812933

research-article2018
CSI0010.1177/0011392118812933Current SociologyRoudometof

Article CS

Current Sociology Review

Recovering the local: From

2019, Vol. 67(6) 801–817
© The Author(s) 2018
Article reuse guidelines:
glocalization to localization sagepub.com/journals-permissions
DOI: 10.1177/0011392118812933
https://doi.org/10.1177/0011392118812933
journals.sagepub.com/home/csi

Victor Roudometof
University of Cyprus, Cyprus

Abstract
Addressing a major theoretical lacuna in the literature concerning ‘the local’ and
localization, different interpretations of the local are presented and critiqued and a
different account of the local and localization as a focal point for social research is
offered. In the article, it is argued that social theory needs to give the local its due and
avoid surrendering the local to localism. The local is thematized in terms of the space/
place nexus; although it is impossible to bind the local in terms of space, it is possible
to do so in terms of place. Hence, the suggestion is to think of the local as a place.
Through these lenses, localization is conceived as a process of place-making, which in
turn successfully differentiates the local from the related concepts of globalization and
glocalization. The increasing pace of globalization emerges as a factor counteracting
localization, thereby giving birth to various localisms. Possible avenues for developing
alternatives to current versions of exclusivist localism are explored.

Keywords
Glocalization, localism, localization, place, space

In the background of the rise of globalization theory was the relatively simple
observation that the world was increasingly becoming a ‘single place’.
(Robertson and White, 2007: 56)

In the context of a world, which is . . . increasingly interconnected the

notion of place (usually evoked as ‘local place’) has come to have totemic resonance.
(Massey, 2005: 5)

Corresponding author:
Victor Roudometof, Department of Social and Political Sciences, University of Cyprus, PO Box 20537,
Nicosia, CY1678, Cyprus.
Email: roudomet@ucy.ac.cy
802 Current Sociology Review 67(6)

Introduction
It is impossible to talk about ‘the global’ without at least implicitly referencing ‘the
local’. According to Google Trends, since 2004 the two correlate, which arguably should
not happen if the two were unrelated. Of course, mere correlation does not offer conclu-
sive support for their relationship. Though globalization and cosmopolitanism have cap-
tured intellectuals’ imagination, the local has emerged as a powerful new blueprint of
social, political and cultural mobilization. Localism is prominent in Euro-scepticism or
American protests against neoliberalism, whereas ultra-right parties and groups, ranging
from France to the US, deploy the local as a key ingredient of their worldview. Its pres-
ence is visible on the political agendas of most nations, and it takes many different forms.
Thus far, theoretical explorations of the local do not by any means come close to the
detailed and voluminous literature on cosmopolitanism and globalization. To address
this lacuna, the following discussion aims to: (1) present the main strands or interpreta-
tions of the local as they have emerged in social scientific discourse, (2) explore the
repercussions of treating the local as a secondary or derivative (Alexander, 1988) cate-
gory in sociological analysis and argue in favour of its analytical autonomy, and (3) offer
a different account of the local and localization as a focal point of research. In this regard,
the argument covers the theoretical terrain from glocalization to the notion of localiza-
tion. While pursuing this agenda, it is important to distinguish between the process of
localization and the worldview or outlook of localism. In fact, what follows takes this
significant distinction as its point of departure.
It is necessary to clarify from the outset that, for the purposes of the following dis-
cussion, globalization refers to the general notion of the spread of any specific topic,
process, condition, artefact, blueprint, idea or cultural item to an inter-regional, plane-
tary or transnational level (Albrow, 1997: 88; O’Byrne and Hensby, 2011: 10–11;
Roudometof, forthcoming). This general definition enables one to relate globalization
to a multitude of instances, fields and areas of interest without necessarily having to
revert back to a totality. Given the multitude of definitions of globalization in the litera-
ture, this definition is restrictive and is meant to allow for a clearer conceptual distinc-
tion among global, glocal and local. From the perspective adopted here, globalization
applies solely to those instances in which phenomena, practices, ideas, models or, in
general, a specific theme X or domain of human action spread throughout the globe or
come reasonably close to it.

How social theory lost the local

Numerous interpretations of globalization contain theorization of trans-local links or
relationships. An impressive array of terms – such as place polygamy, nomadic lifestyle,
global fluidity, spaces of flows, ‘-scapes’, time–space compression, de/re-territorializa-
tion and many others – have been developed in an effort to capture such links and rela-
tionships. Unlike the intense scrutiny of global and transnational links and/or relationships,
the local is typically seen through the lenses of post-1989 ‘globalization’ (usually identi-
fied with regimes of economic neoliberalism) or cosmopolitanism. In the post-1989
period, dominant trends within social theory have paid insufficient attention to the
Roudometof 803

analytical autonomy of global, local and glocal (Roudometof, 2016b), and as a result, the
significance of local as such has been underestimated. In contrast, the entry point of the
current discussion is Kennedy’s (2007) insightful observation that it is necessary to pay
more attention to the lives of ordinary people, for these lives continue to be determined
by affiliations, affections and obligations constructed around place; most people live
‘local lives’ that are largely dependent on co-presence and interpersonal sociability (see
also Perkins and Thorns, 2011: 2).
It is a truism that the local is present in theorizing about globalization. The issue is
whether the analytical frames employed to study it allow its examination on its own
terms, and not in terms of other concepts, which are elevated into a greater standing and
hence subordinate the local into the status of a derivative or secondary notion. In terms
of theoretical trajectories, there are three pairs of binary relationships that involve the
local: the local–global oppositional relationship; the cosmopolitan–local relationship,
which in turn might be oppositional or complementary; and the local–global symbiotic
or complementary relationship, typically expressed through the notion of glocalization.
Of the three pairs, the first has become part of the oppositional rhetoric of the Left and
the Right and has penetrated into the actors’ life worlds all over the globe. That has been
in large part fuelled by neoliberal advocacy proclaiming the coming of a post-1989 New
World Order that guaranteed the undisputed legitimacy of a single economic system as
the only viable model for all societies. Globalization is seen as inevitable, and the local
is viewed as reactionary, counter-modern or simply an uninteresting relic of the past. The
local occupies a theoretical terrain similar to that of tradition in classical modernization
theory: an under-theorized term that signifies what is presumably left untouched by mod-
ernization (for a counter-argument, see Shils, 1981). This modernist bias is replicated in
discussions of globalization, whereby often the local is what stands in the way of globali-
zation. Resistance or protection of the local is thus seen as running against the currents
of history. For some, the local no longer exists (Caldwell and Lozada, 2007; Ritzer,
2003). Tacit acceptance of this narrative fuels localist rhetoric, as it de facto legitimizes
localism while delegitimizing voices pointing out any actual benefits coming out of glo-
balization. Although local places are said to be produced through globalization, scholar-
ship does not offer truly sufficient accounts of the processes that lead to their construction;
agency is not always present (Massey, 2005: 101). The defence of ‘local places’ remains
a mere counterpoint to global neoliberalism.
The global modernization narrative, Latour (2016) notes, is predicated upon the unex-
amined and false premise that the entire planet can successfully modernize toward a
single convergent point (‘Globe Central’). In this master narrative, people’s attachments
become obstacles to modernization’s success, whereby globalization is associated with
macro-processes (such as economic integration driven by interstate agreements and mul-
tinationals) and localization is associated with micro-processes (such as resistance or
opposition movements to such processes). This formula assumes the existence of socie-
ties contained within nation-states (for a critique, see Touraine, 2003). Next, such socie-
ties develop inter-national contacts that operate through macro-forces (such as
international banking, trade, diplomatic and commercial agreements). Global capital and
its impersonal agencies organize these macro-structures while the local, the worker, the
student, the civil servant, are left to cope at a micro-level with the structural imbalance
804 Current Sociology Review 67(6)

between the local and the global. This logic fails to take into account the endurance of
place within a globalized world (see De Blij, 2009).
The second of these pairs concerns the cosmopolitan–local relationship and has been
the subject of numerous interpretations. Most of these struggle with the dilemma between
oppositional versus complementary readings. The oppositional reading of the cosmopol-
itan–local relationship is typically invoked in all descriptions that identify cosmopolitans
with the privileged nomads of 21st-century transnational capitalism – versus those locals
who are left behind (Bauman, 1998). It is clear that the global success of cosmopolitan-
ism rests upon its successful reconciliation with the local –thereby preventing cosmo-
politanism from turning into a caricature associated with the ‘class consciousness of
frequent flyers’ (Calhoun, 2003), the upper mobile classes that are routinely identified as
the privileged minority that benefits from contemporary globalization (Douthat, 2016).
The result of such efforts has produced an impressive terminological vocabulary with a
range from rooted cosmopolitanism to vernacular, to glocal or local cosmopolitanisms
(for overviews, see Delanty, 2018; Roudometof, 2005; Skrbis and Woodward, 2013).
Although intellectuals have championed various notions (vernacular, rooted, thick or
thin) of cosmopolitanism, the local is rarely placed on equal footing with the normative
aspects of the cosmopolitan. In most instances, it serves merely as a geographical loca-
tion for the successful articulation of the cosmopolitan. Such readings fail to give the
local its due; the local is subsumed under the cosmopolitan by turning the local into mere
location where cosmopolitan ideals might be realized. The legitimacy of the non-cosmo-
politan is not recognized as such – that is, on its own terms.
The third pair of relationships involves looking upon the local–global relationship as
complementary; it suggests the dissolution of the local–global antithesis into a new syn-
thesis captured by the neologism of glocal and glocalization (Roudometof, 2015). This
complementary reading is prominent in Asian-centred perspectives (Chan, 2007; Deng,
2012) that reject various streams of cultural homogenization. It is related to the ways in
which social scientific discourse subjects the local into realist or constructivist readings.
In realist terms, the local no longer exists in the globalized world of the 21st century
(Ritzer, 2003). But this understanding lacks historical depth; nearly all the world’s cul-
tures have been interconnected and, if isolation from the global (or standing ‘outside’ the
global) is taken as a key prerequisite for the existence of the local, then it is doubtful
whether this is a description applicable to the majority of human history (Kraidy, 2005).
In short, realism turns the local into a mirage, e.g. the concept itself becomes illusionary.
There is a long and venerable bibliography of historical works that have demonstrated
the migration of numerous cultural items – ranging from germs and diseases to ideas,
material items and relationships – across the globe. Such relationships extend far into
humanity’s past and, irrespective of the various authors’ proposed timelines, the legiti-
macy of trans-regional connections over the longue durée is generally recognized (see
Braudel, 1972; O’Brien, 2006; Pieterse, 2012; Stearns, 2016).1
In contrast to realist readings, the long history of global or trans-regional intercon-
nectivity is not a problem for constructivism. In turn, constructivist readings stress the
degree to which local and global are mutually constituted and one is inseparable from the
other (Appadurai, 1995; Robertson, 1992). Conventionally, interconnectedness is often
taken as seamlessly leading into social integration. However, in reality there is a great
Roudometof 805

gulf between the two, and if the latter is an attribute routinely associated with the global
then the former is an attribute associated with ‘the glocal’. The glocal in this sense is a
feature of cultural connectivity that does not necessarily lead to social integration but
rather to new forms of heterogeneity. This perspective offers a better insight into the
dynamics of the local but fails to clearly articulate or accept a meaningful difference
between local and glocal. In Robertson’s (1992, 1995) interpretation, globalization
becomes glocalization, and in turn glocalization bridges the gap between global and local
(Roudometof, 2016a). This does not in effect leave space for an analytical difference
between glocal and local. As Robertson (2014: 8) writes, ‘globality and locality are rela-
tive terms’. Such a reading begs the question: ‘How are “local” and “global” cultures to
be identified as analytically separate if they are completely enmeshed in one another?’
(Radhakrishnan, 2010: 27). Indeed, the almost common criticism of such an interpreta-
tion is that glocalization becomes a means through which the local can be integrated back
into the global, thus leaving no room for oppositional politics to neoliberal capitalism
(Korff, 2003; Thornton, 2000).
At this point, I directly pose the question: What is the local? Realist readings often
take the local to be identical to a geographical locale or sheer location (see, for example,
Giddens, 1984). This is a designation most often implicit when authors refer to ‘multiple
social scales’ or advocating a ‘multilevel approach’ that views ‘global relations at multi-
ple scales of interaction’ (Pieterse, 2013: 11). In Sassen’s (2006) work, the presence of
such scales of interaction is used to advance the argument that globalization does not
operate against the state but rather through the state. Such interpretations subscribe to a
geographical reading of space. Space is seen as abstract or physical. As such, it can be
divorced from ‘global relations’ and these relations can be mapped onto different spatial
scales (which can range from local to global). Such scales might form a nested hierarchy
but they can also form a multitude of other possible combinations. In contrast, from a
constructivist point of view, space is seen as primarily social space and hence social rela-
tions are seen as articulated through (social) space and not merely in (absolute or geo-
graphical) space. Overall, realist interpretations typically see the local as a layer in a
hierarchy of homogeneous absolute or geographical space, or as an intersection formed
by various spatial scales.
In the US’s indigenous tradition of symbolic interactionism, the local is viewed as the
very foundation that provides the cornerstone for the creation of social order. The local-
ism of this tradition registers the image of US society as part of a New World where all
the baggage of the Old World is left behind. That is more an expression of intent and of
attitude than a description of actual social reality. From within this tradition, Fine (2010:
355) acknowledges the necessity for a ‘robust theory of how local circumstances create
social order’ and stresses the importance of local context in constituting social worlds.
But in Fine’s framework, that is done at the expense of global and glocal.

The local as a place

To give the local its due requires recognition of the relational quality of space (Harvey,
1996) or what humanist geographers typically refer to as ‘sense of place’ (Relph, 1997),
that is, the experiential, emotional and aesthetic feeling of a particular location being
806 Current Sociology Review 67(6)

endowed with meaning and value. These dimensions feature prominently in urban
research. It is no accident that in the 1990s early research on localism took place within
the context of an urban renewal policy agenda (Goetz and Clarke, 1993), whereas later
work was predicated upon the notion that globalization is not ethereal but rather grounded
at the local level (Eade, 1996; for a reappraisal, see Eade and Rumford, 2016). The return
of this theme to public debate is also far from accidental (Katz and Nowak, 2018). The
‘lure of the local’ (Lippard, 1998) registers powerfully with one of the most common
references to the notion of the local, namely, the notion of a ‘local place’. Massey’s
(2005: 5) remark on the totemic importance of ‘local place’ points to the renewed signifi-
cance of place for 21st-century global life.
Before proceeding further, it is important to clarify some definitional and conceptual
issues regarding the notions of space and place. Space and place are among the most
widely circulated concepts in geography, and their intertwining requires a reappraisal of
their conventional interpretations. The space–place binary opposition in geography
almost routinely carries with it a duplication of the classical sociological distinction
between Gemeinschaft (community) and Gesellschaft (society).The thematization of the
place–space binary relationship across Gemeinschaft–Gesellschaft lines has broader
implications, as it reproduces within geographical discourse all the sociological binary
oppositions that come with sociology’s master discourse on modernity. Historically,
space has been the dominant concept in geography, and it is telling that even recent
efforts to explicitly introduce spatiality into sociology almost ignore the space–place
relationship (see Fuller and Löw, 2017).
Over the second half of the 20th century, however, humanist geographers have sought
inspiration from phenomenology to articulate perspectives that focus explicitly on expe-
riential understandings of place (Creswell, 2004; Relph, 1976; Tuan, 1977; for a historio-
graphical survey, see Withers, 2009). Accordingly, space is seen as a location that has no
social connections for a human. No value or meaning has been added to it, and it is more
or less abstract in nature (Tuan, 1977: 6). Though open, space can be marked off and
defended against intruders (Tuan, 1977: 4, 164–165). Space does not invite or encourage
people to fill it by being creative. In contrast, place can be described as a location created
by human experiences. ‘The basic meaning of place’, Relph (1976: 43) writes, ‘does not
. . . come from locations [but] lies in the largely unselfconscious intentionality that
defines places as profound centers of human experience’. Tuan (1975: 164–165) con-
cludes a long overview of various places – ranging from the home to the nation-state –
with the telling statement that traditionally it is space and not place that has captured the
American (or more generally, Western) imagination.2 In the literature, place identity
often revolves around identity politics that involve differential access to power in differ-
ent locales. Place becomes raw material for identity construction (Creswell, 2004: 32).
The size of geographic location does not matter and is practically unlimited: a city, a
neighbourhood, a region or even a classroom, etc. In fact, place exists as space filled with
meanings and objectives by human experiences in this particular space.
The space–place relationship has been further explored by philosophers (Casey, 1993,
1997; Janz, 2017; Malpas, 1999). Place is considered as a primary foundation for classi-
cal Greek thought, which however is superseded by space during the Hellenistic era.
Western philosophy has inherited and amplified the notion of space, and only during the
Roudometof 807

20th century has it begun to recover the notion of place. This return of place as a point of
reference is related to the politics of globalization – and in particular to the contradiction
between the extensive proliferations of space that prompt the retreat of people to ‘their’
place. The rediscovery of place in 20th-century geography has grown out of ecological
considerations as well as the necessity to justify the preservation of the natural environ-
ment. Conceptualizations of place involve both human and non-human components,
bridging the gap between humanity and non-human aspects of the world at large (Latour,
1993).
The philosophical ideas notwithstanding, it might be more appropriate to reframe the
space–place relationship not as a strictly binary opposition but as referring to qualita-
tively different notions that do not necessarily need to be seen as dialectically opposed.
Space and place therefore might not be necessarily opposite; in fact, globalization itself
is often related to the notion of ‘the world’ becoming a ‘single place’ (Robertson and
White, 2007). As Short (2001: 18) puts it,

. . . the spatial dialectic of globalization is the construction of space and the creation of place.
Globalization constructs space through space–time convergence, cultural homogenization,
economic re-globalization, and political (dis)integration. But the same things are also creating
places. Nationalism, community consciousness, and the self-conscious construction of ethnic
identity are as much part of globalization as 24-hr. markets and global travel.

The politics of place therefore are equally complex as the politics of space. Massey’s
(1994) evocative statement of the necessity to develop or articulate a ‘global sense of
place’ is testimony of such complexity (see also Massey et al., 1996). Transnational or
trans-local spaces might also contribute to the articulation of places (Casey, 1997; Low,
2009), whereas the ICT (information and communications technology) revolution of the
21st century has contributed to the popularization of new digital or locative places
(Evans, 2015; Horan, 2000) that provide new formats for articulating notions of place.
This notion of place has been proposed by Gieryn (2000), who suggests that a place
should be considered as having the following attributes: geographical location, material
form or physicality, and be further invested with meaning and value. Gieryn (2000: 465)
formulates the space–place nexus as follows: ‘Space is what place becomes when the
unique fathering of things, meanings, and values are sucked out . . . [whereas] place is
space filled up by people, practices, objects and representations.’ Through these lenses,
then, it is possible to think of the local as a place.3 An important reason for such a move
is the conceptual impossibility of marking off or ‘bounding’ a local space (Creswell,
2004; Massey, 1994). That in turn suggests that to think of local as a space becomes
inherently deficient as an intellectual strategy. This difficulty can be successfully resolved
through changing metaphors or moving from space to place.
Contemporary research on mobility has offered some highly relevant empirical exam-
ples of place-making: these range from work on the recovery of local in the context of
contemporary tourism (Russo and Richards, 2016) to the locality constructed via inter-
national migration (Yu, 2018) to place-making in the context of labour or leisure though
the use of ICTs (Flecker, 2016; Hjorth and Richardson 2017; Ozkul, 2017). In particular,
the use of ICTs for place-making has rendered Gieryn’s (2000: 465) exclusion of cyber-
space from notions of place premature. Mobile media are connected to people’s sense of
808 Current Sociology Review 67(6)

place through a variety of modalities of presence, whereby ‘placing’ becomes a dynamic

process. The aforementioned examples strongly suggest that the frequent association of
space with mobility and place with immobility has been overcome.
Place provides a suitable description of local and, as the next section shows, this con-
ceptualization undermines the hold of exclusivist localism over the notion of local; ena-
bles the analytical autonomy of local; and allows the articulation of a balanced perspective
with regard to the concepts of local, global and glocal. The above by no means suggests
that it is impossible to think of other (global, trans-local, digital, etc.) places that are not
local (for example, Low, 2009; Ortega and Schrottner, 2012). That is, place as a concep-
tual category is broader than the category of local.

From glocalization to localization

Thinking of the local as a place helps with the clear articulation of the processes that
distinguish the local as such from related notions and enables the articulation of local as
a distinct unit from the global. Of course, global and local are connected, and the issue is
one of establishing the nature of their relationship as well as the key mechanisms that
allow their conceptual disentanglement.
By far the most promising starting point for such a task is Robertson’s (1995) theori-
zation of glocalization, which stresses the extent to which heterogeneity and homogene-
ity are both equally possible outcomes of interaction among cultures. But the notion of
heterogeneity associated with glocalization is vague for, in fact, heterogeneity might
assume two different blueprints or forms. The first of these is the construction of cultural
hybridity (Burke, 2009) or a cultural mélange (Pieterse, 2009) or glocal hybridity
(Roudometof, 2016a). Such a hybridity is predicated upon the fusion between local and
global cultural forms. Not all hybridity is necessarily glocal – only those hybrid forms
that include a local element. As I have discussed elsewhere (Roudometof, 2016a, 2016b),
globalization can be conceived in terms of trans-local waves that emanate from one
locality and spread to others – and when passing through other localities it is possible to
think that these waves are refracted, thereby producing new forms of glocal heterogene-
ity. In these cases, glocal hybrids are the result of this refraction. In nearly all such cases,
actors reflexively recognize these glocal hybrids as such: they are seen as ‘new’ additions
or forms that relate to non-local forces.
The second form of heterogeneity is the construction of a new or seemingly ‘authen-
tic’ local cultural form, either food or clothing or other material or immaterial item. In
this case and in contrast to the first form, actors recognize such forms as local, as
belonging to their place or being ‘in place’. For an outsider or a third party observer or
a historian, the difference between these two forms of heterogeneity might seem spuri-
ous. In effect, historically speaking from the perspective of the longue durée, such a
difference is unfounded: in most cases ‘authenticity’ does not actually translate into
parthenogenesis but is constructed. To understand the difference between glocal and
local then requires a recontextualization of their differences that goes beyond realism.
Although realism might be sufficient when speaking of the ‘facts’ of the historical
record, a different viewpoint is required to capture the difference between glocal and
local. Suffice it to say, the difference between the two is quite significant and apparently
Roudometof 809

real in people’s own interpretations or in their own ‘definition of the situation’, and it is
at that level that the validity of the distinction between the two forms is grounded.
Perhaps some examples from the world’s cuisines can help make this point clear.
Although originally from China, pasta is routinely identified as Italian in origin; the
Greek salad contains tomatoes, a New World produce; and to add a New World example,
taco el pintor is an Old World import, originally derived from Ottoman kebab, but having
been transformed and adopted into its transatlantic surroundings, is now identified with
Mexico (Pilcher, 2012). The above examples are among those routinely cited as instances
that debunk the layperson’s presumed misperception that authenticity as such is real or
actually original. But there is a second reading that turns such interpretations on their
head. What matters is not the realist absence of authenticity but the actors’ sense of what
these cultural items are and what they signify. To put it differently, the presence of out-
side influences is immaterial to cultural decoding. Such items are not considered or rec-
ognized even as hybrid or glocal, but rather they are viewed as authentic or original.
The aforementioned examples illustrate the broader point: namely, that differentiation
between glocal and local does not necessarily rest on realist grounds but rather it is the
result of social processes. Cultural items become local when, and as a result of social
processes, they are recognized as being ‘in place’ – as being part of the very fabric of a
locality or as belonging to a place (as evoked in the expression ‘American as apple pie’,
for example). In other words, cultural items are local when actors recognize them as part
of the local scenery. Making the case for a difference between socially constructed
authenticity and glocal hybridity rests in large part on the social conception of ‘original-
ity’. Cultural hybridity exists not only as a social ‘fact’ or a ‘real’ thing – it also exists as
a perception, and the same applies for authenticity. The difference between glocal and
local rests precisely on this point. The local exists as an independent or analytically
autonomous form from the glocal only insofar as the politics of representation suggest
that a cultural form or item is not recognized as a fusion or as bricolage but rather as
belonging to a place, as ‘homemade’ or ‘traditional’. Needless to say, this sense of tradi-
tional or local is a product of social construction as such and not ‘real’ (at least in a realist
sense). Its power does not rest on its ‘reality’ but in its embodiment of moral codes, tradi-
tions and customs that are seen as offering meaning and content to local authenticity. To
put it differently, the issue is whether an imported cultural item makes a difference that
‘makes a difference’. That is, if it does make a difference then actors tend to speak of
glocal or global, while if it does not then actors perceive it as local.
Tuan’s (1975, 1977) thoughtful remark that place attachment takes time highlights
the fact that time, or more broadly temporality, is a factor that often acts in a decisive
manner on the process of decision-making about differences that count. It does so
because sense of place is experiential, and therefore it requires time for its articulation.
But time does not stand still and certainly its perception shifts, especially as ICTs can
accelerate time, a condition that has become ubiquitous in the 21st century. ‘How long
do you have to be here to be local?’ Massey (2005: 149) asks. That is a pointed question.
Massey (2005) employs the example of a massive boulder unearthed in Hamburg,
Germany, which soon became a local attraction – being identified as a local landmark
– yet at the same time, the boulder itself was an ‘immigrant’ in terms of geological time;
hence called ‘Hamburg’s Oldest Immigrant’. In fact, the solution to Massey’s question
810 Current Sociology Review 67(6)

pertains directly to the resources mobilized for the construction of the local as a place
and to the duration necessary to generate place attachment. Place attachment facilitates
a sense of security and well-being; it defines group boundaries, stabilizes memories and
is deeply involved in memory and identity formation (Gieryn, 2000: 481). It can also
become a rallying point for collective action – such as in NIMBY or nativist and anti-
immigrant movements – but also in terms of active local resistance to capitalist homog-
enizing tendencies. Massey’s (2005) discussion of the French localist farmers who
actively demand rewriting the global rules of trade in order to safeguard their well-
being is indicative of the double-edged nature of such movements. It is important to
note that issues of hierarchy-making, power and difference are deeply embedded in the
politics of place. For example, Massey points out the degree to which one’s sense of the
same place is contingent upon gender – and of course gender is only one from a list of
additional factors (race, ethnicity, sexuality, class, etc.). Place-making does not negate
the sociological significance of these factors. Instead, these factors become influential
in the contested construction of place. To call one’s actions ‘out of place’ is a normative
statement or an act of symbolic power.
While localization refers to the processes through which place-making naturalizes
and constructs a locale as a place, it does not mean that conflicts are impossible or that a
harmony of interests might prevail. In contrast, the contests over the meaning of place
reveal the deeply seated politics involved; for example, Confederate flags and statutes of
Confederate heroes in the South of the US are symbolic means through which a very
specific ‘sense of place’ is constructed – with rather apparent racial undertones.
Long’s (2010) ethnographic study of Austin, Texas, offers an excellent example of the
importance of attachment to place. In Austin, the locals’ strategies and attitudes stand in
sharp contrast to Barber’s (2013) vision of ‘glocal city’. For Barber cities are the original
locus of creativity, immigration and civilization. Unable to address issues of scale, cities
were historically overtaken by states. But in the 21st century states are compelled to
safeguard their cherished sovereignty: ‘nation-states cannot address the cross-border
challenges of an interdependent world … [and as a result] the forward to cosmopolis may
demand of us a journey back to the polis’ (Barber, 2013: 77). Where nations fail, cities
can succeed in delivering a miracle of civic glocality that centres on ‘pragmatism instead
of politics, innovations rather than ideology and solutions in place of sovereignty’
(Barber, 2013: 5). For Barber it is cities that offer the most suitable terrain for global
restructuring. ‘Glocality strengthens local citizenship and then piggybacks global citi-
zenship on it’ (Barber, 2013: 23).
In contrast to this vision of urban glocality, Long (2010) investigates the strategies of
creative resistance employed by a multitude of local constituencies that fight to prevent
gentrification, environmental problems and large-scale efforts at economic homogeniza-
tion. The book’s thick description reveals the ways in which people demonstrate attach-
ment to place or sense of place as well as the importance of a devoted citizenry for the
success of such projects. In this context, ‘Keep Austin Weird’ has emerged as a slogan
that captures the locals’ sense of distinctiveness and difference; but of course, its appro-
priation has been varied. There are dozens of ‘Keep ____ Weird’ movements that have
appeared in the US (for example in Boulder, Colorado; Portland, Oregon; and Louisville,
Kentucky) in an effort to duplicate and capitalize on the success of the initial movement.
Roudometof 811

These also register efforts at commercial appropriation and the employment of the slo-
gan for the promotion of local businesses.4
The appropriation of place is contested and can take place within varied political con-
stituencies. Irrespective of their political leanings, localisms propose an essentialist view
of place – and therefore align or tacitly propose definitions and processes of place-mak-
ing that are deeply political and express mentalities of specific constituencies. Many
political movements, Latour (2016) notes, aim toward a return to ‘the land of Old’, an
imaginary place that seems to promise peace and protection against the uncertainties of
the present and future. Latour correctly dismisses the impulse to disregard such an orien-
tation as merely reactionary; such movements appeal to a deep sense of place. Long’s
(2010) study further demonstrates how misguided it is to view the politics of localism as
inherently geared toward conservative orientations.
Robertson’s (1992: 78–80) analysis recognizes that localism comes under two very
different formats. On the one hand, there is localism that sees the world ‘ordered only in
the form of a series of relatively closed societal communities’ or what I have referred to
above as exclusivist localism; whereas, on the other hand, it is possible to envision a
form of localism that ‘maintains that only in terms of fully globe wide community per se
can there be global order’ (Robertson, 1992: 78). These are quite distinct perspectives
that might share the same normative ideal but take radically different positions when it
comes to universalism. Exclusivist localism contains a nostalgic element that is genera-
tionally specific; according to data from Pew Research Center (Stokes, 2017) in the US,
people 50 years old and older are more likely (40%) than are 18- to 34-year-olds (21%)
to say that it is very important that a person be born in the US in order to be considered
truly American. In Japan, this generational divide is even more pronounced. According
to the aforementioned study, in contrast to the US, nativism in Japan is far more pro-
nounced irrespective of the generational divisions. This suggests that, although it is rea-
sonable to expect that time has an effect on the importance of place, it does not mean that
place attachment can be reduced to a mere function of age. In contrast, all generational
cohorts are influenced by other factors, even in regions where birthright is not linked to
national membership; that is, in Europe, Australia and Canada, language and culture play
an important role in the public understanding of legitimate membership in the nation
(Stokes, 2017). To insist solely on age as a determinant of place attachment disregards
the unevenness of contemporary regimes of mobility (Bauman, 1998). These potentially
might lead actors to identify localism with the underprivileged and, inversely, globalism
with the privileged cosmopolitans.

Conclusions
What unites academic and non-academic strands of writing about globalization is the
inscription of the local as a secondary or derivative term; the local is seen as meaningful
only through and in terms of its relationship to the global. By failing to give local its due,
social theory has unintentionally opened the door for various strands of localism to lay
claim upon localization. Thus, localism can successfully claim to appear as the only
legitimate representative of the local. The local is subject to a two-fold constraint: on the
one hand, it is the product of complex processes of localization; whereas on the other
812 Current Sociology Review 67(6)

hand, it is also shaped by the influence of various localisms. To the extent that intellec-
tual engagement with the local has been limited, the agents of various localisms are suc-
cessful in shaping the public understandings of the local. Recovering the local is therefore
an intellectual strategy that can reclaim this conceptual terrain without the appearance
(and hopefully also the substance) of a condescending or elitist or highbrow attitude. In
other words, taking the local seriously can address the central conventional accusation
levelled against some of the influential strands of cosmopolitan thinking.
In the article’s first section, a brief overview of the various renderings of the local in
relation to the dominant discourses of sociological perspectives is offered. This primer is
not aimed as an exhaustive account but only as a means of establishing the fundamental
premise of the analysis: namely, that taking the local seriously is an important task for
theory construction and one that has not been pursued with the same rigour as the dis-
courses of globalization and cosmopolitanism. To effectively do that though requires the
very question that is directly posed in the article’s next section: What is the most effec-
tive way of thinking about the local? To think of the local as a space fails to provide the
necessary closure mechanism for or bounding of the local, which is an attribute univer-
sally accepted as a key characteristic of the local. Consequently, the solution is to shift
conceptual metaphors: instead of thinking of local as a space, it is best to think of the
local as a place. The notion of place in this context is adopted from the tradition of
humanist geography, and the overview of some of these ideas in the article’s second sec-
tion is meant to offer a context for this particular interpretation.
Through these lenses, then, the article’s final section offers a conceptual elaboration of
an approach that grants analytical autonomy to the notion of local. The notion of the
local’s analytical autonomy is an extension of an approach pursued elsewhere (Roudometof,
2015, 2016a, 2016b) with regard to the notions of globalization and glocalization. This
article offers an extension of this conceptual strategy by addressing the local and localiza-
tion. Given the conceptual impossibility of sorting out the local from the glocal in terms
of space, the suggestion is that the difference between local and glocal lies precisely in the
notion of local as a place. Boundary creation is therefore possible and that in turn means
that, as a place, the local is certainly not imaginary but real to the inhabitants of local
places. Moreover, the analysis has sought to offer examples that illustrate the significance
of the distinction between the more exclusivist localisms and those that follow a more
communitarian worldview. In this respect, and in order to highlight the significance of the
distinction between the two, examples are used from news stories that have received con-
siderable publicity in the press. These help shed light on the perspective outlined in this
discussion. The underlying suggestion should be clear: research should take the emotional
connections between people and locales seriously and place should have a place in ana-
lysing globalization’s impact upon our lives. Such an effort can be successful only insofar
as it recognizes the analytical autonomy of the local and avoids a view of the local as a
secondary or derivative concept vis-a-vis globalization.
Lastly, the contested nature of place-making within a locality does not imply the
absence of additional arenas. These involve the articulation of global, transnational,
trans-local or glocal places, all of which could provide loci of identity, memory and
attachment. For the overwhelming majority of the Millennial generation, for example,
cell phones and digital communities might be thought of as involving place-making. By
Roudometof 813

the end of the 21st century, the notion of local places might include digital, locative and
other forms of place-making. The Earth itself might also be viewed as a place: Latour
(2016) suggests that we think of earth (or Gaia, in his vocabulary) as local – a suggestion
not fundamentally different from Robertson’s (1992) invocation of the world as a ‘single
place’ or the advocacy of Sanders’ (2010, 2011) cosmopolitics. It is against the back-
ground of these ideas that the fundamental premise of the preceding discussion has been
to take the local seriously; recovering the local could make it possible to alter the lenses
through which different scenarios for our present and future are constructed.

Acknowledgements
The author would like to thank the journal’s editors and the manuscript’s anonymous reviewers for
their constructive remarks and feedback.

Funding
This research received no specific grant from any funding agency in the public, commercial, or
not-for-profit sectors.

Notes
1. As a reviewer has insightfully suggested, it is important to note the influence of Henri Bergson
on the ideas about temporality. Bergson suggested that duration is connected to mobility; and
that it implies both unity and multiplicity. While these ideas connect to some Eastern phi-
losophies, there are also long-standing criticisms of Bergson’s philosophy and the argument
advanced here is not necessarily related to full-blown acceptance of his philosophical ideas.
2. As an anonymous reviewer has suggested, there is considerable theoretical complexity
involved in the space–place relationship. Gieryn’s (2000) plea to ‘make space for place’ in
sociology suggests, by its very title, an intricate relationship between the two. This complex-
ity cannot be fully explored in this discussion, especially as ideas about place have evolved
considerably since the 1970s and new forms of placeness have been introduced.
3. Following Niklas Luhmann, Guy (2009) develops an interpretation, whereby global and local
are not seen as spatial structures (levels, scales, places, distances, etc.) but as different repre-
sentations of space competing with each other to shape the reality of ‘society’ as such. Guy’s
approach bears resemblance to the perspective adopted in this discussion – but only insofar as
spatial realism is seen as inadequate for capturing the experiential dimension of space and place.
4. International marketing promotes place branding for cities, regions and nations. Within this
blooming cottage industry, Florida (2002) might be the most successful academic entrepre-
neur. Such a ‘provincial globalization’ brings forth strategies of place branding and place
marketing that are deeply contested (for an insightful discussion, see Andersson, 2010).

ORCID iD
Victor Roudometof https://orcid.org/0000-0001-7886-6048

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Author biography
Victor Roudometof is Associate Professor at the University of Cyprus and Professor (adjunct)
with the University of Tampere, Finland. His research interests include glocalization, globali-
zation, culture and religion. He is the author of four monographs and editor or co-editor of
several volumes and special issues of refereed journals. His latest books are the monograph
Glocalization: A Critical Introduction (Routledge, 2016) and the edited volume Glocal
Religions (Basel: MDPI, 2018).
Roudometof 817

Résumé
Dans l’objectif de combler une lacune théorique majeure de la littérature concernant
« le local » et la localisation, différentes interprétations du local sont présentées et
critiquées dans cet article en même temps qu’est proposée une approche différente du
local et de la localisation comme orientation pour la recherche sociale. Dans cet article,
nous soutenons que la théorie sociale doit donner au local ce qui lui est dû, tout en
évitant de l’abandonner au localisme. Le local est thématisé en termes de lien espace/
lieu; bien qu’il soit impossible de lier le local en termes d’espace, il est possible de le
faire en termes de lieu. Il est donc suggéré de considérer le local comme un lieu. À
partir de ce point de vue, la localisation est conçue comme un processus de création de
lieux, qui à son tour permet de différencier avec succès le local des concepts connexes
de globalisation et de glocalisation. L’accélération de la globalisation apparaît comme
un facteur contrecarrant la localisation, donnant ainsi naissance à divers localismes.
Diverses voies possibles pour développer des alternatives aux versions actuelles du
localisme exclusif sont ici explorées.

Mots-clés
Espace, glocalisation, lieu, localisation, localisme

Resumen
Abordando una laguna teórica importante en la literatura sobre ‘lo local’ y la localización,
se presentan y critican diferentes interpretaciones de lo local y se ofrece una descripción
diferente de lo local y la localización como punto focal para la investigación social.
En el artículo, se argumenta que la teoría social debe dar a lo local el papel que le
corresponde, al tiempo que debe evitar entregar lo local al localismo. Lo local está
tematizado en términos del nexo espacio/lugar. Aunque es imposible articular lo local
en términos de espacio, es posible hacerlo en términos de lugar. Por tanto, la sugerencia
es pensar en lo local como un lugar. Desde esta perspectiva, la localización se concibe
como un proceso de construcción del lugar, que a su vez diferencia con éxito lo local
de los conceptos relacionados de globalización y glocalización. El ritmo creciente de
la globalización surge como un factor que contrarresta la localización, dando lugar a
diversos localismos. También se exploran posibles vías para desarrollar alternativas a las
versiones actuales del localismo exclusivista.

Palabras clave
Espacio, glocalización, localismo, localización, lugar