Troubling economic geography: New directions in the post-pandemic world

Abstract

This intervention focuses on recent disruptions and transformations in the (post)pandemic world economy that will likely ‘trouble’ economic geographers for some time to come. It aims to foster constructive dialogues and move conversations forward in the expanding field of economic geography whose presence and relevance in critical human geography is ironically at stake. I contend that economic geography in the early 2020s is characterised by a changing world and a changing generation of more diverse researchers who can be innovative enough to take on these troubling themes for future research. I suggest four such research directions that combine new themes of geopolitics and risks in remaking the global economy with older issues of work and environment that certainly merit renewed interest and greater analytical attention in the field. Taken together, these new horizons for economic geography research throughout the 2020s and beyond can be well capitalised upon to enhance the intellectual and public relevance of the field.