Showing papers in "Annals of the American Association of Geographers in 2017"
TL;DR: In this article, a multiscale geographically weighted regression (MGWR) is proposed, which allows different processes to operate at different spatial scales by deriving an optimal bandwidth vector in which each element indicates the spatial scale at which a particular process takes place.
Abstract: Scale is a fundamental geographic concept, and a substantial literature exists discussing the various roles that scale plays in different geographical contexts. Relatively little work exists, though, that provides a means of measuring the geographic scale over which different processes operate. Here we demonstrate how geographically weighted regression (GWR) can be adapted to provide such measures. GWR explores the potential spatial nonstationarity of relationships and provides a measure of the spatial scale at which processes operate through the determination of an optimal bandwidth. Classical GWR assumes that all of the processes being modeled operate at the same spatial scale, however. The work here relaxes this assumption by allowing different processes to operate at different spatial scales. This is achieved by deriving an optimal bandwidth vector in which each element indicates the spatial scale at which a particular process takes place. This new version of GWR is termed multiscale geographically we...
485 citations
TL;DR: In this paper, a Future Land Use Simulation (FLUS) system is presented to simulate global land-use and land-cover change in relation to human-environment interactions, which is built and verified by using remote sensing data.
Abstract: Global land-use and land-cover change (LUCC) data are crucial for modeling a wide range of environmental conditions. So far, access to high-resolution LUCC products at a global scale for public use is difficult because of data and technical issues. This article presents a Future Land-Use Simulation (FLUS) system to simulate global LUCC in relation to human–environment interactions, which is built and verified by using remote sensing data. IMAGE has been widely used in environmental studies despite its relatively coarse spatial resolution of 30 arc-min, which is about 55 km at the equator. Recently, an improved model has been developed to simulate global LUCC with a 5-min resolution (about 10 km at the equator). We found that even the 10-km resolution, however, still produced major distortions in land-use patterns, leading urban land areas to be underestimated by 19.77 percent at the global scale and global land change relating to urban growth to be underestimated by 60 to 97 percent, compared with the 1-k...
244 citations
TL;DR: The authors conceptualized posthuman agency as always already coconstituted with technologies and argued that posthumans are simultaneously individuated and exteriorized in that cocon-stitution, and this permits agency.
Abstract: Accounts by geographers of the ways in which urban spaces are digitally mediated have proliferated in the last few years. This significant body of work pays particular attention to the production of urban space by software and digital hardware, and geographers have drawn on various kinds of posthumanist philosophies to theorize the agency of the technological nonhuman. The agency of the human, however, has been left undertheorized in this work, often appearing in the form of excessive resistance to the agency granted to the digital. This article contributes to understanding the digital mediation of cities by theorizing a specifically posthuman agency; that is, a human agency both mediated through technics and diverse. Drawing on the philosophy of Stiegler as well as a range of feminist digital scholarship, the article conceptualizes posthuman agency as always already coconstituted with technologies. Posthumans are simultaneously individuated and exteriorized in that coconstitution, and this permits agency...
131 citations
TL;DR: A coevolutionary framework widens the explanatory power of multiple drivers to changes in exposure and risk and supports a shift from structural, security-based policies toward an integrated, risk-based natural hazard management system.
Abstract: A coevolutionary perspective is adopted to understand the dynamics of exposure to mountain hazards in the European Alps. A spatially explicit, object-based temporal assessment of elements at risk t...
102 citations
TL;DR: The socio-ecological implications of the diversion of fixed capital into the built environment have been insufficiently developed by Harvey and others as discussed by the authors, and neither Harvey nor Smith emphasized the role of political struggle and contestation as internal to the formation of spatial fixes and the production of nature.
Abstract: In this article, and the companion piece that follows, we develop an account of the socioecological fix. Our concern is to explore the ways in which crises of capitalist overaccumulation might be displaced through spatial fixes that result in the production of nature. We review Harvey's theory of the spatial fix, with emphasis on his model of capital switching, noting that the socioecological implications of the diversion of fixed capital into the built environment have been insufficiently developed by Harvey and others. We invoke Smith's writings on the production of nature to help fill this lacuna but note that Smith did not discuss the spatial fix vis-a-vis the production of nature explicitly. Moreover, neither Harvey nor Smith emphasized the role of political struggle and contestation as internal to the formation of spatial fixes and the production of nature, respectively. We draw on O'Connor's theory of ecological contradiction along with Katz and other feminist political economists who emphasized th...
97 citations
TL;DR: In this paper, the glaciers are referred to as our world's water towers because glaciers both store water over time and regulate seasonal stream flow, releasing runoff during dry seasons when socie...
Abstract: Glacierized mountains are often referred to as our world's water towers because glaciers both store water over time and regulate seasonal stream flow, releasing runoff during dry seasons when socie...
75 citations
TL;DR: In this article, the authors identify and critique the emerging consensus among international financial regulators as to how this threat can best be managed, and show that the preferred approach mirrors hegemonic post-financial crisis regulatory practice vis-a-vis financial stability risk more generically: prioritization of market discipline underpinned by risk disclosure.
Abstract: In recent years, climate change has increasingly come to be seen as one of the principal threats to future global financial stability. This article identifies and critiques the emerging consensus among international financial regulators as to how this threat—the key perceived components of which are also delineated—can best be managed. It shows that the preferred approach mirrors hegemonic postfinancial crisis regulatory practice vis-a-vis financial stability risk more generically: prioritization of market discipline underpinned by risk disclosure. The article characterizes this approach as a quintessentially neoliberal modality of governance. It also argues that insofar as this approach relies on financial market workings and financial institutional behaviors explicitly belied by the financial crisis, it risks precisely the type of “climate Minsky moment” regulators aim to avoid.
71 citations
TL;DR: The authors examined the impacts of direct experience with weather anomalies, ideology, relative prioritization of environmental conservation in comparison to economic development, and motivated reasoning that adjusts individual opinion to align with others who share one's party identification.
Abstract: After a decade of steady growth in the acceptance of the existence of climate change and its anthropogenic causes, opinions have polarized, with almost one third of Americans, mostly Republicans, denying that the climate is changing or that human activity is responsible. What causes Americans to change their minds on this issue? Using a large panel data set, we examined the impacts of direct experience with weather anomalies, ideology, relative prioritization of environmental conservation in comparison to economic development, and motivated reasoning that adjusts individual opinion to align with others who share one's party identification. A generalized ordered logit model confirmed the importance of political ideology, party identification, and relative concern about environmental conservation and economic development on attitude change. The effect of party identification strengthened with attentiveness to news and public affairs, consistent with the logic of motivated reasoning. Recent experience with h...
68 citations
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors used both observational and questionnaire surveys to study the relationship between the neighborhood environment and physical and mental health of older adults living in Hong Kong, Singapore, and Tokyo.
Abstract: Aging in place can be a challenge for seniors living in cities, where the infrastructure and associated services are typically designed for the working population to enhance efficiency and productivity. Through surveying community-dwelling seniors, we ask these research questions: How is the neighborhood environment related to the physical and mental health of seniors living in Hong Kong, Singapore, and Tokyo? How can we make cities more age-friendly to encourage aging in place? To answer these research questions, both observational and questionnaire surveys are used. Characteristics of the local neighborhood are captured by individual-based and general local characteristics. Multilevel analysis is used to disentangle the effects of factors operating at different spatial scales. A total of 687 seniors aged sixty-five and older living in Hong Kong, Singapore, and Tokyo in eleven residential neighborhood districts were recruited through local senior community centers. Based on the final models, 17.53 percen...
66 citations
TL;DR: In this paper, a three-stage interpretive geonarrative study conducted in southwest England from May to November 2013 was designed to explore the complex spatial-temporal ordering of people's lives.
Abstract: A growing evidence base highlights “green” and “blue” spaces as examples of “therapeutic landscapes” incorporated into people's lives to maintain a sense of well-being. A commonly overlooked dimension within this corpus of work concerns the dynamic nature of people's therapeutic place assemblages over time. This article provides these novel temporal perspectives, drawing on the findings of an innovative three-stage interpretive geonarrative study conducted in southwest England from May to November 2013, designed to explore the complex spatial–temporal ordering of people's lives. Activity maps produced using accelerometer and Global Positioning system (GPS) data were used to guide in-depth geonarrative interviews with thirty-three participants, followed by a subset of go-along interviews in therapeutic places deemed important by participants. Concepts of fleeting time, restorative time, and biographical time are used, alongside notions of individual agency, to examine participants' green and blue space exp...
55 citations
TL;DR: The authors explored the experiences of ethnic and religious minority young people who are mistaken for being Muslim in Scotland, including young Sikhs, Hindus, and other south Asian young people as well as black and Caribbean young people.
Abstract: Exploring both debates about misrecognition and explorations of encounters, this article focuses on the experiences of ethnic and religious minority young people who are mistaken for being Muslim in Scotland. We explore experiences of encountering misrecognition, including young people's understandings of, and responses to, such encounters. Recognizing how racism and religious discrimination operate to marginalize people—and how people manage and respond to this—is crucial in the struggle for social justice. Our focus is on young people from a diversity of ethnic and religious minority groups who are growing up in urban, suburban, and rural Scotland, 382 of whom participated in forty-five focus groups and 224 interviews. We found that young Sikhs, Hindus, and other south Asian young people as well as black and Caribbean young people were regularly mistaken for being Muslim. These encounters tended to take place at school, in taxis, at the airport, and in public spaces. Our analysis points to a dynamic set...
TL;DR: This article presents and demonstrates a multiscalar approach for studying segregation and clustering that avoids the modifiable areal unit problem, including the part of the problem related to the area of reference.
Abstract: One problem encountered in analyses based on data aggregated into areal units is that the results can depend on the delineation of the areal units. Therefore, a particular aggregation at a specific...
TL;DR: This paper examined the role of corruption narratives in struggles against land enclosures in two Indian cities and found that corruption serves as a cultural, semantic, and moral rubric that expresses and shapes a sense of structural injustice in this moment of sharpening urban inequality.
Abstract: In this age of global inequality, how people talk of corruption matters. This article examines the role of corruption narratives in struggles against land enclosures (“land grabs”) in two Indian cities. Drawing on ethnographic research on land grabs in Mumbai and Bangalore and critical corruption and geography literatures, we argue that corruption talk by slum-based and lower middle-class residents and activists advances an ethical critique of contemporary capitalism. In our cases, corruption discourse upends mainstream development agendas that narrowly equate corruption with individual acts of bribery and the long-standing notion in India that corruption manifests mainly among the poor and lower rungs of the state. Instead, we find that “corruption” serves as a cultural, semantic, and moral rubric that expresses and shapes a sense of structural injustice in this moment of sharpening urban inequality. Specifically, corruption talk is leveraged to identify and challenge the mechanisms underlying elite land...
TL;DR: In this article, the authors trace the evolution of the relationship of exception and its mutual links with the production of hybridity in Lebanon's sovereignty from 1948 until today, focusing particularly on the key period from 1968 to 1982 when Palestinian militancy led to a formal recognition of Palestinian autonomy in the camps.
Abstract: This article traces a genealogy of sovereignty and exception in the Palestinian refugee camps in Lebanon that highlights their mutual connections and contaminations with the mechanisms of Lebanese state sovereignty from 1948 onward. Drawing together two theoretical approaches emerging from the work of Giorgio Agamben and recent political geographical work on sovereignty, we explore the refugee camps as spaces of exception characterized by hybrid sovereignties. Drawing on original fieldwork, we trace the evolution of the relationship of exception and its mutual links with the production of hybridity in Lebanon's sovereignty from 1948 until today, focusing particularly on the key period from 1968 to 1982 when Palestinian militancy led to a formal recognition of Palestinian autonomy in the camps. Rather than simply undermining Lebanon's sovereignty, the camps' fragmented security and territoriality have instead reshaped Lebanon's state sovereignty in complex ways and forged hybrid spaces for refugee politica...
TL;DR: In this article, the authors argue that it is equally important to explore the types of sharing and exchange that are survival-compelled among those with precarious livelihoods, i.e., irregular migrants including refused asylum seekers in the United Kingdom.
Abstract: There is growing interest in the sharing economy as a different way of living in neoliberal capitalist societies, but this discussion is frequently heavily classed and the ethos generally rests on excess capacity of goods and services. This article intervenes in this emerging body of writing to argue that it is equally important to explore the types of sharing and exchange that are survival-compelled among those with precarious livelihoods. Precarious migrants are a group facing significant livelihood pressures, and we are concerned here with a particular category of insecure migrants: irregular migrants including refused asylum seekers in the United Kingdom. Such migrants are especially shaped by their sociolegal status, and without rights to work or welfare they are susceptible to exploitation in their survival-oriented laboring. Existing literature from labor geographies and the subdisciplinary area of unfree and forced labor has not generally focused on the experiences of these migrants as house guest...
TL;DR: The authors examines how companies contend with this problem both within their own supply chains and as members of multistakeholder initiatives, showing that even the biggest food companies exercise surprisingly little clout over producers.
Abstract: Over the past several years, many of the companies collectively known as Big Food have launched ambitious programs to assess and improve the sustainability of their raw material supply chains Fueled partly by concerns about the risks posed by climate change and other environmental problems, these efforts differ from earlier corporate food supply chain governance in that they rely more on metrics of continuous improvement than compliance with standards They also extend beyond high-value, high-profile products to include staple ingredients such as corn and soy These commodities are sourced through long, complex, and traditionally nontransparent supply chains, where even the biggest food companies exercise surprisingly little clout over producers This article examines how companies contend with this problem both within their own supply chains and as members of multistakeholder initiatives The assemblage concept not only describes the many actors, technologies, and practices now working to get certain ki
TL;DR: In this article, a Bayesian spatial multilevel logistic model is developed to account for spatial dependence in unobserved contextual influences (neighborhood effects) on health.
Abstract: Environmental pollution is a major problem in China, subjecting people to significant health risk. Surprisingly little is known, though, about how these risks are distributed spatially or socially. Drawing on a large-scale survey conducted in Beijing in 2013, we examine how environmental hazards and health, as perceived by residents, are distributed at a fine (subdistrict) scale in urban Beijing and investigate the association between hazards, health, and geographical context. A Bayesian spatial multilevel logistic model is developed to account for spatial dependence in unobserved contextual influences (neighborhood effects) on health. The results reveal robust associations between exposure to environmental hazards and health. A unit decrease on a five-point Likert scale in exposure is associated with increases of 15.2 percent (air pollution), 17.5 percent (noise), and 9.3 percent (landfills) in the odds of reporting good health, with marginal groups including migrant workers reporting greater exposure. H...
TL;DR: In this article, the authors propose two topological figures that move beyond narrower spatial metaphors that read that state either as a fixed, hierarchically scaled entity or as a flat, wholly malleable assemblage without consequential spatial order or historicity.
Abstract: This article seeks to insert questions of temporality into the core of geographical analysis of the state. It does so by drawing on extended fieldwork in slums and so-called unauthorized colonies in Delhi, India, to describe how those who live on the margins of the state employ a topological sensibility in accessing, influencing, and “timing” the state. By attending to the temporal rhythms of these residents' everyday efforts to secure water, electricity, and building permission, the article proposes two topological figures that move beyond narrower spatial metaphors that read that state either as a fixed, hierarchically scaled entity or as a flat, wholly malleable assemblage without consequential spatial order or historicity. These are the topological state and the state outside itself. The analysis of the topological state centers on how real-time connections are forged between residents and key nodes in the bureaucracy, producing momentary reconfigurations of state form that allow low-level state actor...
TL;DR: In this article, a case study from the Nanga parbat region in Gilgit-Baltistan in Pakistan is presented, based on which the availability of glacier and snow meltwater is essential for irrigated crop cultivation in the northwestern Himalaya.
Abstract: Regular availability of glacier and snow meltwater is essential for irrigated crop cultivation in the northwestern Himalaya. Based on a case study from the Nanga Parbat region in Gilgit-Baltistan, ...
TL;DR: The Indian Himalayan Region, a climate change hotspot, is witnessing a massive surge in hydropower development alongside a dramatic rise in natural hazard events as mentioned in this paper, and the authors explore indigenous p...
Abstract: The Indian Himalayan Region, a climate change hotspot, is witnessing a massive surge in hydropower development alongside a dramatic rise in natural hazard events. This article explores indigenous p...
TL;DR: Migrant farmworkers in Canada's Seasonal Agricultural Worker Program (SAWP) are bound by unfree labor relations as discussed by the authors, and they are employed by and live adjacent to Canadian family farms.
Abstract: Migrant farmworkers in Canada's Seasonal Agricultural Worker Program (SAWP) are bound by unfree labor relations. Migrants are employed by and live adjacent to Canadian family farms. Extending curre...
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors focus on how hydro-social relations are differentially structured across technical experts engaged within diverse and multiple networks of institutional and bureaucratic practice and the implications this has for more inclusive forms of environmental governance and decision-making.
Abstract: This article concentrates on how hydro-social relations are differentially structured across technical experts engaged within diverse and multiple networks of institutional and bureaucratic practice and the implications this has for more inclusive forms of environmental governance and decision-making. I empirically focus on stormwater governance in Chicago and Los Angeles as a means to capture the range of geographical and institutional variations in environmental knowledge. Both cities face considerably different water resource challenges in the United States but are at the forefront of developing comprehensive and progressive urban water governance programs. In the article, I identify four visions of hydrosocial relations: hydro-reformist, hydro-managerial, hydro-rationalist, and hydro-pragmatist. Each of these represents a particular understanding of how hydrosocial relations should proceed. They all align around shared framings of integrated management and the utilization of the best available science...
TL;DR: Andean paramo grasslands have long supported human populations that depend on them as forage for livestock and, increasingly, have been recognized as critical water sources with large soil carbon s as mentioned in this paper.
Abstract: Andean paramo grasslands have long supported human populations that depend on them as forage for livestock and, increasingly, have been recognized as critical water sources with large soil carbon s...
TL;DR: In this article, the authors argue that political ecology has neglected examining the hidden abodes of industrial factory production and suggest a visit to such sites can expand and deepen what counts as both ecology and politics in the field.
Abstract: In this article, I argue that political ecology has neglected examining the “hidden abodes” of industrial factory production. I suggest a visit to such sites can expand and deepen what counts as both ecology and politics in the field. Ecologically speaking, the industrial secondary sector is not only at the center of the overall “metabolism” between society and nature but also is central in producing many large-scale ecological problems like climate change. Politically, although much of political ecology focuses on marginalization, dispossession, and what I call “following the politics” (i.e., protest and resistance movements), industrial environments often entail uncontested power over massive flows of raw materials, energy, and waste. I suggest that political ecology analysis can use chains of explanation to make these industrial ecologies political. To illustrate the argument, I focus on a large industrial nitrogen fertilizer facility in southern Louisiana. In the empirical sections of this article, I ...
TL;DR: Geographers have a sustained interest in urban community gardens because such spaces provide a meaningful lens to interrogate the complexities of living at the intersection of nature and society as discussed by the authors, and they provide a way to connect the two.
Abstract: Geographers have a sustained interest in urban community gardens because such spaces provide a meaningful lens to interrogate the complexities of living at the intersection of nature–society relati...
TL;DR: This study uses data from the U.S. Census, American Community Survey, and the Environmental Protection Agency at the 2010 census tract level to examine the spatial relationships between same-sex partner households and cumulative cancer risk from exposure to hazardous air pollutants in Greater Houston (Texas).
Abstract: Disparate residential hazard exposures based on disadvantaged gender status (e.g., among female-headed households) have been documented in the distributive environmental justice literature, yet no published studies have examined whether disproportionate environmental risks exist based on minority sexual orientation. To address this gap, we use data from the U.S. Census, American Community Survey, and the Environmental Protection Agency at the 2010 census tract level to examine the spatial relationships between same-sex partner households and cumulative cancer risk from exposure to hazardous air pollutants (HAPs) emitted by all ambient emission sources in Greater Houston (Texas). Findings from generalized estimating equation analyses demonstrate that increased cancer risks from HAPs are significantly associated with neighborhoods having relatively high concentrations of resident same-sex partner households, adjusting for geographic clustering and variables known to influence risk (i.e., race, ethnicity, so...
TL;DR: The standard approach to China's environmental management, fragmented authoritarianism, assumes the existence of state, corporations, farmers, and consumers as discussed by the authors, and new social actors now populate the Chin...
Abstract: The standard approach to China's environmental management, fragmented authoritarianism, assumes the existence of state, corporations, farmers, and consumers. New social actors now populate the Chin...
TL;DR: In this article, the authors conducted a county-based assessment of the changes in population and urban areas in high-risk flood zones from 2001 to 2011 in the contiguous United States and found that the ratio of urban development in flood zones is less than the proportion of developed (urban) land in flood zone by county at the two time points, and indexes of difference were calculated.
Abstract: This article conducts a national, county-based assessment of the changes in population and urban areas in high-risk flood zones from 2001 to 2011 in the contiguous United States. The U.S. Federal Emergency Management Agency's (FEMA) 100-year flood maps, land cover data, and census data were used to extract the proportion of developed (urban) land in flood zones by county at the two time points, and indexes of difference were calculated. Local Moran's I statistic was applied to identify hot spots of increase in urban area in flood zones, and geographically weighted regression was used to estimate the population in flood zones from the land cover data. Results show that in 2011, an estimate of about 25.3 million people (8.3 percent of the total population) lived in high-risk flood zones. Nationally, the ratio of urban development in flood zones is less than the ratio of land in flood zones, implying that Americans were responsive to flood hazards by avoiding development in flood zones. This trend varied fro...
TL;DR: In this article, the authors examine two prominent examples of this process of rent extraction through the enclosure of common access regimes: lease lots and working forest conservation easements, and argue for regulatory intervention, as well as the need for concrete case studies on the impacts of financial investment on the biophysical environment.
Abstract: This article looks at the changing nature of property access regimes in northeastern Maine. The state's unique “open lands” tradition has come under threat as a result of the large-scale restructuring of the timber industry from vertically integrated forest products companies toward individual and institutional investor-owners. Using a large conservation project in the town of Grand Lake Stream as a case study, I argue that new investor-owners have been able to generate profits by enclosing long-standing common access regimes and commanding monopoly rent payments. After reviewing literatures on rent, enclosure, and the commodification of nature, I examine two prominent examples of this process of rent extraction through the enclosure of common access regimes: lease lots and working forest conservation easements. The article concludes arguing for regulatory intervention, as well as the need for more concrete case studies on the impacts of financial investment on the biophysical environment.
TL;DR: The authors analyzed digitally mediated interactions using Twitter data collected about a variety of actors engaged in entrepreneurial networks for the United States over an eighteen-month period, and found that the hashtags used in this analysis (#smallbiz and #entrepreneur) do capture (albeit not exhaustively) well-known actors in entrepreneurial network, as well as important subtleties in the geography of locales engaged in these activities.
Abstract: As we begin to understand who uses particular social media platforms, this user information represents a way forward for understanding the types of research questions for which big data might prove valuable. In this respect, the use of social media data for analyzing entrepreneurial networks represents a promising research domain. Not only does the user profile of social media users overlap substantially with the profile of entrepreneurs, but research highlights that the entrepreneurial process is a fundamentally networked activity. Given this research promise, this study analyzes digitally mediated interactions using Twitter data collected about a variety of actors engaged in entrepreneurial networks for the United States over an eighteen-month period. Analytical results reveal that the hashtags used in this analysis (#smallbiz and #entrepreneur) do capture (albeit not exhaustively) well-known actors in entrepreneurial networks, as well as important subtleties in the geography of locales engaged in these...