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Seeing Like a Theorist
Author(s) -
King Loren
Publication year - 2013
Publication title -
international journal of urban and regional research
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 2.456
H-Index - 114
eISSN - 1468-2427
pISSN - 0309-1317
DOI - 10.1111/1468-2427.12017
Subject(s) - sovereignty , dualism , politics , state (computer science) , space (punctuation) , sociology , law and economics , rest (music) , political economy , political science , epistemology , law , philosophy , computer science , medicine , linguistics , algorithm , cardiology
W arren M agnusson sees a problem endemic to political thought and practice: we see the world in ways that presume and reaffirm the necessity of a sovereign territorial state, on pain of violent disorder in its absence. The solution is to ‘see like a city’, shaking off the dualism of sovereignty versus anarchy and finding a richer space of political possibilities. I admire and applaud M agnusson's critical efforts to challenge dominant categories and illuminate possibilities, but these aims rest uneasily with his polemical contrast between sovereignty and cities.