There is a Politics of Space because Space is Political

This lecture offers a reading of the work of the French Marxist Henri Lefebvre, particularly focusing on his writings on the question of space. It suggests that this is a simultaneously political and philosophical project and that it needs to be understood as such. Accordingly we need to examine and work with both terms in Lefebvre’s book The Production of Space — thinking about the Marxist analysis of production and the question of space which goes beyond the resources Marxism can offer. The paper concludes by offering some reflections on Lefebvre scholarship through the relation of space and history.