Presentations of the 16 themed sessions > Session B

Session B

The Creative Edges of Globalisation: Spaces, Processes, Flows

Facilitators: Pierre BERGEL (ESO), Emmanuelle BOULINEAU (EVS), Lydia COUDROY DE LILLE (EVS) & Leïla VIGNAL (ESO)

In the 1990s, globalisation was seen as a process of homogenisation: a network would link all places in the world, eliminating distance and time. Today, on the contrary, globalisation is considered as a vector of spatio-temporal differentiation of regional and sub-regional areas, leading to the emergence of cores and grey zones, or peripheries.

The purpose of this session is to explore the ties between processes of globalisation and trends in the development of regional areas, seen as geographical units between local, state and supranational scales. The flows of globalisation shape these areas and in particular their creative edges. “Creative edges” refers to territorial developmental processes, which are determined by relations of proximity between individuals, groups or populations that intersect, meet, or even confront each other in certain places.

The papers for this session will detail the ways in which these relations strengthen or constrain inherited socio-spatial patterns. They will furthermore enable the evaluation of network effects or the use of resources, in some cases over several generations. Behind the fiction of a “zero time”, which supposedly circumvents time and distance thanks to instantaneous digital flows of data, lies the reality that temporal processes are in fact at the heart of the development of regional areas. As such, the historic depth of the analyses will support the argument that the processes under study obey a logic of continuity and change, alternating between phases of rapid change and stasis.

Submissions dealing with the ways in which war and conflict, ongoing or planned infrastructure projects, and trade and exchange relations renew the development of regional areas and the question of “creative edges” will be reviewed with interest.

Indicative bibliographical references

Choplin A., Pliez O., 2018, La mondialisation des pauvres, Paris, Seuil.
Gray J., 2005, “The World is Round”, New York Review of Books, August 11, 2005 Issue.
Friedman T.L., 2005, The World is Flat. A Brief History of the Twenty-First Century, NYC, First Editions.
Müller M., 2018, “In Search of the Global East: Thinking between North and South”, Geopolitics [DOI: 10.1080/14650045.2018.1477757].
O’Brien R., 1992, Global Financial Integration: The End of Geography, Londres, Pinter ed. for Royal Institute of International Affairs.
Probst B., « Marge et dynamique territoriale », Géocarrefour, vol. 79/2, 2004, p. 175-182.
Richard Y., Mareï N., 2018, Dictionnaire de la régionalisation, Paris, éd. Atlande.
Talahite F., Pairault T., Adel A., 2017, La Chine en Algérie. Approches socio-économiques, Paris, MA Éditeurs.
Vignal L. (dir.), 2016, Transnational Middle East. People, Places, Borders, Londres–New-York, Routledge.