BOOK REVIEWS

Mah, Alice.Industrial Ruination, Community and Place: Landscapes and Legacies of UrbanDecline.Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2012.240 pp.ISBN: 978-1-4426-1357-7

Written for the academic theorist cum dereliction tourist. Industrial Ruination,Community, and Place brings to life three case studies of industrial decline,namely Niagara Ealls, Canada/ USA, Newcastle-upon-Tyne, UK, and Ivanovo,Russia. Integrating ethnography, social theory, and empirical observation, AliceMah attempts to contextualize the lived experiences of workers (both formerand current) and residents to demonstrate how industrial decline has differen-tially affected various groups of people in her case study city-regions, and howthese people in turn act in relation to processes of de-industrialization.

Industrial Ruination, Community and Place is Mah's first self-authoredbook, and builds on her early research throughout the first decade of the newmillennium in her case study cities. Her central purpose is to "advance a newtheoretical framework for analyzing the complex relationships between de-industrialization and industrial ruins: 'industrialization as a lived process.'" Toachieve this end, Mah draws on methodologies and previous research by othersin the fields of community studies (especially research in 'rust belt' cities), avariety of literature dealing with transitions from industrial to post-industrial,Eordism to post-Eordism, uneven geographical development (particularly cap-italist growth and destruction in urban areas) and sociology of landscapes andlegacies of the past. In terms of practical research methods, Mah used archival,documentary and photographic materials, 'Mobile Methods' (aka walking anddriving tours of areas of urban decline), secondary analysis of statistics andqualitative interviews with local people in the case study areas.

The ambitious theoretical comparison of such disparate communities thatMah examines here is intriguing. The contexts of development in each are rad-ically different from the others. However, despite this apparent disjuncture,there is ample precedent for this type of extended case study method, especiallywithin the sub-discipline of industrial geography/ sociology. In order to makethe extended case study method 'work' across widely different cases, the key isto be able to look for patterns between the cases, determine what these patternsmean theoretically and then hold these emergent theories in conversation withthe broad set of existing theory that the researcher is already well versed in. Of

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Book Reviews

course, operating within this methodology effectively presupposes an ability toget 'in' to the cases, to be able to see as effectively as possible the world of peopleat the site of research, through the eyes of those people.

Throughout the book, there is no clear delineation of empirical and theor-etical sections, which caused confusion about whether Mah is writing aboutwhat she saw, or working out how to interpret what she saw. Yes, there arepoints when Mah reaches out to the broader theoretical frameworks mentionedpreviously but she offers little that is strikingly new or particularly insightful interms of understanding deindustrialization. The patterns between Mah's casestudies are already well-documented within geography and sociology: div-isions based on historical classes, gendered divisions of labour, differing agencyof people (predicated by age, socioeconomic standing, even political power) toresist or work around the externalities of deindustrialization, gentrification,etc. But what are the actual insights and new ways to understand, for example,the cultural role of factories in the Soviet Union? Likewise there must be someaspect of this cultural attachment to work that can be described and be foundto hold true in Niagara Falls. A vague nostalgia or appreciation of a materialplace of employment is a fine starting point for research, but to what extentdoes it hold sway over residents' decisions in the face of deindustrialization?Surely there exists a unique "Russian mentality" when facing industrial decline.Mah does not examine how Russian workers and factory managers may havebeen successful at responding to industrial decline by other means (throughpersonal, political, even criminal networks for example). There is more to belearnt about these responses and their (non)existence elsewhere.

Mah does not claim to have spent extensive periods of time in andamongst her case study locations, and her observations come across as morecursory than embedded. WTiat may have been more effective is an attempt togain longer-term access to the political institutions presiding over industrialdecline (possibly through employment therein). Of further benefit would havebeen a view of industrial decline from the vantage of a lower-level decisionmaker, who readily interfaces with local workers, pensioners, and private sec-tor employers.

As a whole. Industrial Ruination, Community, and Place is best treated asan interesting empirical work shedding light on places we may not normallyassociate immediately with deindustrialization. It brings to life the stories ofresidents and workers, who readily deserve both a voice and a sympathetic ear.

Nicholas ByrneM.A. CandidateDepartment of GeographyUniversity of British Columbia

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