Edited by
Guy Baudelle, University of Rennes 2, France.
Emmanuelle Boulineau, École normale supérieure de Lyon, France.
ISBN : 9781789451818
Publication Date : August 2025
Hardcover 290 pp
165.00 USD
Co-publisher
The European continent has given rise to the greatest number of spatial divisions. Its limits have provoked numerous debates, both within and outside of the continent. The European Union, for its part, has become a laboratory for the production of divisions.
Each of these divisions, a vector of identity and territoriality, reflects an intentionality, as revealed in Mapping the Spatial Divisions of Europe. The book shows the multiplicity of forms and modalities of these divisions and the actors who produce, use and question them in a globalized, and reticular world.
From the continent as a whole to the individual regions via metropolitan areas and their networks, from meshing to zoning, from regionalization to representations, this book explores how these divisions are used to govern, plan, imagine and build European territories beyond the heritage of states and their borders. The chapters shed new light on the theoretical and practical issues involved in carving Europe on different time and space scales.
Part 1. Europe and Its Divisions: A Matter of Scale, Time and Perspective.
1. Europe, a Region with Variable Geography, Yann Richard.
2. Europe, a Continent? A Geohistorical Analysis, Vincent Capdepuy.
3. The Dissemination of European Administrative Divisions throughout the World, Nathalie Fau, Stéphanie Lima, Hubert Mazurek and Julien Thorez.
Part 2. Divisions of Europe by the European Union.
4. Three Patterns of Territorial Division: NUTS, Macroregions and Cross-border Areas, Emmanuelle Boulineau.
5. Dividing the EU for Its Own Development, Frédéric Santamaria.
6. The Blue Banana or the Influence of Symbolic Divisions on Our Representations of Europe, Guy Baudelle.
Part 3. Questioning Europe’s Divisions.
7. The Difficulty in Adjusting Metropolitan Perimeters, Marianne Guérois, Brice Lamenie, Dominique Rivière and Anne Bretagnolle.
8. Urban/Rural Divisions in Europe, Samuel Depraz.
9. Europe, Water and Divisions: River Basin Districts and Bodies of Water, Stéphane Ghiotti and Anne Rivière-Honegger.
10. Reticular Divisions for Transportation, Antoine Beyer.
11. Networked Cities, Ninon Briot.
Guy Baudelle is Professor Emeritus of Spatial Planning at the University of Rennes 2, France. He is also a member of the UMR CNRS ESO research unit and former Jean Monnet Chair (2003–2022). His work focuses on territorial development policies in the European Union and France.
Emmanuelle Boulineau is Professor of Geography at the École normale supérieure de Lyon, France, and a member of the CNRS EVS research unit. She specializes in the political geography of territorial reform in Europe, particularly in Central and Eastern Europe.
