The Active Role of Geography: A Manifesto

The role attributed to geography and the possibility of a valid intervention by geographers in the process of social transformation depend on one another and result from the manner in which we conceptualize the discipline and its object.If this conceptualization is not embracing of all forms of relation with its milieu, the interventions of geographers will only be partial or functional, and their effectiveness will be increasingly limited in time.It is true that, in common language and in the understanding of other specialists, such as politicians and administrators, geography is frequently considered to be a discipline that is preoccupied with locations. Moreover, a good many geographers work within this vision.Nevertheless, the list of relations that occur between humankind and its milieu shows that the long‐accepted position of geography as a discipline of locations is limiting and, for this reason, insufficient.But this is not the only focus that simplifies and distorts the significance of the discipline of geography.