Investigación geográfica en regiones marginales. Antecedentes y actualidad científica

Abstract

The current emergence in the international academic world of a scientific questioning of the center-periphery models that reproduce or tend to perpetuate underdevelopment poverty, backwardness and environmental deterioration; the scarce knowledge of spacial dynamics and intensity of the marginality phenomenon as a universal, geographical space process, considered to be one of the main causes of global environmental changes show that this phenomenon IS in a periphery-to-center transition.Geographical sciences in Cuba have not been out of this trend of the growing international conceptualization of marginality problems and of marginal areas and,while experiences allusive to these areas can be found in the works by Massip and Isalgué (1942), Marrero (1957), Núñez (1959), Cosculluela (1965), and Acevedo (1980), it may be affirmed that their focalization has been recent, using -rather - terms such as fragile ecosystems, or low economic assimilation areas.In the wake of the academic confrontation with different schools and exponents of Latin American and world geography which fostered the recent holding in Cuba of the IGU Regional Conference and the 5th Meeting of Latin American and Caribbean Geographers, and of joint working session with Professor Roser Majoral, president of the International Geographical Union Study Group for the study of development in marginal regions, it was apparent that there was a need for a unified approach and for a common agenda to address the problems with the emergence of marginality and with the expansion of Latin American and Caribbean marginal areas as one of the main global environmental eiements, an action that constitutes not only a scientific challenge but also a moral demand for the regional (Latin American) scientific community In keeping with the above. the perspectives of geographical research on the marginalphenomenon and Cuba's marginal areas stem from two large scenarios. The current emergence in the international academic world of a scientific questioning of the center-periphery models that reproduce or tend to perpetuate underdevelopment poverty, backwardness and environmental deterioration; the scarce knowledge of spacial dynamics and intensity of the marginality phenomenon as a universal, geographical space process, considered to be one of the main causes of global environmental changes show that this phenomenon IS in a periphery-to-center transition.Geographical sciences in Cuba have not been out of this trend of the growing international conceptualization of marginality problems and of marginal areas and,while experiences allusive to these areas can be found in the works by Massip and Isalgué (1942), Marrero (1957), Núñez (1959), Cosculluela (1965), and Acevedo (1980), it may be affirmed that their focalization has been recent, using -rather - terms such as fragile ecosystems, or low economic assimilation areas.In the wake of the academic confrontation with different schools and exponents of Latin American and world geography which fostered the recent holding in Cuba of the IGU Regional Conference and the 5th Meeting of Latin American and Caribbean Geographers, and of joint working session with Professor Roser Majoral, president of the International Geographical Union Study Group for the study of development in marginal regions, it was apparent that there was a need for a unified approach and for a common agenda to address the problems with the emergence of marginality and with the expansion of Latin American and Caribbean marginal areas as one of the main global environmental eiements, an action that constitutes not only a scientific challenge but also a moral demand for the regional (Latin American) scientific community In keeping with the above. the perspectives of geographical research on the marginalphenomenon and Cuba's marginal areas stem from two large scenarios.