Management Geography – Managers and Management of Space(s)

• Lech Suwala – Technische Universität Berlin – lech.suwala@tu-berlin.de
• Piotr Pachura – Czestochowa University of Technology – piotr.pachura@wz.pcz.pl
• Rolf D. Schlunze – Heinrich-Heine-University, Ritsumeikan University – rolf@mangeo.org

Management geography is a subfield of economic geography that focuses on the nexus of managerial decision-making and spaces in a globalizing corporate world. The objective is to analyze the management of economic, social, and cognitive spatial realms in multi-scalar configurations that influence corporate performance through concentration, interaction, and/or perception. We are interested in the spatial organization of corporations and managerial tasks, spatial managerial practices, and cognitive spatial behavior of managerial subjects.

This raises manifold questions about the distribution of managers / management functions in space, decision-making processes, or managerial practices that create in (interconnected) locations and places in within various spatial configurations. Where do global talents / prospective managers concentrate that take on current challenges including ecological, health and social crises in the global economy pro-actively? How does international management influence and transform innovative spaces around the world? How do managerial subjects embed their decision making locally? What kind of management ethics do leaders follow working in global management? Can we expect that international management will perform the necessary business ethics and contribute to the current changes in the global economy? The Research Group Management Geography welcomes submissions in the following issues:

• Theorizing managerial or organizational spaces or critically discussing management practices in absolute, relative, relational and/or topical space using approaches related to Cross-cultural management and communication, Business ethics, International human resource management (IHRM), Corporate social/spatial responsibility (CS(p)R), Corporate governance, Communities of practice (COPs), innovative practices in manufacturing and/or services, global production networks (GPNs) and networking of managerial subjects from a spatial / economic geography perspective.
• Demonstrating new methodologies for investigating managerial mobility, practices, preferences, networking and decision-making in private and governmental organizations transforming spaces of international economy and management while advancing qualitative studies and/or mixed methods.
• Providing empirical evidence on all kinds of management issues including knowledge transfer and management as well as localizing and globalizing practices. In particular, studies that focus on managerial embeddedness, CSR, COPs, GPNs and strategic coupling of transnational firms.
• Deepening our understanding on the increasing spatial and managerial divide by financial, geopolitical power relations or effects of crises (e.g. CoVid-19 pandemic). Developing implications for the need of building international social capital in diverse city locations around the world.