ABSTRACT
This chapter outlines Neil Smith's theories on the production of Nature, the production of space and uneven development in relation to capital flows. It considers his theory of rent gap, its explanatory role in the gentrification process and towards the revanchist city, understood as processes of class violence. The chapter looks at his contributions concerning the close ties between the production of geographical knowledge and its links to American imperialism. It examines an equally important facet of the author's personality and scientific practice, namely, the interrelation between his intellectual work and his political activities. Smith held that geography needed to be critical and incorporate political economy and class analysis. In 2009 he published The Revolutionary Imperative in which he openly advocated the need to recuperate and broaden political imagination as a prior step to conceiving the possibility of revolutionary change.
