This original study explores the difference that space and spatiality make to the understanding of power.

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• Explores the difference that space and spatiality makes to an understanding of power.
  
• Moves forward the incorporation of ideas of space into social theory.
  
• Presents a new understanding of the exercise, uses and manifestations of cultural, economic and political power in the second half of the twentieth century.
  
• Illustrated with cases and examples.

John Allen is Professor of Economic Geography at the Open University. His recent publications include Rethinking the Region: Spaces of Neoliberalism (1998, with Doreen Massey and Allan Cochrane) and Human Geography Today (1999, with Doreen Massey and Phil Sarre).