The International Critical Geography Croup: Forbidden Optimism?

At the end of the fulcrum year of 1989 Casper W. Weinberger, Reagan's exsecretary of Defence, rejoiced over the “enormously heartening, daily rejection of Communism” in Eastern Europe and issued an appeal (Weinberger, 1989). As publisher of the business magazine Forbes, which subtitles itself “Capitalist Tool,” Weinberger admonished his readers that the United States could “profit in every sense of the word” from these events, but that it all “starts with geography” (Weinberger, 1989). Less than a decade later, 1997 proved to be as pivotal as 1989 – this time economically more than politically – as the neo-liberal globalization from which Weinberger eagerly sought to profit showed the first signs of fatal weakness. Overproduction in Asia after an extraordinary 30-year industrial revolution transformed with lightening efficiency into a global stock market meltdown. But in geographical circles, 1997 may turn out to be significant for other reasons: it was also the year in which a very different vision of global geography was launched, one which puts a radical twist on Weinberger‟s assertion of the importance of geography.