but constantly (re)produced by a series of actors. Looking back now, I recall two major insights which are probably obvious to most regional studies researchers and practitioners.įirst, regions do not present themselves naturally. It was only towards the end of the programme that this simplistic approach to ‘the region’ was problematized and things got more interesting and relevant. Largely, it consisted of fact-filled introductions to the world’s, Europe’s and Belgium’s ‘regions’, or used such pre-defined ‘regions’ as the self-evident background for discussing geographical variation. When I was a Geography student at Ghent University (Flanders, Belgium), most of the instruction I received into ‘regional geography’ and ‘regional studies’ was fairly traditional. His primary research focus is on measuring and interpreting patterns in global urban networks, a summary of which can be found in a recent Regional Studies paper and the second edition of World City Network: a Global Urban Analysis (both published with Peter Taylor). He is one of the editors of Regional Studies, and will be a plenary speaker at the 2019 RSA Annual Conference. Ben Derudder is Professor of Urban Geography at Ghent University’s Department of Geography and an Associate Director of the Globalization and World Cities (GaWC) research network.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |