Time, space and collective action: political space/political geography

Abstract

Political geography's renaissance has been rehearsed now a number of times, and neither the disciplinary history, nor evidence for revival, will be offered here. Instead, this paper confronts some different issues, the first of which is an attempted resolution of what political geography is, a task that depends upon an analysis of some key problematics. The second task follows logically from the first, and involves discussion of what a definition dictates for our research practice. The third is a continuation of this theme, in the form of a review of a recent manuscript by historian Charles Tilly, on the question of state formation, which serves as a catalyst to a discussion of what a reformulation of political geography might look like.