The Dictionary of Human Geography

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(e.g. Badie, 1995; Hardt and Negri, 2000:

cf.network society). Others tend to see

deterritorialization in terms of the weakening

of territorial identities in the face of globaliza-

tion (e.g. Mitchell, 2000) or the creation of

‘non-places’ (Auge ́, 1992).

Though frequently used as a stand-alone

term, deterritorialization makes most sense

when used in the context of territorialization.

For example, the ‘disappearance’ of territory

at onescale can see its recomposition at

others (Brenner, Jessop, Jones and Macleod,

2003). At the same time, deterritorialization

undoubtedly has metaphorical currency (see

metaphor) when applied, for instance, to the

fading of intellectual boundaries, and some

descriptive utility when used as a synonym

for the instability and unravelling of territorial

space. Notwithstanding the ambiguities inher-

ent in the terms, in a world in which evidence

for both territorialization (e.g. the Israel–

Palestine Separation Barrier) and deterritoria-

lization (e.g. the European Union Schengen

passport zone) is not hard to come by, their

usage suggests a dynamism to the forms of

territories and territorialities that some writers

have been all too willing to deny. jaa

Suggested reading

Brenner, Jessop, Jones and Macleod, (2003);

Doel (1996).

territory A unit of contiguous space that is

used, organized and managed by a social

group, individual person or institution to re-

strict and control access to people and places.

Though sometimes the word is used as syn-

onymous withplaceorspace, territory has

never been a term as primordial or as generic

as they are in the canons of geographical ter-

minology. The dominant usage has always

been either political, in the sense of necessarily

involving thepowerto limit access to certain

places or regions, or ethological, in the sense

of the dominance exercised over a space by a

given species or an individual organism.

Increasingly, territory is coupled with the

concept ofnetworkto help understand the

complex processes through which space is

managed and controlled by powerful organiza-

tions. In this light, territory is only one type of

spatiality, or way in which space is used,

rather than the one monopolizing its employ-

ment. From this perspective,territoriality

is the strategic use of territory to attain organ-

izational goals.

Territory is particularly associated with the

spatiality of the modernstatewith its claim to

absolute control over a population within care-

fully defined externalborders(Buchanan and

Moore, 2003, p. 6). Indeed, until Sack (1986)

extended the understanding of human terri-

toriality as a strategy available to individuals

and organizations in general, usage of the term

‘territory’ was largely confined to the spatial

organization of states. In the social sciences,

such as sociology and political science, this is

still mainly the case, such that the challenge

posed to territory bynetworkforms of organ-

ization (associated withglobalization) is in-

variably characterized in totalistic terms as ‘the

end of geography’. This signifies the extent to

which territory has become the dominant geo-

graphical term (and imagination) in the social

sciences (Badie, 1995). It is then closely allied

to state sovereignty. Assovereigntyis seen to

‘erode’ or ‘unbundle,’ so goes territory

(Agnew, 1994). From this viewpoint, territory

takes on an epistemological centrality (see

epistemology) in that it is understood as

absolutely fundamental to modernity.As

such it can then be given an extended meaning

to refer to any socially constructed geograph-

ical space, not just that resulting from state-

hood (Scivoletto, 1983; Bonnemaison, 1996;

Storper 1997a). Especially popular with some

French-language geographers, this usage often

reflects the need to adopt a term to distinguish

the particular and the local from the more

general global or national ‘space’. It then

signifies the ‘bottom-up’ spatial context for

identityand cultural difference (or place)

more than the ‘top-down’ connection between

state and territory.

The territorial state is a highly specific his-

torical entity. It first arose ineuropein the

sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. Since

that time, political power has been seen as

inherently territorial. Politics take place only

within ‘the institutions and the spatial envel-

ope of the state as the exclusive governor of a

definite territory. We also identify political ter-

ritory with social space, perceiving countries as

‘‘state-societies’’’(Hirst, 2005, p. 27). The

process of state formation has always had two

crucial attributes. One isexclusivity. All of the

political entities (the Roman Catholic Church,

city-states etc.) that could not achieve a rea-

sonable semblance of sovereignty over a con-

tiguous territory have been delegitimized as

major political actors. The second ismutual

recognition. The power of states has rested to

a considerable extent on the recognition each

state receives from the others by means of

non-interference in so-called internal affairs

(seesovereignty). Together, these attributes

Gregory / The Dictionary of Human Geography 9781405132879_4_T Final Proof page 746 31.3.2009 9:40pm Compositor Name: ARaju

TERRITORY