Economic segmentation and networks of power: the current debates of the proposed theory by Taylor and Thrift

Abstract

This paper takes up the assumptions of the theory of economic segmentation and power networks developed in the early 1980s, with the purpose of providing a theoretical framework to explain the industrial changes in space. Contrary to the structuralist and descriptive aspects that at the time characterized studies in Industrial Geography, the approach to segmentation and power networks is part of the set of works of corporate geography or geography of corporations, whose central concern was to reestablish business organizations as central agents of economic change. Throughout the article, we outline the main characteristics, theoretical-methodological assumptions and weaknesses of this approach. Although the proposal for segmentation and power networks presents some problems (absences from the discussion on the State and capital-labor conflicts, static innovation, determined segmentation etc.), its assumptions support the understanding of the diversity of companies in terms of the scale and scope of their operations and their insertion in a vast and complex network of unequal power relations.

Keywords: Economic segmentation, networks of power, corporations, small firms.