Space: The Final Frontier

Traditionally, until the early 1990s, spatial economics -- the study of where economic activity takes place and why -- was pretty much neglected. Even now not one of the best-selling introductory textbooks in economics contains a single index entry for "location," "space," or "regions." In the last six or seven years, however, interest in spatial economics has surged. In this article I will try to summarize briefly the reasons for that surge; the key elements of the so-called "new economic geography;" the current state of research; and the prospects and difficulties facing this subfield of economics.