David Harvey (geographer) 1417002 225331197 2008-07-13T03:30:51Z Countertopology 7282486 {{Infobox Philosopher |image_name = Replace this image male.svg <!-- only free-content images are allowed for depicting living people - see [[WP:NONFREE]] --> | <!-- Scroll down to edit this page --> <!-- Philosopher Category --> | region = Geography | era = [[20th-century philosophy]] <br> [[21st-century philosophy]] | color = #B0C4DE | name = David Harvey | image_size = 187x217px | image_caption = | birth = {{birth date and age|1935|12|7}} <br /> Gillingham, [[Kent, England]] | death = | school_tradition = [[Geography]], [[social theory]] | main_interests = [[Geography]], [[Urban Development]], | spouse = | influences = | influenced = | notable_ideas= }} '''David Harvey''' (born [[1935]]) is the Distinguished [[Professor]] of [[Anthropology]] at the Graduate Center of the [[City University of New York]] (CUNY). A leading [[social theory|social theorist]] of international standing, he graduated from [[University of Cambridge]] with a [[PhD]] in [[Geography]] in 1961. He is the world's most cited academic geographer (according to Andrew Bodman, see ''Transactions of the IBG'', 1991,1992), and the author of many books and essays that have been prominent in the development of modern [[geography]] as a [[academic discipline|discipline]]. His work has contributed greatly to broad social and political debate, most recently he has been credited with helping to bring back [[social class]] and Marxist methods as serious methodological tools in the critique of [[global capitalism]], particularly in its [[neoliberalism|neoliberal]] form. ==Life== Harvey was born in [[1935]] in [[Gillingham, Kent]], [[England]]. He attended [[Gillingham Grammar School for Boys]]. Harvey's early work, beginning with his PhD (on hop production in c.19th Kent), was historical in nature, emerging from a regional-historical tradition of inquiry widely used at Cambridge and in [[United Kingdom|Britain]] at that time. Historical inquiry runs through his later works (for example on [[Paris]]). By the mid 1960s he followed trends in the social sciences to employ quantitative methods, contributing to spatial science and [[positivist]] theory. Roots of this work were visible while he was at Cambridge, a Department that also housed [[Dick Chorley]], and [[Peter Haggett]]. His ''[[Explanation in Geography]]'' (1969) was a landmark text in the methodology and philosophy of geography, applying principles drawn from the philosophy of science in general to the field of geographical knowledge. But after its publication Harvey moved on again, to become concerned with issues of social injustice and the nature of the capitalist system itself. He has never returned to embrace the arguments made in ''Explanation'', but still he conforms to the critique of absolute space and exceptionalism in geography of the regional-historical tradition that he saw as an outcome of Kantian ''synthetic a priori'' knowledge. Moving from [[Bristol University]] to [[Johns Hopkins University]] in [[Baltimore, Maryland|Baltimore]] in the USA, he positioned himself centrally in the newly-emerging field of radical and [[Marxist geography]]. Injustice, racism, and exploitation were visible in Baltimore, and activism around these issues was tangible in early 1970s [[Northeastern United States|East Coast]], perhaps more so than in Britain. The journal ''Antipode'' was formed at [[Clark University]], and Harvey was one of the first contributors. The Boston [[Association of American Geographers]] meetings in 1971 were a landmark, with Harvey and others disrupting the traditional approach of their peers. In 1972, in a famous essay on ghetto formation, he argued for the creation of “revolutionary theory”, theory “validated through revolutionary practice”. ''[[Social Justice and the City]]'' (1973) expressed Harvey's position that geography could not remain 'objective' in the face of urban poverty and associated ills. It has been cited widely (over 1000 times, by 2005, in a discipline where 50 citations are rare), and it makes a significant contribution to Marxian theory by arguing that capitalism annihilates space to insure its own reproduction. [[Dialectical materialism]] has guided his subsequent work, notably the theoretically sophisticated ''[[Limits to Capital]]'' (1982). ''LTC'' furthers the radical geographical analysis of capitalism, and several books on urban processes and urban life have followed it. ''[[The Condition of Postmodernity]]'' (1989), written while at Oxford, was a bestseller (the London ''Independent'' named it as one of the fifty most important works of non-fiction to be published since 1945). It is a materialist assault on [[postmodernism|postmodern]] ideas and arguments, suggesting these actually emerge from contradictions within capitalism itself. ''[[Justice, Nature and the Geography of Difference]]'' (1996) focusses on social and environmental justice (although its dialectical perspective has attracted the ire of some Greens). ''[[Spaces of Hope]]'' (2000) has a utopian theme and indulges in speculative thinking about how an alternative world might look. His study of Second Empire Paris and the events surrounding the Paris Commune in ''[[Paris, Capital of Modernity]]'', is undoubtedly his most elaborated historical-geographical work. The onset of US military action since 2001 has provoked a blistering critique - in ''[[The New Imperialism]]'' (2003) he argues that the war in Iraq allows US neo-conservatives to divert attention from the failures of capitalism 'at home'. His most recent work, ''[[A Brief History of Neoliberalism]]'' (2005), provides an historical examination of the theory and divergent practices of neoliberalism since the mid-1970s. This work conceptualizes the neoliberalized global political economy as a system that benefits few at the expense of many, and which has resulted in the (re)creation of class distinction through what Harvey calls "[[accumulation by dispossession]]". Harvey returned to Johns Hopkins from [[University of Oxford|Oxford]] in 1993, but spent increasing time elsewhere as a speaker and visitor, notably as a salaried Miliband Fellow at the [[London School of Economics]] in the late 1990s. He moved to the City University of New York in 2001 as a Distinguished Professor, now residing in its Department of Anthropology. He has spent much of his academic career in Anglo-America, with brief sojourns in France and a range of foreign visiting appointments (currently as acting Advisory Professor at Tonji University in Shanghai). He has supervised many PhD students. Several of these, such as [[Neil Smith (geographer)|Neil Smith]], Richard Walker, [[Erik Swyngedouw]], Michael Johns, Maarten Hajer, Patrick Bond, Melissa Wright, and Greg Ruiters now hold important academic positions themselves. Two constants in Harvey's life and work have been teaching a course on Marx's ''Capital'', and his support for student activism and community and labour movements (notably in Baltimore). Critical response to Harvey's work has been sustained. In the early years, there was little love lost between Harvey and proponents of quantitative and non-politicized geography, notably Brian Berry of the [[University of Texas at Dallas]]. Additionally, as interest in Marx's thought has waned in recent years, Harvey's continued commitment to it has led to reappraisals and in some cases rejection by younger Leftist scholars. A recent critical appraisal (Castree & [[Derek Gregory|Gregory]], 2006) explores these critiques in detail. Harvey's books have been widely translated, particularly into Korean, Spanish, Japanese and Italian as well some into Arabic, Turkish, Norwegian, Russian, German, Chinese and Rumanian. He holds honorary doctorates from Roskilde (Denmark), Buenos Aires (Argentina), Uppsala (Sweden) and Ohio State University (USA). Among other awards he has received the Anders Retzius Gold Medal of the Swedish Anthropological and Geographical Societies, The Patron's Medal of the [[Royal Geographical Society]] and the Vautrin Lud International Prize in Geography (France). In 2007 he was elected to the [[American Academy of Arts and Sciences]]. ==Career== *B.A. (Hons) St Johns College, Cambridge, 1957 *Ph.D. St Johns College, Cambridge, 1961. *Post-doc, University of Uppsala, Sweden 1960-1961 *Lecturer, Geography, University of Bristol, UK (1961-1969) *Associate Professor, Department of Geography and Environmental Engineering, Johns Hopkins University, (1969-1973) * Professor, Department of Geography and Environmental Engineering, Johns Hopkins University (1973-1987, and 1993-2001) * Halford Mackinder Professor of Geography, University of Oxford(1987-1993) * Distinguished Professor, Dept. of Anthropology, City University of New York (2001-present) ==Major works== *''Explanation in Geography'' (1969) *''Social Justice and the City'' (1973) *''The Limits to Capital'' (1982) *''The Urbanization of Capital (1985) *''Consciousness and the Urban Experience'' (1985) *''The Condition of Postmodernity'' (1989) *''The Urban Experience'' (1989) *Teresa Hayter, David Harvey (eds.) (1994) ''The Factory and the City: The Story of the Cowley Automobile Workers in Oxford''. Thomson Learning *''Justice, Nature and the Geography of Difference'' (1996) *''Megacities Lecture 4: Possible Urban Worlds, Twynstra Gudde Management Consultants, Amersfoort, The Netherlands, (2000) *''Spaces of Hope'' (2000) *''Spaces of Capital: Towards a Critical Geography'' (2001) *''The New Imperialism'' (2003) *''Paris, Capital of Modernity'' (2003) *''[[A Brief History of Neoliberalism]]'' (2005) *''Spaces of Global Capitalism: Towards a Theory of Uneven Geographical Development (2006) *''The Limits to Capital'' New Edition (2006) ==Articles, Lectures, Interviews== *Harvey, D. 2000. [http://www.transformaties.org/bibliotheek/possibleurbanworlds.pdf Possible Urban Worlds]. The Fourth Megacities Lecture. The Hague. *Merrifield, A. 2002. David Harvey: The Geopolitics of Urbanization. In ''Metromarxism: A Marxist Tale of the City''. New York: Routledge. *Harvey, D. 2002. Chapter in ''Geographical Voices: Fourteen Autobiographical Essays''. Ed. p Gould and FR Pitts. Syracuse University Press. * Harvey, D. and Kreisler, H. 2004. [http://globetrotter.berkeley.edu/people4/Harvey/harvey-con0.html A Geographer's Perspective on the New American Imperialism]. Conversations with History. Institute of International Studies, UC Berkeley. [http://132.239.126.220/mp3/8800.mp3 audio] [http://webcast.ucsd.edu:8080/ramgen/UCSD_TV/8800.rm video] *Castree, N. 2004. David Harvey. In ''Key Thinkers on Space and Place'', eds. Hubbard, Kitchin, Valentine. Sage Pubs. *Castree, N., Essletzbichler, J., Brenner, N. 2004. "Symposium: David Harvey's 'The Limits to Capital': Two Decades On." ''Antipode'' 36(3):400-549. *Harvey, D. 2005. [http://chiasmos.uchicago.edu/events/harvey.shtml A Brief History of Neoliberalism]. University of Chicago Center for International Studies Beyond the Headlines Series. October 26, 2005. [http://chiasmos.uchicago.edu/media/david_harvey.mp3 audio] *Harvey, D. and Choonara, J. 2006. [http://www.socialistreview.org.uk/article.php?articlenumber=9655 "A War Waged by the Wealthy"], an interview in SR magazine covering Harvey's account of neoliberalism and class. *Jones, J.P. III, T.Mangieri, M.McCourt, S.Moore, K.Park, M.Pryce-Jones, K.Woodward. 2006. ''David Harvey Live''. New York: Continuum. *Castree, N. and Gregory, D. 2006. ''David Harvey: a Critical Reader''. Oxford: Blackwell. [http://www.geog.ubc.ca/~tbarnes/chapters.html Trevor Barnes chapter] *Harvey, D. 2006. [http://uc.princeton.edu/main/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=753 Neoliberalism and the City]. Middlebury College, Rohatyn Center for International Affairs Symposium, "Urban Landscapes: The Politics of Expression". September 29, 2006. [http://coblitz.codeen.org:3125/uc.princeton.edu/main/images/stories/podcast/DavidHarvey.mp3 audio] [http://coblitz.codeen.org:3125/uc.princeton.edu/main/images/stories/podcast/vodcast/DavidHarvey.mp4 video] *Ashman, S. 2006. "Symposium: On David Harvey's 'The New Imperialism'." ''Historical Materialism'' 14(4): 3-166. *Lilley, S. 2006 [http://mrzine.monthlyreview.org/lilley190606.html On Neoliberalism: An Interview with David Harvey] ''MR Zine'' June 19, 2006. *Harvey, D. 2006. [http://urban.ssc.upenn.edu//events/lecture/2006lecture.html Neoliberalism and the City]. 22nd Annual University of Pennsylvania Urban Studies Public Lecture. November 2, 2006. [http://media.sas.upenn.edu/urban_studies/Urban_Studies_Lecture_11-2-06.MP3 audio] *Harvey, D. 2007. [http://uc.princeton.edu/main/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=1461 The Neoliberal City]. Lecture at Dickinson College, sponsored by the Clarke Forum for Contemporary Issues. Feb 1, 2007. [http://coblitz.codeen.org/uc.princeton.edu/main/images/stories/podcast/20070209DavidHarvey.mp3 audio] [http://coblitz.codeen.org/uc.princeton.edu/main/images/stories/podcast/vodcast/20070209DavidHarvey.mp4 video] *Harvey, D., Arrighi, G., Andreas, J., 2008. [http://www.archive.org/details/2640Arrighi Symposium on Giovanni Arrighi's Adam Smith in Beijing]. March 5, 2008. Red Emma's of Baltimore. [http://www.archive.org/download/2640Arrighi/2640Arrighi.mp4 video] *Harvey, D. 2008 [http://davidharvey.org Reading Marx's Capital] An open course consisting of a close reading of the text of Marx's Capital Volume I in 13 two-hour video lectures by David Harvey. ==Links== * [http://web.gc.cuny.edu/anthropology/fac_harvey.html CUNY Graduate Center Faculty Page] * [http://davidharvey.org davidharvey.org] Official Site. Currently "Reading Marx’s Capital with David Harvey" Summer 2008 course * [http://www.logosjournal.com/issue_5.1/harvey.htm A Conversation With David Harvey] {{DEFAULTSORT:Harvey, David}} [[Category:1935 births]] [[Category:Academics of the London School of Economics]] [[Category:British geographers]] [[Category:City University of New York people]] [[Category:Living people]] [[Category:Marxist theorists]] [[Category:People from Gillingham]] [[Category:Recipient of Vautrin Lud International Geography Prize]] [[Category:Fellows of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences]] [[ar:دايفد هارفي]] [[ca:David Harvey]] [[de:David Harvey (Geograph)]] [[es:David Harvey]] [[hi:डेविड हार्वे]] [[it:David Harvey]] [[ja:デヴィッド・ハーヴェイ]] [[pt:David Harvey]] [[ru:Харви, Дэвид]]