Spaces of Capital is a collection of essays by David Harvey, a geographer whose work has embraced elements of sociology, history, and economics, amongst other fields. Harvey is Marxist, and seeks both to use Marxist methodologies to give the field of geography a more critical, coherent framework, and to inject a greater sense of space/geographical difference into orthodox Marxist thought. I'm a historian, not a geographer, and not someone with a great background in theory, so I was very pleased by the quality of Harvey's prose—it's lucid and clear, and while there are some quite complex ideas presented, on the whole it's done without jargon. In fact, I think it could probably be held up as an exemplar, proof that it's possibly to write theory or other critical works without doing as Mr Darcy does—"studying too much for words of four syllables."

Harvey clearly doesn't set out to curry favours with either his fellow geographers or with the broader academic community with his book. I absolutely agreed with him that scholars need to develop a greater sense of awareness of the ethical ramifications of their work, of their own ideological assumptions/convictions which underlie their work, and that the classist/racist/sexist/etc. concepts which still underpin textbooks need to be removed. I also found interesting his emphasis on Marxist methodologies of history—dialectics, processes, relationships—rather than Marxist... I suppose tropes is the word I'm looking for. I find it a much more productive mode of inquiry than structural analyses. That said, while Harvey is most interested in Marxist modes of history, he still views class a being the driving force of historical process. It's one that I find pretty Eurocentric, and unwilling to address women's history, or gender issues—either as a means of understanding societal change/structure or as a key element of capitalism.

My notes had a lot of smiley faces in the margins as I began this book; as I progressed through it, they became a lot more sceptical and/or sad faces. (And in one case, angry—referring to 'Orientals'? Seriously? Is it 1925 and I didn't notice?) Still, probably worth reading if this is an area of interest of yours. ( )

"Spaces of Capital" is the title under which David Harvey has collected a series of essays or observations written by him for a variety of geographical and economical journals. The essays span the whole period of Harvey's working life, and therefore trace the development of his view and thoughts closely. This is interesting at a sort of 'meta' level, but it has the downside that the first half of the book is still very much in the orthodox geographical mold and mostly quite vague and noncommittal. Although already in the first essays he proposes a more critical geographical science, and lashes out at the McCarthyism in the field, they still lack the coherent framework that the Marxist point of view would later give to his insights.

Of most interest, for this reason, are the last three or four essays in the book. These are in fact very good and worthwhile, dealing with his theory of rent, the theory of uneven geographical development, and the way capitalist accumulation affects and is affected by geographical structures, mostly in the form of immobile fixed capital. The essay called "The Spatial Fix" is more historical, and goes into the role of space and geography in the works of Marx, Von Thünen and Hegel; this is probably the most interesting part of the book for philosophers and historians.

If you're interested in the later Harvey's insights into Marxist political economy and geographical differences, I would recommend buying "Limits to Capital" instead. This book is mostly of use as an addition to an already well-stocked 'critical theory' shelf, for the specialist. Inhabitants of Baltimore, MD, might also want to buy this for the quite extensive study on the political economy of the city that is included in this book. ( )