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Title: | World city network research at a theoretical impasse: On the need to re-establish qualitative approaches to understanding agency in world city networks |
Authors: | Watson, Allan Beaverstock, Jonathan V. |
Keywords: | World city networks Inter-locking network Qualitative methods Relational economic geography Agency Practice |
Issue Date: | 2014 |
Publisher: | © 2014 Royal Dutch Geographical Society KNAG. Published by Wiley |
Citation: | WATSON, A. and BEAVERSTOCK, J.V., 2014. World city network research at a theoretical impasse: On the need to re-establish qualitative approaches to understanding agency in world city networks. Tijdschrift voor economische en sociale geografie, 105(4), pp. 412-426. |
Abstract: | From the late 1990s, the establishment of a new relational ‘turn’ in the study of world city connectedness in globalization has run parallel to the wider relational turn occurring in economic geography. Early work, built firmly upon a qualitative approach to the collection and analyses of new inter-city datasets, considered cities as being constituted by their relations with other cities. Subsequent research, however, would take a strong quantitative turn, best demonstrated through the articulation of the inter-locking world city network (ILWCN) ‘model’ for measuring relations between cities. In this paper, we develop a critique of research based around the ILWCN model, arguing that this ‘top down’ quantitative approach has now reached a theoretical impasse. To address this impasse, we argue for a move away from Structural approaches in which the firm is the main unit of analysis, towards qualitative approaches in which individual agency and practice are afforded greater importance. |
Description: | This is the peer reviewed version of the following article: WATSON, A. and BEAVERSTOCK, J.V., 2014. World city network research at a theoretical impasse: On the need to re-establish qualitative approaches to understanding agency in world city networks. Tijdschrift voor economische en sociale geografie, 105(4), pp. 412-426., which has been published in final form at http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/tesg.12098. This article may be used for non-commercial purposes in accordance with Wiley Terms and Conditions for Self-Archiving. |
Version: | Accepted for publication |
DOI: | 10.1111/tesg.12098 |
URI: | https://dspace.lboro.ac.uk/2134/21406 |
Publisher Link: | http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/tesg.12098 |
ISSN: | 0040-747X |
Appears in Collections: | Published Articles (Geography)
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