Production and Consumption Geographies
- Neil M. Coe – National University of Singapore – geonmc@nus.edu.sg
- Jana Kleibert – Leibniz, IRS – Jana.Kleibert@leibniz-irs.de
The last 15 years have been tumultuous for the global economy. By several measures, global integration stalled in the aftermath of the Global Financial Crisis that unfolded in 2007-08, and the ensuing period has seen the rise of economic nationalism, trade wars, Brexit and, of course, the COVID-19 pandemic. Seeming certainties about the serene progress of neoliberal globalization and the associated development of global production networks have been disrupted by new discussions of decoupling, reshoring and localization. Industrial strategy and state ownership are back on the agenda, albeit unevenly pursued across a multi-polar global economy marked by geopolitical rifts. At the same time, retail and consumption geographies have been profoundly transformed both by the continued rise of the middle class in Asia, and by the accelerating growth of online shopping, a dynamic exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic and leading to the rapid development of new logistics infrastructures. This theme welcomes submissions – theoretical, empirical and methodological – on all aspects of these topics, including, but not limited to:
- Global value chains/production networks (GVCs/GPNs) under challenge
- GVCs/GPNs and contested regional economic development
- Economic, social and environmental up/downgrading in GVCs/GPNs
- Global production at a time of economic nationalism, trade wars and Brexit
- Global production during and after the COVID-19 pandemic
- The return of industrial strategy?
- New forms of state capitalism and the (post)developmental state
- State-owned/linked enterprises as lead firms
- Varieties of capitalism/variegated capitalisms and intersections with GVCs/GPNs
- States and infrastructure-led development
- New logistical geographies
- Logistics, power and security
- Logistics as an economic development strategy
- E-commerce and the last mile: new modes of logistics
- Logistics labour
- Shifting retail geographies
- The globalization of retailing, and its unravelling?
- The uneven boom in online retailing
- Retailing and platform ecosystems
- The shifting urban geographies of retailing
- Shifting consumption geographies
- New patterns of the global middle class
- Cultures of consumption, place and identity
- Scales of consumption: from the ‘global’ to the home and the body
- Consuming places – travel, tourism and mobilities