ABSTRACT

This essay reviews developments in spatial theory since the 1960s to argue that any consideration of possible future worlds must begin from a fully dialectical, and fully materialist theory of space. Much critical social and cultural theory instead begins from as unexamined assumption of absolute space, which is deeply problematic theoretically and especially politically. By contrast, what is necessary is a theory capable of understanding not just that spaces are simultaneously absolute, relative, and relational, but how they are simultaneously absolute, relative, and relational. Fundamental building blocks of such a dialectical theory have been laid down by Henri Lefebvre, David Harvey, Doreen Massey, Neil Smith, and Cindi Katz (among many others), but the theory remains insufficiently materialist. A fully materialist, dialectical theory of space requires the re-introduction of landscape and its opposite, anti-landscape as the key mediating spatial forms. Without this, absolute space will continue its tyrannical reign, and the future geography sculpts one more of constraint than of possibility.

摘要

本文回顾了 1960 年代以来空间理论的发展，认为对可能的未来世界的任何考虑都必须从完全辩证和完全唯物主义的空间理论开始。相反，许多批判的社会和文化理论都是从未经审查的绝对空间假设开始的，这在理论上尤其是在政治上存在严重问题。相比之下，所需要的是一种不仅能够理解空间同时是绝对的、相对的和相关的，而且能够理解空间如何它们同时是绝对的、相对的和相关的。Henri Lefebvre、David Harvey、Doreen Massey、Neil Smith 和 Cindi Katz（以及其他许多人）已经奠定了这种辩证理论的基本构件，但该理论仍然不够唯物主义。一个完全唯物主义的、辩证的空间理论需要重新引入景观及其对立面、反景观作为关键的中介空间形式。没有这一点，绝对空间将继续它的专横统治，未来的地理将塑造出更多的限制而不是可能性。