Legal Geography and Spatial Justice
Summary
Legal geography examines the co-constitutive relationship between law, space and society. It explores how legal rules, practices and discourses shape, and are shaped by, spatial arrangements at scales ranging from the body to the city and the globe. Spatial justice addresses the equitable distribution of rights, resources and recognition across territories and communities, analysing how legal frameworks produce and contest patterns of inclusion, exclusion and inequality. Together, these fields highlight the materialisation of law in landscapes, the performances of legality in everyday life and the contestations over spatial rights. Research in this area spans urban governance, environmental management, property regimes and human rights, emphasising the mutual constitution of legal orders and spatial practices. By tracing legal pluralism, material encounters and power relations in space, scholars reveal the spatial dimensions of social justice and the juridical stakes of place-making processes worldwide.
Research from Nature Portfolio
No recent Nature Portfolio content available.
Legal Geography and Spatial Justice publication trend
The graph below shows the total number of articles in legal geography and spatial justice across all publications each year (not limited to Nature Index journals).
Technical terms
Legal geography: The interdisciplinary study of how law and space co-produce social, political and material relations.
Spatial justice: The equitable distribution of rights, resources and recognition across territories and social groups.
Legal pluralism: The coexistence of multiple legal systems, norms or practices within a given social field.
Right to exclude: A property law principle granting owners the authority to bar access and use by others.
References
- Legal geography I: Everyday law. Progress in Human Geography (2024).
- Letting the plants speak: Law, landscape and conservation. Ambio (2023).
- How to turn a union organizer into a cable junction box: Union access to workers, the property right to exclude, and the United States Supreme Court's alchemical geographical imagination. Political Geography (2025).
Turn complex research questions into confident strategic decisions
When you're under pressure to set direction, justify investment, or understand your competitive position, you need more than raw data — you need trusted insights you can act on.
Benchmark your performance against global peers using robust, methodologically sound analysis.
Combine quantitative metrics with qualitative expert insight to uncover strengths, gaps and emerging opportunities.
Gain tailored, decision-ready recommendations aligned to your strategic priorities.
Talk to us to learn more about our data dashboards and bespoke strategy reports.
Grow research skills, confidence and careers with training built for every stage of the research lifecycle.
Developed with Nature Portfolio journal Editors and internationally renowned experts. Discover three ways to learn:
Self-paced, online courses in convenient bite-sized units, covering key skills across scientific writing, publishing, grant writing, data analysis, and more.
Expert trainer-led workshops with hands-on exercises and real-time feedback across core research skills, delivered via interactive group sessions.
Editor-led workshops combining core principles in writing and publishing, personalised 1:1 feedback from Nature Portfolio Editors and hands-on exercises.
Explore course catalogues and workshop agendas, enquire about the options or request institutional pricing.