All three concepts of space are important in shaping the way humans
experience and interact with the world, and each plays a role in human geography. A major misconception that has caused some to doubt the
continued relevance of geography is that it is concerned with absolute
space only. Globalization is altering the way time–space operates and is
perceived. Time–space geography has formed an important subdiscipline
since the groundbreaking work of Hägerstrand (1968, 1975). Building on
this foundation, there are three interlinked ways of thinking
geographically about the relationship between space and time.
● Time–space convergence
● Time–space distanciation
● Time–space compression
Time–space convergence refers to the decrease in the friction of distance
between places. Coined by Donald Janelle in the late 1960s (1968, 1969,
1973), it referred to the apparent convergence of settlements linked by
transport technology. As transport evolved travel time would be reduced
between them, giving the sensation that they had moved closer together.
The velocity at which settlements are moving together may be called the
time–space convergence rate. Using Edinburgh and London he noted that
they had converged at a rate of thirty minutes per year over a 200-year
period. This measure emphasizes the importance of relative distance and
how this is shifted by technology (see Map 1.1 for an example of this
approach).
Time–space distanciation refers to the stretching of social systems across
space and time. The term was coined by sociologist Anthony Giddens
(1990) and refers to the interpenetration of people and places over
increasingly large distances. Echoing McLuhan’s work (see global village
section above) Giddens argues that people interact in two ways: face to
face, and remotely through transport and communications technologies.
The second has become increasingly important, ‘distanciating’ the
relations between people. Thus people who are not actually physically
present in absolute space can be important social actors. Giddens does
not argue that this process leads to homogenization, indeed greater
distanciation increases the potential for humans to restructure global
scale systems. Massey (1991) builds on this concept when she discusses
the ‘global sense of the local’ which pervades our everyday experiences.
Time–space compression – refers to the annihilation of space through
time that lies at the core of capitalism (Harvey, 1989). Concepts of
convergence and distanciation do not offer an explanation for why social
relations are stretched across space. Geographer David Harvey, in The
Condition of Postmodernity (1989), provided an argument which has been of central influence in the way geographers think about the
relationship between time–space and globalization. He suggests:
that we have been experiencing, these last two decades, an intense phase
of time–space compression that has had a disorienting and disruptive
impact upon political-economic practices, the balance of class power,
as well as upon social and cultural life.
(p. 284)
He goes on to argue that time–space convergence and distanciation
are results of the expansion of capitalist relations of production across
the globe. Given that ‘time is money’, capitalists are constantly seeking
ways to speed up the circuit of capital to reduce the ‘turnover time of
capital’ – the amount of time it takes to convert investment into a profit.
This search for reduced turnover time has led to the development of
technologies and policies which facilitate time–space compression.
Barriers have been removed through neoliberal discourse and technology
has advanced to make capital, goods and people as rapidly transportable
as possible. He notes the following outcomes for example:
● Between 1960 and 1990 operating costs per mile for world airlines fell
by 60 per cent.
● Between 1970 and 1990 the cost of an international phone call fell by
90 per cent.
● In 1970 only 50,000 computers existed in the world. By 1998 the
internet was being used by 150 million people worldwide, up from
fifty million in 1995.
Harvey links this increased time–space compression to a crisis in
accumulation of capitalism as we move from the modern to the
postmodern era (see Chapter 4). He is careful to draw out the cultural
roots and implications of this. Capitalism itself is a culture, and the
impacts of time–space compression in the cultural sphere are important
as identity ‘melts into air’ and people search for ‘secure moorings
and longer-lasting values in a shifting world’ (p. 293). Ultimately the
argument places an economic rationale at the core and this has been
criticized by new cultural geographers especially. The links with his
ideas and WST are apparent when he says: ‘We have, in short, witnessed
another fierce round in that process of annihilation of space through time
that has always lain at the centre of capitalism’s dynamic’ (p. 293).