ABSTRACT

Industrial geography has been a major component of economic geography since the turn of the century. Much of the early work concerned the location of industries, particularly in the developed world, and the flows of raw materials and finished goods from and to the developing world. Its focus was largely on manufacturing industry operated within a capitalist economy. For its theories and concepts it tended, not unnaturally, to borrow from the discipline of economics: the output, if it was applied at all, tended to feed into physical and regional economic planning and to explain some social problems. During the post-war period a number of changes have occurred which in turn have forced industrial geographers to re-evaluate what they do. First, the role of government has expanded dramatically, as an industrialist itself operating whole sectors (coal, steel) or very substantial parts of sectors (motor vehicles, shipbuilding, aerospace), as an influence on investment and locational decisions of the private sector, and as a major customer of the private sector. Secondly, in the developed world there has been a steady transition from manufacturing to service industries, when measured in terms of employment. Thirdly, the perspective with which geographers have looked at manufacturing has had to become increasingly global. Explanations of industrial change in Britain will remain at best only partial unless they recognise the changing nature of the world economy in the postcolonial age. Lastly, industrial organisational structures have changed dramatically. Whereas the most common form of enterprise 30 years ago would have been the single indigenously owned and managed plant, the growth of multinational multiplant companies has recently become a major feature of industrial geography. At the same time, in the current recession, less formal industrial enterprises based upon worker cooperatives or community initiatives have also grown in number.