The Dictionary of Human Geography (172 page)

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Authors: Michael Watts

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regional science
A hybrid discipline origin ating in the early 1950s that combined neo classical economics and Quantitative Methods to analyse spatial issues in econom ics, huMAN geography and planning. Regional science was the vision of a single man, the American economist Walter Isard (1919 ). Isard roundly criticized the assump tion of the a spatial ?pin head? economy found in standard economic theory, and provided an alternative version based upon Location theory, and in 1954 he convened the first meeting of the Regional Science Association in Detroit. Partly because of Isard?s indefatig able energy, and partly because of the move ment?s fortuitous emergence in a period of significant American regional and urban growth, regional science rapidly expanded, increasing its membership, forming new uni versity departments, inaugurating journals such as the Proceedings of the Regional Science Association and then, in 1958, the (NEW PARAGRAPH) Journal of Regional Science, initiating inter national branches (Europe in 1961, Asia in 1963) and attracting attention from co gnate disciplines. One of those was economic geography, and for a period in the 1960s the halcyon years of the quantitative revo Lution and spatiaL science the agendas of the two were symbiotically linked. The 1970s began a reversal of fortunes, as former allies such as economic geography increasingly deserted regional science, its practitioners caught up in the critique of spatial science, the concomitant advance of poLiticaL econ omy through the sub discipline, and the emer gence of an avowedly radicaL geography. From the 1990s, competitors for the same intellectual (and artificial) turf cultivated by regional science emerged, such as the new economic geography, and university admin istrators turned sour (Isard?s original Regional Science Department at the University of Pennsylvania was closed in 1994 5). Against the backdrop of two decades of intellectual and then institutional assault, regional science moved to the margins of human geography and the social sciences more generally. tb (NEW PARAGRAPH) Suggested reading (NEW PARAGRAPH) Barnes (2004c). (NEW PARAGRAPH)
regionalism
A term referring to both a form of political identity and sub national eco nomic integration. Attempts have been made to clarify the definition to delineate the ?old? regionalism of a political identity seeking autonomy or separation from the state (see secession) and the ?new? regionalism of eco nomic integration at the sub national scale, which may include governmental administra tive functions (Witt, 2005). Regionalism is seen as a theoretical and methodological vehicle to analyse new forms of governance within the context of neo liberal policies (see neo LiberaLism) and supra state institutions (O?Loughlin, 1996). Further clarification is provided by Jones and MacLeod (2004), who distinguish between regional spaces and spaces of regionalism. Regional spaces are regional economic geographies of techno logical spillovers and inter firm aggLomer ation that produce a regional clustering of economic assets (cf. cluster). Spaces of region alism are the ?(re)assertion of national and regional claims to citizenship, insurgent forms of political mobilization and cultural expres sion and the formation of new contours of territorial government? (Jones and MacLeod, (NEW PARAGRAPH) p. 435). (NEW PARAGRAPH) As governments restructure under the pres sures of neo liberalism and gLobaLization, the politics of regionalism often does not distinguish between the regional economic policies and regional political identity. As Paasi (2003) has pointed out, there is an important difference between the identity of a region, or the classification of a space by government and other agencies, and the regional consciousness of individuals, or the degree and form of political regional attach ment. Recent identification of a ?resurgence of the regions? refers to both the creation of regional economic spaces attempting to cap ture global investment by touting a regional comparative advantage as well as the polit ical movements, such as Lega Nord in Italy, dissatisfied with membership in the existing state. Jones and MacLeod (2004) caution social scientists and policy makers that there is no necessary relationship between regional economic spaces and regional political iden tity, which may cause problems for govern ments and the European Union promoting regional policies. Furthermore, both regional spaces and spaces of regionalism occur at various scales, and must be viewed as a poli tical process involving conflict and negoti ation rather than fixed political geographical entities. (See also regionaLpoLicy.) cf (NEW PARAGRAPH) Suggested reading (NEW PARAGRAPH) Allen, Massey and Cochrane (1998); Honnigh ausen, Frey, Peacock and Steiner (2005). (NEW PARAGRAPH)
regression
A statistical relationship between a dependent variable and one or more inde pendent variables. The standard technique for regression analysis fits a straight line trend through a scatter of points (as shown in the figure), with the line placed to minimize the sum of the (squared) distances between it and the individual points. In the formula for a simple regression (i.e. with one independent variable), (NEW PARAGRAPH) Y = a + bX ¤ e, (NEW PARAGRAPH) is the dependent variable (shown on the vertical axis); X is the independent variable (shown on the horizontal axis); a is the inter cept or constant term (i.e. the value of Y when X equals zero); b is the regression coefficient (i.e. the slope of the relationship, indicating the change in Y for each unit change in X); and e is the error term, indicating the degree of scat ter of points around the line. The closer the fit of the line to all of the points, the larger the associated correLation. (NEW PARAGRAPH) Multiple regression equations have the form (NEW PARAGRAPH) = a + b\X\ + b'^Xri + ... + bnXn i e, (NEW PARAGRAPH) in which each of the independent variables (X1, X2, ..., Xn) has an associated partial regression coefficient (b1, b2, ...) indicating the amount of change in Y for each unit change in the relevant X variable, assuming no change in any other X. (See also general linear model; geographically weighted regression; logit regression models; multi level modeling; poisson regression.) rj (NEW PARAGRAPH) Suggested reading (NEW PARAGRAPH) O?Brien (1992). (NEW PARAGRAPH)
regulation theory
A branch of contempor ary political economic theory, influenced by marxism, which seeks to explain the growth, crisis and transformation of capitaLism, with particular reference to historically, geograph ically and institutionally specific conditions. Regulation theorists balance a Marxian emphasis on the structures, ?laws of motion? and incipient crisis tendencies of capitalist economies with an appreciation of (a) the vari ability exhibited in forms of economic growth over time and space and (b) the com plex of social and institutional forces that serve to channel and sustain particular forms of economic growth, and defer crises, over periods of decades. Here, ?regulation? does not simply denote laws and rules but, after the French regulation, refers to processes of social regularization. (NEW PARAGRAPH) The central concept in regulation theory is the regime of accumuLation, a historically distinctive and relatively durable form of growth, based on a particular nexus of produc tion/consumption and a supporting ?mode of regulation? (an ensemble of organizational forms, networks, and institutions, rules, norms and patterns of conduct, including a distinctively capitalist state). Regulation the ory rose to prominence in the 1980s, following the French regulationists? seminal analysis of fordism the regime of mass production and mass consumption that prevailed in North America and Western Europe during the period between the mid 1940s and the mid 1970s. Fordism was accompanied by a ?Keynesian welfarist? mode of regulation (including an interventionist nation state, a coordinated industrial relations system, a managed regime of international trade and finance, expansionist social welfare policies and the generalization of mass consumption norms). Initially developed by Michel Aglietta, these arguments became well known in geography through the work of Alain Lipietz, Robert Boyer and their pre eminent British ?translator?, Bob Jessop. (NEW PARAGRAPH) Regulationist approaches became influential in geography after the late 1980s, where they were invoked in debates around the decline and restructuring of Fordist manufacturing industries (paradigmatically, automobile pro duction) and more controversially in the rise of putative successors to Fordism, such as flexible specialization, fLexibLe accumuLa tion and post fordism (see Scott, 1988a; Tickell and Peck, 1992). For the most part, regulationists prefer to remain somewhat agnostic on the question of Fordism?s succes sor, despite the evidence of extensive experi mentation in flexible production systems and new forms of governance, since the criteria for regimes of accumulation emphasize the medium term reproduction and inter penetration of these structures, most often demonstrated through historical analysis. (NEW PARAGRAPH) Subsequent regulationist inspired work in geography has focused on emergent forms of institutional regulation and governance, which are evidently less centred on the national state than had been the case in the Fordist era (see MacLeod, 2001), in contrast with the rather more economistic tradition of the original French school (see Boyer and Saillard, 2002). In turn, regulationist concerns have shaped the growing body of work on neo LiberaLism, raising questions about the character, origins and socio economic impli cations of such market oriented modes of regulation. While strict adherence to regula tionist principles has become increasingly (NEW PARAGRAPH) rare in economic geography, the approach can be credited with helping to establish the widely held view that economies are socially embedded and institutionally regulated, rather than being guided by some ?hidden hand? of market forces. jpe (NEW PARAGRAPH) Suggested reading (NEW PARAGRAPH) Jessop and Sum (2006); Peck (2000). (NEW PARAGRAPH)
relational database
Relational databases allow tables to be joined using columns of data common to the tables in which the various data sets are stored. For example, if one table has a list of countries and population size, and a second the countries and their land areas, then relating one to another by each country?s name permits calculation of population dens ity. In GIS, the vector data model is rela tional, storing the attributes and geography of objects in linked tables: for example, place named A [in table 1] has a boundary I [in table 2] that includes point 1 [in table 3] which has location (x, y) [in table 4]. Rh (NEW PARAGRAPH) Suggested reading (NEW PARAGRAPH) Longley, Goodchild, Maguire and Rhind (2005). (NEW PARAGRAPH)
relativism
Understanding the production and justification of knowLEdge as relative to the standards of the society and cuLture within which it arises. In emphasizing the social rather than individual variability of ideas and beliefs, relativism gives explanatory power to historical and geographical context uaLity, and suggests that because knowledge is dependent upon context, truth will itself be relative. Relativism is opposed by univer salism, which holds that true knowledge tran scends context, and that reason can cut across contextual difference to judge the truth of knowledge. (NEW PARAGRAPH) huMAN geography has been concerned with both cultural and epistemological relativ ism. While explicit geographical arguments for relativism are rare, the term has a positive and negative presence in debate; as an approach consonant with long standing geo graphical interests in cultural difference, and as an accusation levelled at those thought to be subverting the foundations of geographi cal enquiry. Cultural relativism is evident in anthropological enquiry concerned to under stand the beliefs and practices of different societies without reducing them to some com mon explanatory schema. Fierce debate has proceeded over the moral and political conse quences of cultural relativism. Geertz (1984) argues for ?anti anti relativism?, criticizing the argument that challenging universal standards of cultural understanding and judgement leaves one unable to provide moral or political commentary on the world. Geertz under stands the debate as an expression of anxieties, ?rather more an exchange of warnings than an analytical debate. We are being offered a choice of worries? (Geertz, 1984, p. 265). Questions of cultural relativism connect to cuL turAL geography, but also to EPistEMOLOgicAL questions concerning reason, rationalism, science and herMeneutics (Hollis and Lukes, 1982; Bernstein, 1983), often raised under the heading of PostMOdernisM. Relativism serves as a marker in the psychology of theory. Relativist worry is countered by the PRAgMAtisM of Richard Rorty (1979), who suggests that relativism is a problem only because of the fouNdAtiONAList vocabulary through which orthodox PhiLosoPhy condemns it. With a dif ferent vocabulary, relativism disappears as a problem. Such an argument has been regarded as political and moral evasion by those from both the political Right and Left, who present themselves as defending traditional standards and/or maintaining positions for progressive political judgement. Debates over PostMOd ernism in geography reflect such tensions and antagonisms. (NEW PARAGRAPH) Relativism has informed debates in the his tory Of geography, and the geographies of science. Relativistic understandings, from paradigM approaches through to science studies work, have presented science as a social practice: Livingstone (1992) discusses the consequences for the status of scientific and geographical knowledge. Smith (2000a) considers the implications for the geography of ethics and moral geographies, showing that relativism is a moral and philosophical impulse with its own history and geography. Whether this relativistic understanding of relativism confirms or undermines relativism is another matter. For many in human geography, the means to address or side step such questions has been provided by argu ments for situated knowLEdge, seen as a means to negotiate the twin perils/demons/ temptations of relativism and universalism. Clear resolution of such issues is unlikely: indeed, pragmatist and/or postmodernist arguments would suggest that searching for resolution is futile, and desiring resolution misguided. dMat (NEW PARAGRAPH) Suggested reading (NEW PARAGRAPH) Geertz (1984); Smith (2000a). (NEW PARAGRAPH)

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