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Spaces of Neoliberalism: Urban Restructuring in North America and Western Europe edited by Neil Brenner and Nik Theodore, Blackwell Publishing, Oxford, 2002, xi + 294 pp., paper US$39.95 (ISBN 1-40510-105-9)
This is the first volume of The Antipode Book Series, the venerable journal of radical theory in geography (the series is co-edited by Noel Castree, Jamie Peck and Jane Wills). As the text on the book cover explains, the volume offers a synthesis of cutting-edge theoretical work in radical geography, critical theory and neo-Marxism to construct a new theoretical approach to the analysis of contemporary urban transformations. The cover is perhaps the best key to this book's content, a suitably dark and gloomy photograph of the Brooklyn Bridge in New York by David Bradford-an artist turned cab driver, well known for his raw 'drive-by shootings' documentary images of city life. The eleven essays, plus an introduction by the editors, attempt to theorise about the confusing maze of the constantly changing landscape of a contemporary urban-based society and economy. Like the photograph on the cover, it is a rather gloomy landscape; the sense of impending crisis, injustice and inevitable contradiction permeate the texts in this book from cover to cover.
The texts are divided into three sections. The first section, with four chapters by...