Geography and Development: 'Core and Periphery'?

Geography and Development: 'Core and Periphery'?Author(s): Rob PotterSource: Area, Vol. 33, No. 4 (Dec., 2001), pp. 422-427Published by: Wiley on behalf of The Royal Geographical Society (with the Institute of BritishGeographers)Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/20004183 .

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Area (2001) 33.4, 422-439

Observations

Geography and development: 'core and

periphery'?

Rob Potter Department of Geography and Centre for Developing Areas Research, Royal Holloway,

University of London, Egham, Surrey TW20 OEX

Email: [email protected]

Revised manuscript received 20 February 2001

Drawing directly on the simplistic core-periphery development model, it is argued that British Geography has been characterized by essentially similar dichotomous thinking. Thus, that part of Geography which deals with the Euro-North American orbit has implicitly been

defined as the 'core' whilst the study of poorer societies has been assigned the status of 'periphery'. It is shown that this unproductive schism has been apparent over the last 50

years and displays little sign of abatement as we enter the new millennium. Four key requirements for the emergence of much-needed enhanced links between development geography and other areas of the discipline are enumerated. In conclusion, the concept of /responsibility to distant geographies' is advanced.

Key words: development Geography, development studies, the nature of Geography, study of poorer societies, 'Geography Overseas'

Introduction

To some of us the human geography of Somerset is more interesting and in many ways more significant than that of, say, Somaliland, and though we should

wish both to be studied, it is the former, in general

which is neglected. The physical difficulties of doing so are admittedly less, but the intellectual difficulties are incomparably greater. (Wooldridge 1950, 7)

The cult, or rather the disease, of what I would call

'otherwheritis', is a real peril to the well-being of

geography ... At its worst it can only lead to a species

of egotistic, impressionistic geography. (Wooldridge 1 950, 9).

I enjoyed reading the recent pieces in Area, written by Peris Sean Jones (2000) and Marcus Power (2000), dealing respectively with doing development

in the Third World (and not 'here', that is, the so-called 'developed world'), and the messy contex tuality of writing about development in the Labour

Government's 'New Britain'. It is, of course, all too easy to attempt to link the two pieces, if you are prepared to suggest that however marginal and contested the movement toward social democracy in Britain since the landslide general election victory of 1 May 1997, issues of development whether regional or urban, national or international should have started to assume greater significance. The establishment of the Department for International Development (DFID) to replace the Overseas Development Administration (ODA), headed up by a full Ministerial position, should have made this par ticularly salient. The increase in funding announced for DFID in Gordon Brown's budget statement of 18 July 2000, similarly offered a ray of hope.

ISSN 0004-0894 ? Royal Geographical Society (with The Institute of British Geographers) 2001



Observations 423

If development is defined as improving the lot of the bulk of the population, then it is implicit that this

will entail reductions in both relative and absolute poverty. In such a manner, access to material goods, services and capital will need to be enhanced (O'Connor 2001). At the same time, access to non-pecuniary benefits, such as freedom of speech, self-expression and effective participation, need also to be considerably improved. Articulated in these terms, development should be synonymous with the advancement of social democracy as a whole, as opposed to the unidimensional processes associated with economic growth (Potter et al. 1999). The central issue addressed in this short observation is, given the 'new' political situation pertaining in 'Cool Britannia' ostensibly more akin to democratic socialism what are the prospects for more and

more geographers talking, writing and research ing development and development-related issues,

whether 'here' or 'elsewhere'?

Core and periphery in Geography from 1950 to the present

Alan Gilbert (1987) has observed that had he done the bulk of his work in the United Kingdom, else

where in Europe or in North America, he would be regarded as an 'urban geographer'. But because he has carried out most of his urban research in the southern portion of the continent of the Americas, he is referred to, and seen as, a 'Latin Americanist'. This suggests that those who work outside the Euro-North American orbit are excluded, or at best marginalized, from the specialisms which see them selves making up the core of the discipline of

Geography. Quite simply, they are regarded as 'ists' of the Latin American, Caribbean, African or Asian variety. If they endeavour to be comprehensive in their consideration of other regions of the globe, then they may qualify as the ultimate 'ists': as full-blown 'developmentalists'!

This also implies that those who specialize in the core areas, and who deal with what they regard as the core topics, see work carried out in Anglo Euro-America as theoretically more demanding and ultimately of greater societal value. In this way, Anglo-American geography defines its own discipli nary 'core', whilst matters of development and devel opment geography become part of the 'periphery'. Gilbert has also repeatedly drawn attention to the fact that geographers write texts under generic titles such as 'Urban Geography' and 'Social Geography',

and feel no compunction at excluding the poorest three-quarters of the world. This is normally excused in the Preface as reflecting the author's lack of experience. Nobody would think of doing this in reverse (see for example, Gilbert and Gugler 1992; Potter and Lloyd-Evans 1998). Both Slater (1989) and Sidaway (1990) have observed that the prevailing focus of urban and regional development studies has been on 'advanced' capitalism, replete

with tendencies toward universalism and Euro Americanism. As a corollary, Slater (1989, 278) has noted how in much theorizing, 'Third World societies are conspicuous by their absence'. Just as saliently, Bradshaw (1990) and Stenning and Bradshaw (1999) make the point that calls for a new regional geography have also been limited to the study of restructuring and regional change under

Western capitalism, and how the post-Soviet world has largely been excluded from consideration. Is 'core geography' really aligning itself with the imperial core tradition in this most simplistic of

manners? But surely, this type of position is going into eclipse in the 'New Britain'?

A few years ago, I published a short piece in Area under the title, 'Little England and Little Geography' (Potter 1993). This was in part a response to a polemical note by James Sidaway (1992) wherein he noted what he regarded as the special ethical responsibilities which are to be faced by those geographers working in 'Third World' countries (see also Potter 2001 a). Whilst generally agreeing with his strictures, I endeavoured to show just how little of

mainstream British Geography could at that time be regarded as dealing specifically with Developing

Countries, that is the poorer nations of the globe. Basically, I sought to exemplify that the 'world's have nots' also receive a disproportionately low share of the attention of geographers the very group that you might expect to be particularly concerned with 'other' places, and 'other' people in short, the 'Great Overseas'. Thus, the 25 per cent of the

world's population that account for 80 per cent of global energy consumption and 85 per cent of total world income, also seemed to be getting about 85 per cent of the attention of British geographers, as measured by the IBG research register, the topics dealt with in articles in mainstream journals such as the Transactions, plus self-reports in surveys con ducted of British development geography research and teaching (see Potter and Unwin 1988; Unwin and Potter 1992; Potter 1993). In direct contrast, it

was shown that the 'have nots', representing some



424 Observations

75 per cent of the world's denizens, who consume only 20 per cent of total energy and whom receive 15 per cent of total world income, seem to get about the same diminutive proportion of the attention of geographers. To put it another way, consider the volume of research carried out on China and India per capita, in the light of their respective populations of approximately 1.3 billion and one billion. Once again, the core-periphery, and by inference, the relevant-peripheral dichotomies seem to leap out at you!

I was delighted when my 1993 observations elicited a personal communication from Mansell Prothero. He said he had read the piece with much interest and wholeheartedly agreed with it. But he

went on to say that although the contemporary situation and attitudes dismayed him, he feared that 'they are much more endemic and have character ised British geography over all the time that I have been involved, from 1 947 onward (my first appoint ment at Edinburgh)' (Prothero pers. comm. 1993). Mansell Prothero went on to note how at his first IBG conference in 1950, he listened to Wooldridge's thoughts on geographical work overseas, at a time

when Britain still had a substantial empire: 'I took very unkindly to his reference to the disease of 'otherwhereitis'. 'I was already incubating it seeking an opportunity to work overseas. ... I have never recovered from the disease and would never have

wished to. Wooldridge was overemphasising, ... but I think he reflected the views of the majority of

academic British geographers at the time' (Prothero pers. comm. 1 993; see also Prothero 1986).

Mansell Prothero continued that about a decade later, after having spent half that time in Africa, things appeared not to have changed very much, as he

found when submitting a paper for reading at an IBG annual conference, at a time before there were sections and study groups in the Institute. In this paper, 'Geography Overseas', he contended that 'some new thinking needs to be done on our relationships with geography departments overseas to accord with conditions resulting from national independence', and that 'the Institute could, and

should, play an important part in promoting these developments' (Prothero unpublished paper c. 1 960). He headed this submitted paper with the first

passage from Wooldridge's Presidential Address, which appears at the beginning of this paper. Of concern to him was that 'comparisons such as we

may make between Somerset and Somaliland may symbolise an attitude of mind which is wrong and

which we cannot afford to maintain at the present time or in the future' (Prothero unpublished paper c. 1 960). What is highly salient in the present context is that the paper was rejected with the response that 'it

would be of insufficient interest to members to be included in the programme'!

Areas of mutual interest between all manner of 'Geographies'

The point is that in the current context there should be plenty of room for fertile overlap and symbiosis between what we have been referring to as Euro North American geography and the geography of development. The areas of work which have undoubtedly been seen by the majority in the disci pline as core and periphery, as exemplified above, from Wooldridge to the year 2000, need to be recast, so that to use a world systems theory analogy, a growing 'British semi-periphery' starts to be seen and recognized as emerging. Partly addressing the concerns expressed by Jones (2000), I am quite sure that this overlap of interest already exists it is just that sub-disciplinary identities and hegemonies mean that these are not recognized and properly valued at present.

This claim can be partially substantiated by a brief look at some of the pressing issues and processes that are being critically examined in contemporary British geography. For example, these include econ omic, cultural and political aspects of globalization, and the argument that such processes are leading to increasing differences both between countries and

within them. These processes apply throughout the world, although in contrasting ways. Linked to this is the idea of economic globalization leading to greater divergence and difference, whilst cultural globaliz ation is ostensibly leading to greater homogeneity. In turn this is related to the idea of the World or Global City, that is cities as places for the articulation, concentration and decentralization of capital, power and producer services (see Massey and Jess 1 995; Potter et al. 1999). As the state withdraws under neo-liberal forces of structural adjustment and free trade, controlled by the IMF, World Bank and WTO,

more accent is placed on the roles of NGOs, civil society, social capital, and the like. These are linking issues which should provide a highly-focused area of communality for all branches of Geography, wherever they are practised globally. Within them, we should see fertile grounds for sub-disciplinary interaction.



Observations 425

The same point can be made retrospectively, in

that there have always been many more links

between 'core' geography and 'peripheral' geogra phy than have been acknowledged and discussed. It is just that few have hitherto been recognized as

valuable or fertile. Policy formulations in the devel oping world may have predominantly emanated from the developed world, in the form of strictures

concerning import-substitution industrialization, export-based industry and the like. But since 1950, there have also been notable cases of the movement

of policy prescriptions in the reverse direction (that is, from Developing to Developed nations). The classic case is the neo-liberal borrowing of the concept of the Free Trade Zone. Peter Hall (1981) in writing about the introduction of Enterprise Zones in Mrs Thatcher's Britain, specifically noted that Sir Geoffrey Howe, the then Chancellor, had linked the idea to his original speculation that such an idea should be borrowed from the Third World. Similarly, of course, some of our big theories, such as dependency approaches and structuralism were developed in the New World context. Culturally too, the flow has not been uni-directional, as witnessed by the oft-cited instances of Indian restaurants, West Indian, Latin American and African music and Asian fashions.

But the argument for less divisiveness can also be made on theoretical grounds. Since the age of dependency and the argument for the recognition of the interdependent nature of development (see Brookfield 1975), it has been suggested that devel opment should be defined as change, either for the better, or for the worse. Thus, development can be defined as a multifaceted series of processes which impact on people and places in different ways and at different times. This gets away from the argument that there is a linear path to development. It gets away from the argument that developing countries need to follow the paths previously taken by devel oped ones. It gets away from the argument that development is only about the Third World. In this formulation, development is ubiquitous. It was this argument which recently prompted a new text on

development (Potter et al. 1999). Thus, Geographies of Development specifically took this remit and stressed that the study of inner city areas, lagging regions and Eastern Europe are all part of develop

ment geography. Indeed, although mainly looking at developing nations, the text uses as examples the case of aboriginals in Australia, and mass tourism and southern Europe via the case of Spain. The same is

true of the starting point for the new journal Progress in Development Studies, with the first Editorial stress

ing that contributions from those writing on devel opment in Europe or elsewhere are welcome and that the processes involved are essentially identical (Potter 2001 b). In short, we pressingly need theories and case studies which travel in all directions, not

just one (Dodson 1995; see also Paul 1993 and

Slater 1992 on this issue). Such an approach also helps to engage with the arguments of the post development, anti-development and post-colonial schools of thought (Nederveen Pieterse 2000).

The way forward: responsibility to distant geographies?

Can positive steps forward be identified? In sum mary, it is argued here that what is needed is basically fourfold. Firstly, geographers interested in development must endeavour more readily to encompass issues and policies of development

wherever they occur. Some, I know, will argue against this, quoting loudly the dangers of universal ism, but it is my view that one way or another, we

must not be separate 'ists' working alone, speaking in a series of semi-voids. We wish and need to publish locally, as well as internationally if our work is to be both helpful and ethical; and our colleagues including those sitting on RAE Panels need to be sympathetic to this, and to see this as the price of having real, global geography (for example, Potter 1996; Potter and Jacyno 1999). It is axiomatic that this will be more difficult to achieve in some parts of the world than others (Porter 1 995), but I still

maintain that it is incumbent upon us to try, even if

only via national and local newspapers. Secondly, if self-appointed 'core' geography as

defined here is, in turn, to play its part, it must stop downgrading research emanating from, and based upon, the world's developing areas (see Paul 1993). In other words, the subject must come to grips

with post-development, anti-development and post colonialism, and other post-modern conditions, and despite all these 'postist-stances' (Young 1999), find something of value in studying places and cultures other than those experienced at home. Here we come back to Power (2000): yes, it is messy studying development in the context of the New Britain, but at least there is more talk about development. Let's try to ensure that the same occurs in Geography, and that it is followed by action.



426 Observations

But to do this successfully, a third real change needs to occur. As noted by Thrift and Walling (2000), there is a strong argument that the cultural turn has meant that mainstream cultural and social geography have largely turned away from the eco nomic and social as expressed in issues of class, inequality, poverty and deprivation. In short, at present, these fields have fewer affinities with the radical traditions of human geography. Thus, Thrift and Walling (2000, 107) comment that 'in its haste to think the unthinkable' cultural and social geogra phy is 'leaving behind the kind of basic equity issues signalled by words such as "class" and "gender"'. Further, they contend, 'Put brutally, social and cul tural geography is, therefore, losing its radicalness. It is just not "political" enough'. As an example of this,

O'Connor (2001) cites the definition of poverty provided in the recent fourth edition of the Diction ary of Human Geography (Johnston et al. 2000). O'Connor notes that the definition is largely couched in relative terms, and says little about absolute poverty at the global level and the con ditions that face the world's poorest people. Amin and Thrift (2000) have equally pointed to the lack of enthusiasm for economic geography in a post

Marxist context, and have argued that most eco nomic knowledge has been enlisted in the causes of the powerful. There is need for rapprochement here.

Fourthly, therefore, these sorts of changes need to stress a re-shaped vision of Geography. For instance, the accent might be placed on the nexus existing between people, environments and development (PED). Thus, QED, geography would be about PED, and development would be an integral part of the discipline wherever it was being carried out. This may be linked almost directly to the argument about our responsibilities to distant others (Smith 1994; Corbridge 1993). In the West, we are predominantly taught to care for those who are proximate to us: our

family, our neighbours, our community: with dis tance, our care reduces. This distance decay is, of course, a strong component of the development issue, and development charities have to try hard to do something about it, in order to inculcate care for those in great need, but whom are far away. We really need the same for Geography. What is needed is an enhanced responsibility to distant geographies.

Such distant geographies are not lacking in intellec tual challenge because they are encountered far away; they are not irrelevant to us because they emanate from other societies and cultures. In a

globalizing world, distant geographies are not only

becoming more complex by the day, one way and another, they are becoming more and more pertinent to the sustainability of the lives we all lead.

Acknowledgements Thanks to Mansell Prothero, Alan Gilbert and David Stoddart for their comments on a draft of this paper. The

detailed comments of two anonymous referees and the Editor are also acknowledged.

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Editor's introduction

Mike Bradshaw

The two observations that follow are the result of an initial submission by Professor Michael Chisholm.

The issue of the relationship between Geography, as a discipline, and the various funding bodies (SSSR/ESRC, NERC and AHRB) has always been contentious. Those of you who spent the summer completing ESRC Postgraduate Recognition docu

ments are well aware of how the grand designs of those in Swindon impinge on how we train future generations of researchers. The fact that Geography does not sit comfortably within the confines of a single funding council is both a source of confusion as well as an opportunity: witness the ESRC/NERC joint studentship scheme. When I received Professor

Chisholm's observation, which recollects events 35 years ago, it struck me as an ideal opportunity to reflect on Human Geography's relationship with the newest funding body to influence our activities, the Arts and Humanities Research Board (AHRB). I asked Professor Felix Driver to provide a complimentary observation on the contemporary relationships between human geography, social science and the humanities. This he has done in the second obser vation published below. Perhaps these two observa tions can stimulate similar debates amongst physical geographers concerning the status of their research within NERC or the efficacy of the various ESRC/ NERC initiatives?



Documents

Geography and Development: 'Core and Periphery'?