经济地理学研究进展

The Development of Economic Geography in China: Progress and suggestions

        刘卫东(地理科学与资源研究所 北京100101)
        陆大道(地理科学与资源研究所 北京100101)

         经济地理学;研究现状;发展思考

        economic geography;contemporary development;suggestions to future development

        经济地理学是一门活跃的和多元化的学科,是地理学最重要的分支学科之一。该学科的特性使其最有资格成为人与自然环境关系研究的纽带和各类空间尺度的可持续发展研究的基础。国际经济地理学研究侧重理论思辩,而我国则以满足国家和社会需求为首要目标,为国家建设做出贡献。在我国,该学科正处在制度变革时期的理论重构阶段,核心问题是区域和城市的可持续发展。今后的发展应处理好以下几个关系,即国家目标与理论研究的关系;核心问题与研究议题的关系;走向国际学术界与中国特色之间的关系;宏观研究和微观研究的关系;科学主义与人文主义之间的关系等。

        Economic geography is one of the most dynamic branches of geography with its diverse study scopes. Such a feature can be attributed mainly to the phenomenon under study, i.e. economic activity, which is ever-changing and displays big spatial differences across countries and even regions. Another feature of economic geography is its inter-disciplinary approach, which considers both physical and human factors. These two features enable economic geography to be an appropriate and necessary tie in the studies of global/regional environmental changes by various disciplines and to be the basis of sustainable development studies at various scales. While the emphasis of economic geography studies in Anglo-American countries is put on theoretical debates, economic geography in China has taken the satisfaction of practical demands as its primary target of development, which makes Chinese economic geographers widely recognized by various government departments. In China, the discipline is experiencing theoretical re-construction as a result of the institutional transformation, and the primary issue contemporarily confronted by the discipline there is regional and urban sustainable development. Future development of the discipline should treat correctly the relationships between satisfying practical demands and academic researches, primary issue and concrete research topics, macro researches and micro case studies, etc.