Producing Places (Perspectives on Economic Change) - Softcover

'Inherently transformative, production is at once a social, material, reproductive, and geographical process. All of its dimensions have to be related and elucidated simultaneously. In exploring places of production and the production of place, Hudson's constructive critique of Marxian political economy does precisely that. This book is crystal clear in theoretical usage, writing, and organization... A major contribution.' - Professor Roger Lee, Queen Mary, University of London, UK 'Hudson is one of the most stimulating scholars currently writing and teaching in economic geography....[The book's] justaposition of Marxist political economy with contemporary heterodox positions, including evolutionary and institutional economics, all filtered through the lens of spatial difference, is spellbinding. Through exceptionally clear writing and carefully chosen examples from a range of places, the author guides the reader step by step through theories of production, the organization of work, and spatial divisions of labor. This book will prove an invaluable text for undergraduate and graduate students in geography and economics. It will also appeal to a wider audience curious about the extent and inevitability of geographic inequalities, as well as the prospects for more sustainable production processes.' - Linda McDowell, Professor of Economic Geography, University College London, UK 'This extraordinarily useful book revitalizes radical political economy by bringing it into a constructive relation with other literatures that have animated debate in social theory over the last two decades....Even undergraduate audiences will find the book an exemplar of clarity.' - Kevin Cox, Ohio State University

This book synthesizes a vast body of theory and research on production in capitalist societies. Ray Hudson considers both the specific sites in which production occurs, such as factory, office, and home, and the production of places in which we live as socialized human beings. Building on and refining contemporary Marxist analysis, Hudson also draws on regulationist, institutional, and evolutionary perspectives. He provides an innovative understanding of the variety of organizational and spatial forms that production can take, the ways these are governed and regulated, effects on social and political arrangements, and implications for the natural world. The book is illustrated with examples and evidence from across the global economy.