The New Geography of Capitalism: Firms, Finance, and Society

The organizing logic of the nation-state still claims legitimacy and relevance. The nation-state is a crucial site of economic governance and regulation, and an incubator of cultural and linguistic tradition. Nonetheless, such legitimacy is juxtaposed with a strong unease in the social sciences and the public sphere over whether the nation-state has the capacity to deliver on its promises and to provide opportunities to its citizens. Indeed, the changing geography of capitalism underpinned by an expanding global division of labor and the integration of financial markets has undercut the bordering logics necessary for the maintenance of national systems of production, national varieties of capitalism, and national systems of social protection. Put simply, the globalization of financial markets coupled with the globalization of supply chains through outsourcing and offshoring act in concert to liberate firms, the key loci of national production systems, from their history and geography. If the collective welfare of the nation-state relies on capturing the value of production, this new economic geography has made doing so increasingly complicated and difficult. This book advances a perspective rooted in economic geography for explaining the changing relationship between contemporary welfare states, firms, and global financial markets.