On Spatial Justice

This essay reflects on the desirability and possibility of fashioning a concept of spatial justice from notions of social justice and territorial social justice. The contested meaning, rival formulations, and uncertain status of social justice form a cloudy and dissuasive foundation. The appeal of evaluations of locational justice steers investigation towards new spatial referents for justice and the prospect of principles of spatial justice. However, it seems that in the term ‘spatial justice’ the prefix can only denote concept context and not concept content. Conceptualising space as a social product rather than as a context for society may yield a substantive concept of spatial justice.