We respond to four critical engagements with our article ‘Geography, the foundational economy, and the fallen-below’. There we sought to differentiate the foundational economy (FE) focus on the socio-spatially uneven crisis of social reproduction from regional studies approaches centred on the uneven crisis of production in European states. The article installed a socio-spatial framework at the heart of foundational analysis. Commentators raised substantive points about the FE's theoretical position(s), its take on place-based policy and politics, and the nature of material versus cultural explanations of discontent. Our reply makes three cross-cutting points to address substantive points raised. First, how the foundational approach sustains a movement not a school. Second, how spatial building blocks and place fit into the foundational concept of provisioning. Third, how the material and the cultural through subjectification jointly drive politics.
Bassens et al. (Sat,) studied this question.