The unauthorized city: Late colonial Lusaka and postcolonial geography

This paper uses a case study of Lusaka, Zambia, to interrogate several aspects of the literature on postcolonial geography. I deploy two concepts from African postcolonial studies – the idea of exclusionary democracy and the concept of the domestication of difference – and assess the continuity in their applicability to Lusaka. More specifically, I examine the contention that both the political and the planning dynamics of the last years of colonialism are foundational to state–society relationships in contemporary Lusaka. Distinguishing two spheres for in-depth discussion – urban government and housing policy – I concentrate on the final years of colonialism, moving through to the contemporary setting, to examine if the roots still show for the processes creating exclusionary democracy and domesticating difference. I also examine the ambivalent and incomplete character of those processes. I close with an assessment of the broader meaning inherent in understanding Lusaka in postcolonial terms.     

Post‐tropical/post‐tsunami: Climate and architectural discourse in South and Southeast Asia

Following the Indian Ocean tsunami on 26 December 2004, scenes of destruction overwrote representations of a benign tropical landscape on the eastern periphery of the Indian Ocean. The incongruous coupling of luxury resort hotels with devastated indigent fisher settlements in international media coverage had exposed the global inequities embedded in a tropical tourism industry subscribed to and abetted by states, institutions, developers and architects. As post‐tsunami reconstruction commenced, it became evident that the climatic trope through which regionalist aesthetics had been filtered thus far was incapable of providing expedient solutions to real social problems. In academia and in the profession, the complex discourse of so‐called tropical architecture shaping the debates has yet to be untangled and problematized. Implicating and haunted by colonial, nationalist, developmental and political renderings, and more recently by issues of globalization, such representations continue to undergird architectural debates and production. In the wake of recent reconstruction projects and provoked by related architectural student designs in Sri Lanka, this paper reviews the politics of the tropical agenda in architecture and some considerations for its demise.     

Transformations in the discipline of geography experienced over 60 years by a Norwegian geographer

ABSTRACT

The article presents the changes in the discipline of geography over 60 years as experienced both in fieldwork and in practice by a Norwegian geographer. Based on diaries and collections of memoirs, the author, Arild Holt-Jensen, presents his life story and how it has been impacted by people, places and special events. His intention is to show how geography and his own work reflect social, political and intellectual changes since the late 1950s. Initially, a regional geography approach was adopted in the fieldwork for his master’s thesis but the approach was challenged by new ideas and methods from both the spatial science school and model thinking. As a young lecturer in 1968, the author was shocked by the positivism debate and critical philosophy, and his spatial science and quantitative approach in his PhD project had to be adapted. His political engagement and interest in planning led him to research social exclusion in European neighbourhoods. His need to trace the identity of geography as a discipline resulted in a textbook that throughout the years has been updated by following up on research trends to the present. Thus, the book and the article show Holt-Jensen’s shifts in disciplinary identity and research practice.     

The engaged geographer: Research in the wider community

After 55 years in geography, it might be useful to look back at the why, how, what and where of my public involvement, as a suggestive guide to younger geographers, in and out of academia who may be interested in putting their geographic knowledge and skills to use in the wider community. Although my motivations may usually have been altruistic, there have often been substantial benefits, for example, in the form of recognition, supplementary income, positions for students, and publications. Projects will be divided into three sets: (1) more ‘pure’ non-reimbursed service activities; often in the local community (2) contractual public sector projects, and (3) court case participation.     

Towards a genealogy of tropical architecture: Historical fragments of power‐knowledge,built environment and climate in the British colonial territories

In this paper, we trace the history of tropical architecture beyond its supposed founding moment, that is, its institutionalization and naming‐as‐such, in the mid‐twentieth century. We note that many of the planning principles, spatial configurations and environmental technologies of tropical architecture could be traced to knowledge and practices from the eighteenth century onwards, and we explore three pre‐1950s moments of ‘tropical architecture’ in the British empire through building types such as the bungalow, military barrack and labourers' housing in the tropics. Unlike the depoliticized technical discourse of tropical architecture in the mid‐twentieth century, this earlier history shows that so‐called tropical architecture was inextricably entangled with medical and racial discourses, biopolitics and the political economy of colonialism. We argue that tropical architecture should not be understood as an entity with a fixed essence that is overdetermined by a timeless and unchanging external tropical nature. Rather, tropical architecture should be understood as a set of shifting discourses that privilege tropical nature, especially climate, in various ways as the prime determinant of built form according to different constellations of sociocultural and technoscientific conditions. We thus see ‘tropical architecture’ not as a depoliticized entity but as a power‐knowledge configuration inextricably linked to asymmetrical colonial power relations.     

Enlivening development: Water management in post‐conflict Baucau city,Timor‐Leste

This paper explores how the state and others involved in the ‘development enterprise’ in Timor‐Leste are (mis)recognizing the potential of the existing environmental governance and exchange capacities of local customary institutions and practices in relation to water supply and management. Examining the problematic of water supply in a particular place‐based instance – more specifically, the intermesh of the customary, state and market sectors – it ponders how customary institutions might be better supported to extend their range of political and economic credibility and contribute to a reconfiguration of dominant community managed water supply models. Drawing out the workings of a ‘diverse economy’ where a customary economy is enmeshed with, and to some extent undermining, a weak capitalist sector, the paper argues that a failure to address issues of resource ownership and control and to engage the strengths and import of local customary institutions will have serious ramifications for the successful implementation of national development objectives in post‐conflict Baucau city and elsewhere in Timor‐Leste. Instead, it argues for an enlivened development approach wherein locally socialized landscapes are recognized as credible political sites with which ‘development’ can engage and power relations can shift.     

演化经济地理:经济学与地理学之间的第二座桥梁

经济学和地理学长期以来互动并不明显。文中首先对经济学与地理学忽视以及可能的合作进行了分析。如果说新经济地理学构筑了经济学和地理学的第一座桥梁,那么演化经济地理学则构筑了经济学和地理学之间的第二座桥梁。随着演化经济学的逐渐成熟,以演化经济学为基础的演化经济地理这一新兴学科逐步发展起来。文中对演化经济地理的形成、优势以及应用进行详细的阐述。演化经济地理继承了演化经济学中的时间和历史的因素,将演化经济学和经济地理加以融合。演化经济地理在微观、中观以及宏观方面都有着广泛的应用,同时演化经济地理对中国经济社会的发展有着一些重要的启示:①产业的动态化认为产业梯度转移并不能实现区域协调发展;②关系网络指出户籍制度放开的必要性与无效的可能;③多样性则认为单一产业发展战略具有风险性;④再演化的政策则指出政策需要具有"连贯性"。     

Timing of depth‐dependent lithosphere stretching on the S. Lofoten rifted margin offshore mid‐Norway: pre‐breakup or post‐breakup?

Depth‐dependent stretching, in which whole‐crustal and whole‐lithosphere extension is significantly greater than upper‐crustal extension, has been observed at both non‐volcanic and volcanic rifted continental margins. A key question is whether depth‐dependent stretching occurs during pre‐breakup rifting or during sea‐floor spreading initiation and early sea‐floor spreading. Analysis of post‐breakup thermal subsidence and upper‐crustal faulting show that depth‐dependent lithosphere stretching occurs on the outer part of the Norwegian volcanic rifted margin. For the southern Lofoten margin, large breakup lithosphere β stretching factors approaching infinity are required within 100 km of the continent–ocean boundary to restore Lower Eocene sediments and flood basalt surfaces (～54 Ma) to interpreted sub‐aerial depositional environments at sea level as indicated by well data. For the same region, the upper crust shows no significant Palaeocene and Late Cretaceous faulting preceding breakup with upper‐crustal β stretching factors <1.05. Further north on the Lofoten margin, reverse modelling of post‐breakup subsidence with a β stretching factor of infinity predicts palaeo‐bathymetries of ～1500 m to the west of the Utrøst Ridge and fails to restore Lower Eocene sediments and flood basalt tops to sea level at ～54 Ma. If these horizons were deposited in a sub‐aerial depositional environment, as indicated by well data to the south, an additional subsidence event younger than 54 Ma is required compatible with lower‐crustal thinning during sea‐floor spreading initiation. For the northern Vøring margin, breakup lithosphere β stretching factors of ～2.5 are required to restore Lower Eocene sediments and basalts to sea level at deposition, while Palaeocene and Late Cretaceous upper‐crustal β stretching factors for the same region are < 1.1. The absence of significant Palaeocene and late Cretaceous extension on the southern Lofoten and northern Vøring margins prior to continental breakup supports the hypothesis that depth‐dependent stretching of rifted margin lithosphere occurs during sea‐floor spreading initiation or early sea‐floor spreading rather than during pre‐breakup rifting.     

Border geostrategies: Imagining and administering New Zealand's post‐World War One borders

Abstract: This paper examines the emergence of an administrative apparatus designed to filter, and in some cases, exclude certain classes of international traveller at the New Zealand border following the end of World War One (WWI). Drawing on Walters’ (2004) ideas of ‘geostrategies’, and specifically focusing on the abolishment of permits for movement across the Tasman Sea, the Undesirable Immigrants Exclusion Act 1919 and the Immigration Restriction Amendment Act 1920, the paper argues that this apparatus was characterized by shifting calculations of risk that shaped international mobility through New Zealand in profoundly uneven ways.     

The spatial stability of alcohol outlets and crime in post‐disaster Christchurch,New Zealand

The devastating Canterbury Earthquakes of 2010 and 2011 left an indelible mark on the city of Christchurch. The social and economic upheaval that immediately followed the Earthquakes has, in time, been replaced with a period of rebuild and transformation. In this study we investigate the effects that the Canterbury Earthquakes had on two important and inter‐related phenomena in the city: alcohol availability and crime. More specifically, we investigate how alcohol outlets and crime across six different categories changed in magnitude and spatial distribution pre‐ (end‐2009) and post‐ (end‐2014) earthquake. We do this using a variety of geospatial techniques including a relatively new method: the spatial point pattern test which allows for the identification of changes in spatial patterns at the local level. Results indicate that both alcohol outlets and crime have decreased in magnitude since the Canterbury Earthquakes. Using the spatial point pattern test we found statistically significant differences in spatial point patterns for both alcohol outlets and all crime types pre‐ to post‐earthquake. The similarity in the differences of the spatial distributions of alcohol outlets and crime provides a first empirical clue of their potential association in the city post‐earthquake.     

Sediment fluxes and buffering in the post‐glacial Indus Basin

The Indus drainage has experienced major variations in climate since the Last Glacial Maximum (LGM) that have affected the volumes and compositions of the sediment reaching the ocean since that time. We here present a comprehensive first‐order source‐to‐sink budget spanning the time since the LGM. We show that buffering of sediment in the floodplain accounts for ca. 20–25% of the mass flux. Sedimentation rates have varied greatly and must have been on average three times the recent, predamming rates. Much of the sediment was released by incision of fluvial terraces constructed behind landslide dams within the mountains, and especially along the major river valleys. New bedrock erosion is estimated to supply around 45% of the sedimentation. Around 50% of deposited sediment lies under the southern floodplains, with 50% offshore in large shelf clinoforms. Provenance indicators show a change of erosional focus during the Early Holocene, but no change in the Mid–Late Holocene because of further reworking from the floodplains. While suspended loads travel rapidly from source‐to‐sink, zircon grains in the bedload show travel times of 7–14 kyr. The largest lag times are anticipated in the Indus submarine fan where sedimentation lags erosion by at least 10 kyr.     

The geography of age

"This article examines the geography of age across the counties of England and Wales and the regions of Scotland [and in Northern Ireland]." Sections are included on national and subnational age structures and on spatial patterns for childhood ages, working ages, and retired ages.     

George Jobberns,freemasonry, geopolitics and the post‐WWII world

The article suggests Jobberns’ view of geopolitics ultimately rested on the work of British geographer Sir Halford Mackinder overlain by the writing of American political geographers. Jobberns’ geopolitical thinking was, however, also strongly informed by his being a Freemason. WWII, as the overshadowing external event of Jobberns’ early years at Canterbury, amplified his interest in geopolitics both as a way of understanding the world and, at a time when geography was not universally accepted as a university discipline, as a means of promoting to a wider public the utility of a geographical perspective on world affairs.     

The economic geography of institutional investment in the United States, 2010

The economic geography of United States’ institutional investments as of December 2010 is presented. With a self-declared value of almost $13 trillion, it is the largest class of equity investors. Included are all investors who file Securities Exchange Commission (SEC) form 13f, meaning they manage at least $100 million. Analysis is undertaken at both the firm and metropolitan levels. The largest firms and targets of investment are determined. Geographic concentrations of both investors and their major stock holdings occur in a small subset (the top 10 largest metropolitan areas). The rates of returns on investments are shown to differ by metropolitan area of investment and by urban rank in the urban hierarchy. Intra-metropolitan investment provides worse rates of returns, countering suggestions of informational advantages for local investment. The network of interurban investments shows a clear hierarchical structure, with New York City being the dominant investment centre.     

Connecting the local and the global in post‐secular urban settings

Postsecular geographies seek to examine how place is linked with identity and how religious identities in turn can be accommodated in public space. Postsecular practices in urban contexts have been researched extensively, but they do not always fully engage with a relational approach to place‐making. This paper argues that through the place‐making practices seen at Virgin Mary statues in Dublin city, Ireland, a relational approach to examining postsecular practices and representations provides a more productive way to understand how the secular and the religious coexist in cities. The paper uses archival and contemporary data gathered from a sample of Marian statues in Dublin city to locate the relational geographies of the religious and the secular. By focussing on the ways that the statues remain uncontested within a changing urban landscape, the paper re‐examines the political significance of religious place‐making practices. It concludes that if geographies of religion in the postsecular city are to have a broader relevance to geography, they need a relational approach to place‐making.     

Late Ediacaran syn‐rift/post‐rift transition and related fault‐driven hydrothermal systems in the Anti‐Atlas Mountains,Morocco

The syn‐rift/post‐rift transition of the late Ediacaran‐mid Cambrian Atlas rift is characterized by the interplay of several processes, such as a widespread episode of fracturing and tilting, associated with encasement of fault‐controlled vein metallic ore deposits of economic importance, and carbonate production and phosphogenesis (Taguedit Bed, Tabia Member) bordering rift‐flank uplifts. A correlatable unconformity marks the end of these processes and the beginning of a thermal subsidence‐dominated regime with development of a more stable, carbonate, peritidal‐dominated platform (Tifnout Member). Late Ediacaran microbial carbonate production and phosphogenesis extended in discontinuous belts around the periphery of uplifted rift shoulders and flanks. Karst development is interpreted to have formed along synsedimentary faults and fractures during abrupt tectonic uplift associated with emplacement of polymetallic hydrothermal dikes (rich in Cu, Fe and subsidiary Pb, Zn). Isotopic analysis indicates that speleothem precipitation in karstic palaeocaves displays significantly lighter δ¹³C and δ¹⁸O values as compared to the host dolomite, implying calcite precipitation by terrestrial fluids rich in decomposing organic matter and/or microbial activity in the cave system.