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Contemporary spatial history is founded on the potential for maps and other visualizations to show the historical constructedness of space, usually in broadly neo-Marxist terms, yet neo-Marxist geographical theory is famously critical of visual representation, especially mapping. At stake in this contradiction isn’t just the relationship between digital enthusiasm and spatial theory (or the wider spatial turn), but the theoretical status of the visual itself in spatial scholarship. It raises a crucial question: how does visual material—everything from today’s statistical maps and cutting-edge data graphics to the broader use of primary-source photographs or drawings—in fact shape our understanding of space, and what theoretical work does it do? By extension, how can humanists make critical theoretical interventions through their own visual production? This article proposes an analytic vocabulary of “visual argument” grounded in an image-focused rereading of two canonical bodies of work: the neo-Marxist theory most cited by spatial history (Henri Lefebvre, David Harvey, Doreen Massey, and Edward Soja) and the conspicuously uncited work of Fernand Braudel. By focusing on how these authors’ illustrations make claims about spatial subjectivity and the historicity of space—especially through visual relationships of background and foreground—I argue for a new way of understanding and responding to this work and to the visual project of spatial history today. A visual analysis highlights not only the limitations of neo-Marxism but also the pervasiveness of certain assumptions—shared across the neo-Marxists, Braudel, and digital visualization—about temporality, the natural/human dichotomy, and the methodological tensions between argument and visualization. I present my own mapping of Phoenix as one possibility for an argument-driven rethinking of familiar visual commitments, which also suggests a broader meditation on the relationship between visual and textual scholarship.

The present article introduces the theory of knowledge of the modern Chinese philosopher Feng Qi (1915–95), who is known as both an explorer of old, and a creator of new systems of comprehension. Although he was a versatile theorist and thinker, he saw epistemology as both the core and mainspring of all his theoretical endeavours. Already before the establishment of the P.R. China, he published his first epistemological thesis under the title On Wisdom and consequently, he never completely abandoned this topic, even though he explored it through the lens of his manifold other interests that were connected with both, traditional Chinese, as well as with Western (including Marxist and neo-Marxist) philosophy. This paper will center its focus on his dialectical exploration of the conversion of knowledge into wisdom, a concept he formulated within the boundaries of his coined “expanded epistemology.” The article expounds on the reasons and methods through which this theory not only addressed epistemological concerns but also entailed ontological and metaphysical dimensions.

While the national discourse on ‘eco-civilization’ drives conceptual thinking on sustainable urban development in China, in practice a systematic implementation gap appears to exist when it comes to local implementation. This paper examines how the leakage occurring in the trajectory from central government ideas to municipal and district level construction projects can be explained. More specifically, it aims to spot whether it is merely the result of mismatches resulting from ineffective interactions among players in the policy process, institutional misalignment between policy goals and policy instruments, or even if the mobilization of bias in the policy process is systematic enough to justify a neo-Marxist explanation of the abovementioned implementation gap. I found two main sources of structural bias: capital accumulation in the mechanisms for urban development and power accumulation in the mechanisms underlying the administrative process.

Public theology or kingdom theology? Thoughts on the social relevance of Reformed Theology. This article investigated the metatheoretical assumptions of the contemporary discourse about Public Theology. The investigation attended to the historical roots of the movement to understand the notion of defining theology as a mere social programme where the principles are sought in a contextual reading from the context of the reader – thus a reading ‘from below’. Although a clear definition of Public Theology is not possible at this stage of the discourse due to a variety of fundamental ideas promoted by the various exponents of Public Theology, certain dualisms can be discerned in the presentations by public theologians. This investigation presented Kingdom Theology, developed in the classic Reformed tradition as a corrective to the dualisms in Public Theology. The research found that Kingdom Theology is better equipped to address social wrongs and to seek socio-political justice.ContributionThe investigation presented the Kingdom Theology of the classic Reformed tradition as a corrective to the notion of Public Theology and indicated that the ethic Kingdom Theology can address the totality of life and the social order fundamentally, and is not inhibited by contexts, temporality and historic spaces.

The Austrian school economics and neo-Marxist theories both have been reviving in recent years. However, the current academic discussion lacks a debate between two schools of economics with diametrically opposed views. This paper is the first and an initial Austrian challenge to Neo-Marxist scholars Nieto and Mateo's argumentation that cyber-communism and the Austrian theory of dynamic efficiency are consistent to enhance economic development. Their argument focuses on two issues: (a) the existence of circular reasoning in the Austrian theory of dynamic efficiency, and (b) dynamic efficiency and full economic development could be strongly promoted in a socialist system through new information and communication technologies (ICT) and the democratization of all economic life. While cyber-communism refers to cyber-planning without private property rights through ICT, dynamic efficiency refers to the entrepreneurs' creative and coordinative natures. In this paper, first, we argue that the hypothesis that dynamic efficiency and cyber-communism is not compatible. Contrary to the above cyber-communist criteria, the Austrian theory of dynamic efficiency argues that to impede private property rights is to remove the most powerful entrepreneurial incentive to create and coordinate profit opportunities. Second, we argue that the cyber-communism system is inconsistent with economic development. In this regard, we explain how the institutional environment can cultivate or stifle dynamic efficiency and economic development. Having briefly outlined the central argument of Nieto and Mateo, we examine the institutional arrangement supporting cyber-communism. After that, we evaluate the implications of cyber-communism in the dynamic efficiency process. It becomes manifest that Nieto and Mateo's accounts are too general to recognize the complexity of how economic development works.

Many authors have written and documented this illustrious and selfless son of the African continent, highlighting his unique kind of leadership different from the one that the African continent has ever experienced for a generation. His style of leadership for four years (1983–1987) as president of Burkina Faso eclipsed several African despots and corrupt leaders before and after Thomas Sankara. This article has three purposes as follows: first, to explore and celebrate the short-lived life of Thomas Sankara, and his legacies. Second, to critically evaluate his solid leadership characteristics and achievements relating it to the economy; Political, social, health, while serving as the President of Burkina Faso. Third, to highlight some of his shortcomings with the view that current and future leaders of African countries can learn from such shortcomings. This study is informed by the post-colonial theories of Ali Mazrui and Frantz Fanon. The author makes the following interesting findings. First, Sankara may have met his demise because of his country’s foreign policy (Non- Aligned), his relentless anti-imperialist campaign. The author acknowledges the solid achievements, made during Sankara’s brief term in office, are inspirational in the psyche of African men and women of his generation. If there is anything the author and many admirers and well-wishers of Sankara would like to see, is that his murderers are all brought to justice. More importantly, there are several lessons or styles of governance for African leaders both at home and in the diaspora to learn from this great man Thomas Sankara.

A significant group of sociologists entering graduate school in the late 1960s and 1970s embraced Marxism as the foundation for a critical challenge to reigning orthodoxies in the discipline. In this review, we ask what impact this cohort of scholars and their students had on the mainstream of American Sociology. More generally, how and in what ways did the resurgence of neo-Marxist thought within the discipline lead to new theoretical and empirical research and findings? Using two models of Marxism as science as our guide, we examine the impact of sociological Marxism on research on the state, inequality, the labor process, and global political economy. We conclude with some thoughts about the future of sociological Marxism.

Up until the 1970s, comparative research on education had been scarcely developed in Italy. The rise of a general attention on the promising chances offered by the comparative inquiries in educational sciences was mainly due to the growing influence of several international institutions and organizations in framing a number of studies and reports on the educational process within a comparative perspective. However, the development of comparative education also met resistances and constraints in the Italian framework. A lot of critical voices rising from radical, neo-Marxist, and “not aligned” cultures questioned the alleged impartiality of the comparative discipline, expounding serious concern about the legitimacy of its scientific pretensions. On the whole, the outstanding critical views on the rise of comparative education fostered a wide suspicion of the influence of global agents in assessing the goals of education and particularly of the role of the main international organizations leading the strategies for global development.

Pieter Lemmens’ neo-Marxist approach to technology urges us to rethink how to do political philosophy of technology. First, Lemmens’ high level of abstraction raises the question of how empirically informed a political theory of technology needs to be. Second, his dialectical focus on a “struggle” between humans and technologies reveals the limits of neo-Marxism. Political philosophy of technology needs to return “to the things themselves”. The political significance of technologies cannot be reduced to its origins in systems of production or social organization, but requires study at the micro-level, where technologies help to shape engagement, interaction, power, and social awareness.

This article aims to present, in a synthetic and theoreticalmanner, the perspectives associated with the theory of branding, such aseconomics, psychology, public relations, sociology, and the ways in which brandsbecome icons through creative interaction with their environment and theapplicability of the model in the sphere of place branding. Within the sociologicalapproach, there is a certain paradigmatic position, as part of the interdisciplinarysocial theory of neo-Marxism, a school of thought that expresses a moderateposition, with socio-economic influences, between the cultural approach and thetheory of iconic brands, and the postmodern anti-branding movement, bothpositioned in a constructivist-interpretivist paradigmatic scheme, the latter beinganalysed in the second part of the article.