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1、Linking discourse and space: towards a cultural sociology of space in analysing spatial policy discourses AbstractThe aim of this paper is to explore how spatialities are constructed in spatial policy discourses, and to explore how these construction processes might be conceptualised and analysed. T
2、o do this we discuss a theoretical and analytical framework for the discourse analysis of socio-spatial relations. Our approach follows the path emerging within planning research focusing on the relations between rationality and power, making use of discourse analytics and cultural theoretical appro
3、aches to articulate a cultural sociology of space. We draw on a variety of theoretical sources from critical geography to sociology to argue for a practice- and culture-oriented understanding of the spatiality of social life. The approach hinges on the dialectical relation between material practices
4、 and the symbolic meanings that social agents attach to their spatial environment. Socio-spatial relations are conceptualised in terms of their practical workings and their symbolic meaning, played out at spatial scales from the body to the global. Thus giving notion to an analysis of the politics o
5、f scale. The discourse analytic approach moves away from textually-oriented approaches to explore the relations between language, space and power. In the paper we use examples of the articulation of space in the emerging field of European spatial policy. It is shown how the new spatial policy discou
6、rse both creates the conditions for a new set of spatial practices which shape European space, at the same time as it creates a new system of meaning about that space, based on the language and ideas of polycentricity and hyper mobility.Linking discourse and space: towards a cultural sociology of sp
7、ace in analysing spatial policy discoursesSpaces, then, may be constructed in different ways by different people, through power struggles and conflicts of interest. This idea that spaces are socially constructed, and that many spaces may co-exist within the same physical space is an important one. I
8、t suggests the need to analyse how discourses and strategies of inclusion and exclusion are connected with particular spaces (Flyvbjerg and Richardson, 1998, pp. 9-10).1. IntroductionThe aim of this paper is to explore how spatialities are constructed in policy and planning discourses, and to explor
9、e how these construction processes might be conceptualised and analysed. Our overall argument is that the analysis of spatial policy discourses will benefit from using a theoretical and analytical framework that deals not only with discourses but also with spaces and spatiality. To achieve this we e
10、laborate a theoretical and analytical framework for the discourse analysis of socio-spatial relations. The application of this framework, and the resulting insights into the nature of spatial policy, are illustrated by focusing on the emerging field of European spatial policy. This is a particularly
11、 interesting case, because it reveals how new modes of policy thinking, institutional structures, and practices are being constructed, challenging those that have evolved in the different EU member states. The new discourse of European spatial policy is being shaped in a complex milieu of power stru
12、ggles and contested meanings which extends across Europe and reaches from local to transational policy arenas.We begin, then, by briefly outlining the EUs tentative steps towards European spatial policy. We then move on to construct a general theoretical framework of space and spatiality - a cultura
13、l sociology of space in our terminology - or what Sayer has described as a new spatially conscious sociology (Sayer, 2000, pp. 133). Drawing from a variety of theoretical sources from critical geography to sociology, we argue for a practice- and culture-oriented understanding of the spatiality of so
14、cial life. Such a cultural sociology of space hinges on the dialectical relation between material practices and the symbolic meanings that social agents attach to their environment. Socio-spatial relations are conceptualised both in terms of their practical workings and their symbolic meaning. Socia
15、l space is thus simultaneously a field of action and a basis for action, on scales from the body to the global. Although our approach emphasises spatiality as an inescapable component of social life, we acknowledge that it is simply one of the factors which need to be analysed to understand social c
16、onditions and dynamics. In some cases it is crucial to this understanding, in others less so.We then consider how a cultural sociology of space might be operationalised in a way which would be useful in researching spatial policy making. Following the path emerging within planning research focusing
17、on power relations (Flyvbjerg, 2000, p. 16), we set out a discourse analytical framework that focuses on how words and actions frame and represent spaces on the basis of certain relations between power and rationality. The non-textual approach to discourse analysis is well equipped to deal with spat
18、iality, by incorporating a dimension of socio-spatial practices, embracing materiality, re-presentation and imagination (Harvey, 1996, p. 322). The essence of a non-textual approach is that it explores the performativity of discourse: how social structures create conditions for thought, communicatio
19、n and action, and how different configurations of power and rationality shape, and are shaped by, policy processes. Analysing language, and analysing practices, become complementary ways of revealing these struggles for control over meaning in policy making and implementation.To illustrate how such
20、a non-textual discourse analysis of the cultural sociology of space might be operationalised, we draw upon our earlier analysis of the emerging field of European spatial policy, manifested in the European Spatial Development Perspective (ESDP)(Richardson and Jensen, 2000, Jensen and Richardson, 2001
21、). In dealing with this example of the construction of a spatial policy discourse we explore its meanings, practices and rationalities as expressions of not only a new politics of scale but also as a contribution to a nascent European identity. Finally we offer some general conclusions on the concep
22、tual effort to bridge spaces and discourse in planning and policy analysis. The message of a theoretical and analytical perspective framed by the cultural sociology of space and the discourse analytical framework thus hinges on perceiving how the spatiality of social life is played out in a dialecti
23、cal tension between material practices and symbolic meanings at scales from the body to the global. Thus any spatial policy discourse seeking to direct or produce new spatial practices works by means of building language uses and practice forms expressing specific power and rationality forms. Seen f
24、rom this perspective, the ESDP both creates the conditions for a new set of spatial practices which shape European space, at the same time as it creates and reproduces a new system of meaning about that space based on the language and ideas of polycentricity and hyper mobility. 2. European spatial p
25、olicy the making of a new spatial policy discourseBefore exploring the links between space and discourse, we will briefly outline the new field of European spatial policy. This should help the reader to make sense of our subsequent attempts to illustrate the analytical potential of linking space and
26、 discourse by returning to analysis of this policy field. Since the late 1980s, principally under the auspices of its General Directorate for Regional Development (in the beginning named DGXVI, since renamed DG Regio), the European Commission has analysed and charted the spatial and territorial deve
27、lopment of the Community with increasing scrutiny. The nature of this engagement has changed dramatically from its early interest in re-structuring the Regional Development Fund to facilitate the redistribution of benefits under its cohesion policy. In the 1990s, through Commission initiatives and t
28、he work of, amongst others, the Committee of Spatial Development (CSD), the EU progressed a series of initiatives on spatial co-operation in Europe marked by the publication of key policy documents setting out spatial analysis and policy issues at the scale of the EU (Europe 2000, Europe 2000+, Comp
29、endium of European Spatial Planning Systems). Through these activities, the aim has gradually broadened and become more ambitious: to provide a strategic spatial framework which could draw together many other EU initiatives with spatial impacts (such as trans-European networks, agriculture and envir
30、onment policy), and to create a spatial vision which could shape the spatial planning activities within and between member states. This framework and vision is enshrined in the European Spatial Development Perspective (the ESDP: CSD, 1999). After working through a series of drafts, the final version
31、 of the ESDP was adopted by the informal meeting of ministers responsible for spatial planning in the EU in Potsdam on 10-11 May 1999.Spatial policy making at the European level necessarily involves concerted integrated working between the different Directorates of the Commission responsible for Reg
32、ions but also among other Transport, Environment and Agriculture. But the Commission itself is itself merely one actor at this level, working between the European Council and the European Parliament in a hotly contested lobbying environment to move forward the policy field whilst reconciling or medi
33、ating between conflicting positions and interests.The new field of EU spatial policy is not legally based on the Treaties of the European Union. The EU therefore has no formal competence for implementing spatial policy, or for making its policies binding on member states, which makes the ESDP distin
34、ctive. It is carefully framed as serving as a basis for voluntary actions, setting out policy options, and even avoiding in its final version the use of proposal maps (after heated debate). It is also titled perspective rather than plan or policy, suggesting its indicative status. However, in spite
35、of this apparent lack of teeth, the thinking and vision-making in the ESDP is increasingly guiding European Funding and influencing planning activity across Europe. This particularly applies to the INTERREG programme, which since the mid-1990s has proven to be the de facto mechanism for implementati
36、on of the emerging ESDPs transnational spatial policy thinking. INTERREG IIC (1994-2000) enabled cross-border trans-national planning initiatives between national and European levels, working within the context of transnational regions subsumed under the ESDP framework. The new and economically stro
37、nger INTERREG IIIB program (2000-2006) explicitly states that recommendations made in the ESDP must be taken into account, and that the program especially encourages the drawing up of spatial visions at the transnational level. Alongside EU initiatives like INTERREG, member states are increasingly i
38、ntegrating the ESDPs language and framing of spatial relations and policy options into planning strategies at national, regional and local levels in a more subtle process of Europeanisation of planning systems. After this brief foray into the field of European spatial policy and planning, we will no
39、w move on to discuss the idea of a cultural sociology of space, as the first step in our attempt to link discourse and space.3. Towards a Cultural Sociology of SpaceThe fundamental assumption of a cultural sociology of space is that analysis must deal with the dialectical relations between socio-spa
40、tial practices and the symbolic and cultural meanings that social agents attach to their environments (these two spheres are separated analytically, not as an ontological statement). That is to say, we need to conceptualise socio-spatial relations in terms of their practical workings and their symbo
41、lic meaning. This dialectical perspective means that the spatiality of social life is thus simultaneously a field of action and a basis for action (Lefebvre, 1974/91, pp. 73 and 191). To this dialectic relation we will add a further perspective of the politics of scale.Spatial practicesThe first (an
42、alytical) dimension of the cultural sociology of space dealing with the coercive and enabling effects of socio-spatial relations on social practices, emphasises not only the material dimension of human agency but also the significance of power. David Harvey stresses that social relations are always
43、spatial and exist within a certain produced framework of spatialities, and that this framework consists of institutions understood as produced spaces of a more or less durable sort (Harvey, 1996, p. 122). Such spatialised institutions ranges from territories of control and surveillance to domains of
44、 organisation and administration, creating institutional environments within which symbolised spaces are produced and attributed meanings. In line with the dialectical framework specific places must furthermore be conceptualised in relational terms. Henri Lefebvre, among others, has recognised the i
45、mportance of the production of space through spatial practices:Spatial practice thus simultaneously defines: places the relationship of local and global; the re-presentation of that relationship; actions and signs; the trivialised spaces of everyday life; and, in opposition to these last, spaces mad
46、e special by symbolic means as desirable or undesirable, benevolent or malevolent, sanctioned or forbidden to particular groups (Lefebvre, 1974/91, p. 288, emphasis in original).As a part of the cultural sociology of space, flows and mobilities are addressed as a key dimension in understanding mater
47、ial practices in society. The new mobility forms transforming the spatiality of social life contribute to uneven geographical development producing difference at various spatial scales (Harvey, 2000, pp. 75-83). The problem of uneven development in the face of globalisation creates a critical proble
48、m in framing policy discourses carrying the idea of balanced development. According to Manuel Castells the complex dynamics of globalisation can be understood as a dialectical tension between these two forms of spatial logic or forms of rationality (Castells, 1996, p. 378). In line with the work of,
49、 for example, Maarten Hajer (2000) and John Urry (2000), Castells sees mobility as the key to understanding these relations. The essence of his conceptualisation is therefore a dialectical tension between the historically rooted local spatial organization of human experience (the space of places) versus the global flow of goods, signs, people and electronic impulses (the space of flows) (Castells, 1996, pp. 412 and 423). In the words of Lefebvre:The loca