The Production of Service Space

Abstract

In this paper we attempt to demonstrate the use and limitations of Henri Lefebvre's The Production of Space as an approach to questions of social space. The City of London provides the service space, as it were, through which Henri Lefebvre's ideas are examined and illustrated. The paper is divided into three parts. In the first section we set out the main ideas of Lefebvre on questions of social space, in particular the notions of representations of space, representational spaces and spatial practices, and how they have been taken up in the work of Harvey, Shields, and Soja. In the second section we use the example of the abstract space of finance to show how a particular dominant coding of space has been achieved through the routine spatial practices and global networks of those who work in the City's financial markets. In particular, the modes of power and the different sets of relationships through which a dominant financial space is secured are highlighted. In the third section we draw attention to the people who disappear within the financial spaces of the City, those who clean, cater within, and secure the abstract space of finance on a subcontract basis. Focusing upon the spatial practices of this contract work force, we show the manner in which they use the dominant space and their ability to subvert or contradict the dominant coding of finance. In short, the two work forces occupy the same place, yet live their everyday lives within different spaces.