The geography of tourism and leisure in Italy

The study of the geography of tourism in Italy has developed progressively over the last fifty years.The principal arguments of over two hundred specialist publications concern the tourist region, the place of geography in the study of tourism, the relations between tourism and land's organisation and the impact of tourism on the environment. Many regional and local studies have contributed to the more precise definition of the methodology and competence of this research field.The geography of leisure has been neglected because of the absence of an Italian equivalent to the term leisure and its consequent absence as a notion from Italian culture. The studies in this field are still at first attempt.     

The geography of defence — developing themes of study

Greater access to information after the Post-Cold War period gives researchers new opportunities to study the environmental, economic and social impacts of military defence. Changing political and economic circumstances are influencing the distribution of military facilities and defence industries in developed countries. The paper illustrates these developments and looks at the contribution to change made by pressure groups end at examples from the UK defence sector. Defence forces are reacting to criticism about negative impacts through a variety of measures including environmental training, site remediation and the use of simulation technology. A framework for further research is presented and many references cited.     

State,capital and spaceships: A terrestrial geography of space tourism

Over the past decade, there has been a significant structural and geographical change in space travel. Following policy, budgetary and regulatory changes in the United States, space travel may now be conducted by private companies. This privatization has also led to some geographical competition and shifts between states within the US. In this paper, I respond to MacDonald’s (2007) call for more critical geographies of outer space activity. Building from his suggestion that we look more closely at the ways in which outer space activity is constituted by “numerous familiar operations” with respect to the practices of international relations and war and to the “basic infrastructural maintenance of the state and the lives of its citizenry”, this paper explores why the US Government has allowed for private space travel and why this privatization drove some states in the US to invest heavily in such a nascent industry sector. It argues that federal and state governments both saw private space travel as a means to fulfill their “basic infrastructural maintenance” with regard to economic expansion, development and competitiveness. The paper analyses these processes through the development of space tourism. In doing so, it provides more detail and geographical context to Dickens and Ormrod’s (2007) overview of the connections between outer space and the circuits of capital. It also demonstrates the many familiar political-economic processes involved in the privatization of space travel and, as such, the possibilities for further critical geographies of space activity.     

Social geography in France — heritages and perspectives

Attention has long been given by French geographers to social factors; one of the first overt attempts at a french social geography were made by Abel Chatelain and Pierre George. Their lead was not immediately followed, but another isolated attempt to develop social geography was made by Renée Rochefort. The gap left by French geographers was to some extent filled by sociologists and ethnologists until the 70s. Pierre Claval then sought to use social factors as a means of unifying human geography, but at the same time rejecting marxist interpretations and moving towards behaviourism. A further nucleus of development was established at Lyons around Renée Rochefort; yet other geographers approached social geography by emphasizing social factors in urban studies etc. An aspect of this development was the formation of affiliations of various social scientists to study social change. All the major currents of thought are now present — humanistic, marxist, positivist — and a wide range of themes examined, but without any agreed definition of social geography. Attempts are here made to work towards a definition, emphasizing the relationship between social factors and spatial factors, and between economic infrastructure and juridicial, political and ideological superstructure; recognizing that there is often an hiatus between change on the infrastructure and change in the superstructure.translated by editor