Abstract
The interest of geographers in relations between knowledge, power, and space has a long tradition but it was reinvigorated by critical engagements with Foucault and Gramsci. For Foucault, space is fundamental in any exercise of power, and knowledge and power are integrated with one another. New inventions of communication have influenced the ways in which those in power can generate, store, evaluate and transmit information; the distance over which rulers or headquarters of organizations can give orders and execute control; the spatial division of labor, the scope of surveillance, and the optimal locations for exercising power. Being at or near the center of a domain also has psychological significance because it denotes importance, reputation, competence, and trustworthiness. It increases the chances that experts and scholars will receive public attention and be able to influence key decision-makers. Centers can function as truth spots, and sites of knowledge generation, information control, and power execution.
Knowledge and power are integrated with one another, and there is no point in dreaming of a time when knowledge will cease to depend on power
Foucault (1980, p. 52).
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Notes
- 1.
- 2.
Some authors, e.g., Scheler (1926), call it salvation knowledge.
- 3.
This may be one of the reasons why fraudulent researchers appear to always find highly respected senior scientists to coauthor their articles (Stroebe, Postmes, & Spears, 2012, pp. 672, 678).
- 4.
Retrieved on 1 October 2014 from http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/the-reith-lectures-speaking-truth-to-power-in-his-penultimate-reith-lecture-edward-said-considers-the-basic-question-for-the-intellectual-how-does-one-speak-the-truth-this-is-an-edited-text-of-last-nights-radio-4-broadcast-1486359.html
- 5.
The expression, first used by Merton (1968), stems from the Gospel of Matthew 25:29: “For unto every one that hath shall be given, and he shall have abundance: but from him that hath not shall be taken even that which he hath” (King James Version). In modern parlance, the rich get richer, the poor get poorer.
- 6.
The role of networking platforms, the intrigues of lobbyists of big money and influential media, and the buzz of power plays in today’s world centers of political power are described in a witty, entertaining, and troubling way by the political correspondent Leibovich (2013).
- 7.
Theoretical concepts of place and space have already been addressed extensively in the volumes 1–6 of this series and hundreds of other publications. Nevertheless, as this book addresses various disciplines it seems necessary to repeat the gist of these discussions in this introduction in order to prevent misunderstandings among those readers who still adhere to traditional concepts of (absolute) space or overrate the role of distance.
- 8.
The Russian poet Alexander Sergejewitsch Pushkin said: “The illusion which exalts us is dearer to us than ten thousand truths”. (retrieved on 1 July 2014 from http://www.quoteid.com/Aleksandr_Pushkin.html)
- 9.
Feuchtwanger was one of the most published German authors during the years of the Weimar Republic (1919–1933). As an opponent of National Socialism, he had to leave Germany.
- 10.
Using the PubMed database, Steen (2011) studied 742 papers (distributed among 404 journals) for which retraction notices could be obtained. The number of papers retracted for fraud increased more than sevenfold in the 6 years from 2004 to 2009 (p. 251). Similar results were presented by Bhutta and Crane (2014).
- 11.
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Gregory, D., Meusburger, P., Suarsana, L. (2015). Power, Knowledge, and Space: A Geographical Introduction. In: Meusburger, P., Gregory, D., Suarsana, L. (eds) Geographies of Knowledge and Power. Knowledge and Space, vol 7. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-017-9960-7_1
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