The examination of social relationships in space: Its territorial, empirical and practical parameters

Social geography is seen as part of an integrated social science, being important for its emphasis on people and its maintenance of the importance of the spatial in social theory. The paper proceeds by looking at the problems of definition, concluding that most definitions are time-specific. Despite this fact, they remain influential and also enable the three main strands of social geographical development to be identified, these being the empirical, the theoretical and the practical. These themes are elaborated in turn as are the relationships between them. While ‘the empirical’ has tended towards empiricism, ‘the theoretical’ is perhaps only just beginning to ground itself in the study of the real world. But ‘the practical’ — or policy element — is seen as being underdeveloped. The conclusion addresses the possible fusion of the three strands.