Local, global and fragmented narratives about road construction: An invitation to look beyond our disciplinary space

Abstract

This article presents an overview of selected works on roads, bringing examples from studies concerned with different geographical and disciplinary perspectives, paying special attention to studies about roads in the “South”. In this vein, it seems to us that the gap between external and internal histories of technology still prevails. Such a gap has produced a fragmented narrative. If we want to advance in the understanding of infrastructure, we have to make an extra-effort to widen our view beyond the established knowledge: other disciplines have investigated some dimensions of the issues and we must take into account them, at least as part of our state of the art. We show that partial viewpoints leave in the shadow important actors, local innovations and negotiations, which are essential to understand the political economy of transport infrastructure. Perhaps the best strategy is working with colleagues from other disciplines.

Pensar las infraestructuras en Latinoamérica

“…"It seems pausible to suggest that Colombian history might have been less violent had the country been flatter" (Hartwig, 1983, p. 55). Este argumento no es original ni novedoso (De Greiff, Herazo y Soto, 2020). El atraso de algunas regiones en Francia y México ha sido atribuido a las inclementes condiciones topográficas (Bird, 1954;Freeman y Guajardo Soto, 2018).…”