The spatial logics of justification – the case of a dispute over a car-free street in Tampere, Finland

ABSTRACT

This article develops the spatial aspect of the justification theory of Luc Boltanski and Laurent Thévenot. The aim is to show that the worlds of justification, distinct constellations of moral values and material objects, also have distinct spatial logics. To illustrate my argument, I use a case study, namely a polarised dispute related to a car-free main street in Tampere, the third biggest city in Finland. I show that the spatial logics in this dispute are ordered by different types of image schemas, recurrent and shared visuospatial patterns depicted by George Lakoff and Mark Johnson. I analyse image schemas to make visible the differences and similarities between the worlds of justification concerned. Developing the spatial aspect of justification theory makes possible a novel way to study disputes related to city and space, as well as controversies that are not obviously spatial. Human thinking is multimodal and entails visuospatial metaphors, even though its subject-matter might on occasion appear non-spatial.

KEYWORDS:

• Space
• city
• cars
• justification theory
• image schema
• visuospatial metaphors

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

ORCID

Jarkko Salminen http://orcid.org/0000-0002-6824-3661

Notes

1 In addition to the original six worlds of justification, Thévenot, Moody and Lafaye (2000) have established a seventh world, the world of ecology, in which nature has intrinsic value. Moreover, Boltanski and Chiapello (2007) have construed the projective world in which networking, flexibility and contacts are valued. There is no final number of the worlds of justification because new worlds can form and be discovered. In this article, I focus on the original six worlds of justification. In the future, the spatial aspect of other worlds of justification and Thévenot’s (2005) regimes of engagement can be examined.

2 Here I focus on the plurality of the image schemas behind the spatial logics of the worlds of justification. I do not focus on the internal binaries as such (inward compared with outward) or why people order the world through binary oppositions.

3 The concept of the image schema has been used in linguistics, psychology, philosophy, computer science and neuroscience. Originally, in cognitive linguistics, the concept was utilised in the analysis of expressions, idioms, metaphors, and so on (Johnson, 1987; Lakoff, 1987; Lakoff & Johnson, 1980). In this article, the unit of analysis is a justification.

4 Turner (1991, pp. 99–120) and Oakley (2005) have analysed image schemas in political argumentation, and they use so-called force dynamic schema to show that when people argue, they ‘struggle for space’, ‘force or push each other away’, ‘block or support each other’, and so on. Related to this vocabulary is the metaphor ‘argument is war’ because people who argue ‘attack each other’, ‘try to win’, or ‘have targets and strategies’ (Lakoff & Johnson, 1980, p. 4). This approach is parallel with Bourdieu’s (1996, pp. 9–10) concept of field, which is based on a spatial metaphor. Fields are physical force fields and fields for competition. However, in this article, I do not focus on argumentation only as a struggle of opposite forces but, instead, on the plurality of image schemas that people commonly recognise and value and therefore utilise in disputes to criticise or convince others.

5 I use the following abbreviations for the threads: A1, A2, A3, A4 and A5.

6 This exemplifies the spatio-temporal logic of justification, as the home environment (space) and traditions (time) are valued and protected.

Additional information

Funding

This work was funded by Strategic Research Council at the Academy of Finland project (303481) as part of Dwellers in Agile Cities.