A Fluid-Dynamics Perspective on the Relational Field of Social Space

Lefebvre is a legendary figure in the history of Western Marxist thought. Over his lifetime, he wrote nearly seventy works and a large number of articles. His original formulation of the “critique of everyday life” achieved a shift in the theory of alienation from macro-level political-economic relations to micro-level social life, and, in the course of moving toward historical materialism, he realized a shift from a temporal thread for observing history to a logic of the production of space. The latter is precisely the central theme of his 1974 book *The Production of Space*. In this work, Lefebvre’s concept of social space is, from the very outset, closely linked to the method of historical materialism. In terms of its core intentionality of ordering, he tightly links the relational field of social space to productive activity, and he even uses the language of fluid dynamics to describe this new observational perspective. Here, Lefebvre sets out some basic principles for the study of social space: methodologically, one must shift from the old problematic of things to a relational perspective; one must focus on people’s actual activities; the core of research is the production and reproduction of social relations; and one must also be vigilant against the invisible ideological shadow in the study of space. In this way, an entirely new theory of social space based on historical materialism is forged.

列斐伏尔是西方马克思主义思想史中一位传奇式的人物。他一生写下了近70部论著和大量文章，他原创性地提出的“日常生活批判”，实现了异化理论从宏观政治经济关系向微观社会生活的转换，并且在走向历史唯物主义的道路中，实现了观察历史的时间线索向空间生产逻辑的转换，后者正是《空间的生产》（1974）一书的主旨。列斐伏尔在此书中提出社会空间概念，从一开始就是与历史唯物主义的方法密切关联，从其核心构序意向上看，他将社会空间关系场境紧紧地与生产性活动联系在一起，他甚至用流体动力学的方式来描述这种新的观察视角。在此，列斐伏尔提出社会空间研究的一些基本原则：在方法论上必须从物的旧问题式中转换到关系视域上来，必须着眼于人的现实活动，研究的核心是社会关系的生产与再生产，还得警惕空间研究中的无形的意识形态阴影，这样，铸就一个全新的基于历史唯物主义基础之上的社会空间理论。

I. The Complex Relational Field of Social Space

一、复杂的社会空间关系场境

In Lefebvre’s situational-conceptual field, his social space breaks free from the traditional empty field or false situation of placing objects, becoming the result of productive ordering activity in the expression of general historical materialism. In his view, spatial existence is described as a relational field of space generated by spatial practice. Moreover, this new relational field of spatial production is typified as “establishing a very unique dialectic of movement (mouvement dialectique).” Extended to today’s thinking on the problem of social space, this includes “the productive forces and their constituent elements (nature, labor, technology, knowledge); structures (property relations); the superstructure (institutions and the state itself),” and so on, which almost encompasses all the discursive elements of Marx’s historical materialism. However, this is already the ordering logic of narrow historical materialism, because, according to Marx’s explanation, primitive tribes and the future communist society have no property relations or state-like superstructural phenomena; technological phenomena and scientific knowledge are products of a specific historical stage of industrial development. The boundary between general historical materialism and narrow historical materialism is clearly a muddled account in Lefebvre’s work.

在列斐伏尔的构境域中，他的社会空间摆脱了传统放置物品的空场伪境，成为广义历史唯物主义表述中生产构序活动的结果，在他那里，空间存在被描述成空间实践生成的空间关系场境。并且，这种新的空间生产的关系场境被赋型“确立了一种非常独特的运动过程的辩证法（mouvemenldialectique）。”延伸到今天的社会空间问题思考，则包括“生产力及其构成要素（自然、劳动、技术与知识）；结构（财产关系）；上层建筑（制度与国家本身）”等，这几乎囊括了所有马克思的历史唯物主义的话语要素。然而，这已经是狭义的历史唯物主义的构序逻辑，因为，按照马克思的说明，原始部族和未来共产主义中是没有财产关系和国家一类上层建筑现象的，技术现象和科学知识也是工业生产一定历史发展阶段上的产物。广义历史唯物主义与狭义历史唯物主义的边界，在列斐伏尔那里显然是一笔糊涂账。

Of course, unlike Marx’s classical exposition of historical materialism and historical dialectics in the 19th century, Lefebvre’s discussion of the dialectics of social space already stands on the basis of entirely new scientific advances of the 20th century. He dynamically advances the abstract concepts of the discourse of production into today’s complex ordering of spatial relations. He tells us that social space is primarily not a visible thing, but a non-intuitive relational existence. Therefore, the physical boundaries in traditional spatial situations cannot sever the relational existence of social space. For example, in our lives today, “the space of a housing unit, its bedrooms, its interior or courtyard space, is separated from social space by fences or walls and all the markers of private ownership, yet it still fundamentally retains the components of social space.” This separation can physically demarcate different architectural spaces, but as the production of social space, separation itself is the manifestation of the existence of private ownership relations. In feudal social space, the spatial syntax of the imperial palace versus the peasant’s thatched hut, and in today’s bourgeois world, the opening-closing of doors, the entering-refusing entry of private buildings (corporate towers, grand mansions, and high-end clubs), generates boundaries of separation, which in turn become the realization and daily reproduction of the existence of social relations. It is also in this situational sense that Lefebvre explicitly states that the non-substantive relational fields of “social spaces interpenetrate and/or superimpose one another (Les espaces sociaux se compénétrent et/ou se superposent).” These important relational fields of social space are clearly something that a substantialist conception cannot enter into.

当然，与马克思在19世纪对历史唯物主义和历史辩证法的经典表述不同，列斐伏尔对社会空间辩证法的讨论，已经站在了20世纪全新的科学进展基础之上。他将生产话语的抽象概念生动地推进到今天的复杂性空间关系构序之中。他告诉我们，社会空间主要不是可见物，而是一种非直观的关系性存在，所以，传统空间构境中的物性边界无法隔断社会空间的关系性存在。比如，今天我们生活中“一套住房的空间，它的卧室、室内或庭院的空间通过栅栏或围墙以及所有私人所有权的标识，与社会空间分割开来，但仍然从根本上保留着社会空间的成分”。这种隔离，在物理空间上可以区隔不同的建筑空间，但作为社会空间生产，隔离本身却是私人所有关系存在的表现，封建社会空间中的皇宫与平民的茅屋、今天资产阶级世界中的私人建筑（公司大厦、深宅大院和高档会所）中的开门-关门、进入-谢绝入内的空间句法生成隔离的边界，又会成为社会关系存在的实现和日常的再生产。也是在这个构境意义上，列斐伏尔明确说，非实体关系场境的“社会空间相互渗透和/或者相互迭加（Lesespacessociauxsecompénétrentet/ousesuperposent）”。这些重要的空间关系场境，显然是实体论观念无法入境的。

First, the relational existence of social space penetrates the material reality of buildings, roads, squares, and other facilities, mutually depending on and interpenetrating each other within a non-intuitive objective order of spatial practice. In Lefebvre’s view, “the various places and sites (lieux) of social space are also very different from natural spaces and cannot be equated with them: they may intermingle, combine, superimpose, and sometimes even conflict with each other.” A square in a city is different from a clearing in a primeval forest. In different socio-historical periods, it might be a religious space for burning witches as a public spectacle, or a bourgeois market for commodity exchange and a space for political assembly. The material square remains that same square, but what truly changes is the different social negentropic qualities of people’s spatial practical activities. If natural space without human presence is silent and discrete, then social space from the very beginning occurs within a relational existence of mutual dependence and mutual conflict in people’s spatial practical activities. Their material reality is merely the reverse material crystallization of the real abstraction of spatial practice. Roads without traffic or pedestrians, squares without activities, buildings without life—they are ruins.

第一，社会空间的关系性存在，会穿透建筑物、道路和广场等设施的物性实在，在一个非直观的客观空间实践构序中相互依存、相互渗透。在列斐伏尔看来，“社会空间的各种地方和场所（lieux）还是非常不同于自然空间的，不能将它们等量齐观：它们或许相互间夹、相互结合、相互叠置有时甚至是相互冲突”。一个城市中的广场，不同于原始森林中的一块空地，在不同的社会历史时期中，它可能是烧死女巫的宗教示众空间，也可能是资产阶级商品交换的市场和政治集会的空间，物性广场还是那个广场，可真正改变的是人的空间实践活动的不同社会负熵质性。如果说没有人存在的自然空间是寂静分立的，而社会空间从一开始就是在一种人的空间实践活动的相互依存、相互冲突的关系性存在中发生的，它们的物性实在不过是空间实践现实抽象的反向物性结晶。道路没有车行人走，广场没有活动，建筑物中没有生活，它们就是废墟。

Second, the interpenetration and superimposition of social spatial relations can potentially lead to the concealment of spatial relations themselves. Precisely because the production of social space is primarily the production of non-intuitive relational fields, these spatial relations, which interact behind material reality, can be deeply obscured. In fact, this should be a characteristic of the production of social space in modern bourgeois society. In the construction of social space in ancient times, the initial relational fields were simple and direct—for example, the single blood-relation in matrilineal society, the hierarchical relations of patriarchal dependence in historical space. The slave owner’s whip and the royal clan’s power were openly proclaimed. It is only in the production of social space in the bourgeois era that complex relational fields of social space become multiply concealed: power is no longer overtly displayed, and relations of domination become hidden forces. Lefebvre analyzes this, saying, “The principle of the interpenetration and superimposition of social spaces leads to a very helpful conclusion, because it means that each analyzed moment of social space conceals not just one social relation (un rapport social), but many social relations, all of which can be uncovered through analysis. By the same token, it also recalls the experience of objects (objets): as responses to needs, they originate from the division of labor, then enter the cycle of exchange, and so on.”

第二，社会空间关系的相互渗透和叠置有可能导致空间关系本身的遮蔽。正因为社会空间生产主要是非直观的关系场境生产，所以，这些隐匿在物性实在背后的相互作用的空间关系，则会很深地被遮蔽起来。其实，这应该是现代资产阶级社会空间生产的特征，因为在远古时代的社会空间建构中，最初的社会关系场境是简单和直接的，比如母系社会中的单一血亲关系，历史空间中宗法性依附关系等级等，奴隶主的皮鞭和皇族的权力是公开宣示的，而只是到了资产阶级时代的社会空间生产，才会出现复杂的社会关系场境多重遮蔽，权力不再是显性张扬的，统治关系成为隐匿的力量。列斐伏尔分析说，“社会空间的相互渗透与相互叠置原理带来一个非常有帮助的结论，因为这意味着每一个受到分析的社会空间的瞬间，不是只掩盖了一种社会关系（unrapportscoial），而是掩盖了许多社会关系，这些都有可能从分析中揭露出来。与此同理，它也让人回想起客体们（objets）的经历：作为对需求的回应，它们来自于劳动分工，然后进入交换的循环之中，如此等等。”

In explaining this characteristic of the production of social space, Lefebvre inevitably enters into the division of labor and the cycle of commodity exchange at the beginning of capitalist industrial production. Also because of the complexity of this special relational field of social space, different spatial relations that interpenetrate and superimpose each other undergo varying degrees of concealment and distortion. It is not merely a matter of concealing one spatial relation, but of obscuring all the real relations within an entire alternative spatial field. For example, under the conditions of the division of labor, the product-thing undergoes a distortion from general objects (objets) to economic things. After entering commodity exchange, it moves from the use value of people’s direct need for objects to the real abstraction of the commodity value relation, and is inverted and reified into money and capital relations that are not what it itself is. In this new economic phenomenal space, the interpenetration and superimposition of complex spatial relations conceal the production and reproduction of the capital-exploitation-of-wage-labor relation. In the complex financial derivatives we encounter today within the economic phenomenal space of capitalism, we can no longer see at all the most original relationship between these virtual wealth exchanges and increases and the labor of production.

列斐伏尔在说明社会空间生产这一特征时，必然会进入到资本主义工业生产之初的劳动分工和商品交换循环之中。也因为这一特殊的社会空间关系场境的复杂性，相互渗透和相互叠置的不同空间关系则会发生不同程度的遮蔽和扭曲，甚至不是仅仅掩盖一种空间关系，而会遮蔽起一个另类空间场境中的全部真实关系。比如劳动分工条件下产品物从一般objets（客体们）到经济事物的畸变，在进入商品交换后，从人的对物品直接需要的使用价值，现实抽象为商品价值关系，并颠倒地事物化为不是它自身的货币、资本关系，在这种新的经济物相化空间中，复杂的空间关系的相互渗透和叠置遮蔽了资本盘剥雇佣劳动关系的生产与再生产。在我们今天遭遇资本主义经济物相化空间中复杂的金融衍生品时，已经完全看不清这些虚拟的财富交换和增殖与劳动生产最原初的关系了。

Third, the mutual influence and interaction of spatial relations at different levels. In the production of social space, there are individual and collective labor, daily life, and their objective activity sites. The spatial existence of individuals and collectives is inevitably influenced and shaped by the production and reproduction of social relations within a regional social space, and is also subject to the projection of social spatial relations at the national and even global levels. These complex spatial hierarchies are fundamentally different in different eras. In 2018, I was teaching at Nanjing University and living in the city of Nanjing. I am an individual source of dynamism within the production of this social space of Nanjing; of course, my work and life are inevitably implicated and invisibly structured by various spatial relations of the Jiangsu-Nanjing region. At the same time, as Chinese people, we stride forward in the world on the great economic achievements of 40 years of reform and opening up, and we can directly feel profound changes in spatial relations. Lefebvre tells us that the social space we all encounter is a very complex multiplicity of spaces: “What we are faced with is not one social space but many—indeed, an unlimited diversity or an uncountable set of social spaces which we refer to generically as ‘social space.’” [1]1 Henri Lefebvre, *The Production of Space*, trans. Donald Nicholson-Smith (Oxford: Blackwell, 1991), p. 86. People do not remain fixed at a single spatial level; they are simultaneously affected by multiple spatial relations. In the process of social spatial production, the “place” (or “point,” in the sense of being determined by a specific point) generated by the production of individual and regional space does not disappear, “because it has never been swallowed up by the regional, national, or even global level. The national and regional levels contain countless ‘places’; national space includes regions; and world space includes not only national spaces but also, at least for now, promotes the formation of new national spaces through a striking process of fragmentation.” [2]2 Ibid., p. 88.

第三，不同层级空间关系的相互影响和作用。在社会空间生产中，有个人、集体的劳作和日常生活及其客观活动场所，个人和集体的空间存在一定会受到一个地区社会空间的社会关系的生产和再生产的影响和塑形，还会受到国家和整个国际范围中的社会空间关系投射。这些复杂的空间层级关系，在不同的时代又是根本不同的。2018年，我在南京大学教书和在南京这座城市生活，我是南京这一社会空间生产中的一个个人动力源；当然，我的工作和生活都必然受到江苏南京地区性的各种空间关系牵涉和无形构式，同时，中国人又是在改革开放40年伟大的经济成就上昂首阔步于世界，我们可以直接感受到深刻的空间关系改变。列斐伏尔告诉我们，我们所有的人遭遇的社会空间都是十分复杂的多重空间存在，“我们所面对的不只是一种社会空间，而是很多种，的确有无限多样、无以计数的社会空间，我们一般性地称之为‘社会空间’（espace social）”。人也不是仅仅停留在某一个空间层面上，他会同时受到多重空间关系的影响。在社会空间生产过程中，个人与区域空间生产生成的“地方的（或‘正点的’，从‘被特定的点所决定’的意义上来说）不会消失，因为它从来没有被地区的、国家的甚至全世界的层面所吞没。国家与地区层面容纳了无数个“地方”；国家空间包括地区；而世界空间不仅包括国家空间，而且甚至（至少从目前情况来看）通过引人瞩目的分裂过程促进了新国家空间的形成”。

Regional space, national space, and global space together constitute the macro-structural relational picture of spatial production. Clearly, this is not a discussion of social spatial relations in terms of the scale of natural-physical space, but rather a specific reference to individual behavior and the activities of social groups in space at different levels of spatial production, the distinctive spatial practices of a nation within a particular regional domain, and the interaction of different regions and nations within the field of larger-scale spatial relations. For example, what we usually call geopolitical relations in international space are not simply general border issues between states, but the dynamic pattern of international spatial relations generated by the contest of political, economic, and military forces among different countries and blocs. It is also in this sense that when Lefebvre says that in the production of social space, “the global does not abolish the local,” [3]3 Ibid., p. 89. this precisely refers to the influence of global spatial relations of production on regions and even individual lives; the global is realized through localization. For instance, KFC introducing Chinese-style breakfasts in China, or Coca-Cola’s Diet Coke changing from caffeine-free to sugar-free in its European and American products—these are all manifestations of global capital relations integrating into localized spatial relations. This has reached an unprecedented level under the impetus of contemporary capitalist network information technology.

地区空间、国家空间和世界性空间共同构成空间生产的宏观结构性关系图。显然，这不是在自然-物理空间的空间规模大小的意义上讨论这种社会空间关系，而是特指不同空间生产层面中个人行为、社会群体在空间中的活动，一个民族在一个特定的地区域中的特有空间实践，以及不同地区、国家在更大空间作用关系场境中的相互作用。比如，我们通常所讲的国际空间中的地缘政治关系，并不是国与国的一般边界问题，而是不同国家和集团的政治、经济和军事力量角逐所生成的国际空间关系动态格局。也是在这个意义上，当列斐伏尔说，在社会空间生产中，“世界性并不消灭地方性（Lemondialn'abolitpaslelocal）”时，这恰恰是指世界性的空间生产关系对区域甚至个人生活的影响，世界性通过本土化获得实现。比如，肯德基在中国推出中式早餐，可口可乐中的健怡可乐将欧美产品中的咖啡因free改为糖分free，这都是世界性资本关系融入地方化空间关系的表现。这一点，在当下的资本主义网络信息技术的推动下，达到了空前的地步。

II. The “Fluid Dynamics” of the Existence of Modern Social Space

二、现代社会空间存在的“流体动力学”

In Lefebvre’s view, this mutual permeation and interdependence of the production of social space is further intensified today by the development of “transglobal communication networks, exchange networks, and information networks.” [4]4 Henri Lefebvre, *The Urban Revolution*, trans. Robert Bononno (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2003), p. 55. Within the already rapidly developing computer technology and information science space, “these newly developed networks do not eliminate the networks established over the years in the context of earlier social spaces; together they constitute various markets: local, regional, national, and international markets; these markets include commodity markets, financial or capital markets, labor markets, and markets for works, symbols, and signs; and finally—the market in the newly created space.” [5]5 Henri Lefebvre, *The Production of Space*, p. 86.

在列斐伏尔看来，社会空间生产的这种相互渗透和相互依存，在今天由“横贯全球的通信网络、交换与信息网络”的发展进一步强化了。在已经迅猛发展起来的计算机技术和信息科学空间（espacedel'informatique）中，“这些新发展起来的网络并不消灭早期社会空间背景下经年累月建立的那些网络，它们一起构成了各式各样的市场：地方的、地区的、国家的与国际的市场；这些市场包括商品市场、金融或资本市场、劳动市场，以及作品的、象征物的与符号（symbolesetsignes）的市场；最后还有——最近新创生的空间中的市场”。

The market is precisely the invisible field of social spatial relations. It is not simply a collection of physical shops or streets, but a complex network of relations established through commodity exchange occurring in different commercial buildings and three-dimensional transportation systems. For example, from the perspective of the concrete spatial scale in which people live, it includes local markets, regional markets, national markets, and international markets; from the perspective of the specific content of exchange in the market, it also includes different markets for commodity exchange, labor exchange, financial and capital exchange, and symbolic and coded cultural exchange. All of this constitutes the social spatial network accumulated over many years and continuously created by the social space in which people live. Lefebvre vividly states, “The social spaces that emerge in a thousand different forms, especially urban space, are far more complex than the homogeneous and isotropic space of classical (Euclidean/Cartesian) mathematics, and are reminiscent of a mille-feuille structure.” [6]6 Ibid., p. 87. Compared to the simple abstract representation of space in geometric space, the field of spatial relations in real life is as complex as a mille-feuille. Particularly in the present, in urban space, these traditional market exchange spaces have been restructured into an omnipotent “market in the newly created space” by electronic financial spatial relations such as “Alipay” and “PayPal” and e-commerce networks. If I want to buy a monograph by Harvey published in 2023 on Marx’s *Grundrisse*, I just click the relevant purchase link on my smartphone, and a few days later, it arrives in my hands. Lefebvre says, unlike “each market stabilizes and takes concrete form through networks, including the network of purchase and sale points under commodity exchange, the network of banks and stock exchanges under capital circulation, and the network of labor exchange under the labor market. Correspondingly, the architecture of the city is the material evidence of this evolution.” [7]7 Ibid., p. 88.

市场正是不可见的社会空间关系场境，它不只是一个个实在的店铺或街道，而是由不同商业建筑、立体化交通运输中发生的商品交换建立的复杂关系网络存在。比如，从人所生活的具体空间尺度上看，它包括了本地的市场，一个地区的市场，国内的市场和国际市场；从市场的具体交换内容上看，它又包括了商品交换、劳动力交换、金融和资本交换，以及象征性和符码化的文化交换的不同市场，这一切又都是人们所处的社会空间长年累月积累和不断创造出来的社会空间网络。列斐伏尔形象地说，“千姿百态般地涌现出来的社会空间，特别是都市空间，比古典（欧几里得/笛卡尔的）数学的同质性和均质性（l'homogénéité-isotropie）空间复杂得多，让人联想到千层糕一般的结构”。相比之几何空间中那种简单抽象的空间表象，现实生活中的空间关系场境就像千层糕一般复杂。特别是在当下，都市空间中这些传统市场交换空间已经由“支付宝”“PayPal”等这样的电子金融空间关系和电子商务网络重构成无所不能的“新创生的空间中的市场”。我想买一本哈维2023年出版的关于马克思《大纲》研究的专著，只要在智能手机上点击相关购买链接，几天后，它就会送到我的手上。列斐伏尔说，不同于“每一种市场都稳固下来并通过网络的途径取得了具体的形式，这些网络包括商品交换条件下的购销点网络、资本循环条件下的银行与股票交易（lesbanquesetboursesdevaleursfinanciéres）网络、劳动市场条件下的劳动力交换网络。而相应地，城市中的建筑则是这种进化的物质证据（matérialise）”。

This again touches upon the relationship between spatial practice and material facilities in social space. In a modern city today, there are corporate office buildings, banks, and commercial center structures, but these are merely the material carriers of the economic exchange market and the commercial market. The essence of contemporary social spatial production lies in the spatial practical activities that occur within these material facilities. In fact, this is also a new example of the non-substantial thing in historical materialism that is most difficult to understand. Essentially, Lefebvre wants us to understand that the relational interaction of social spatial production is like a flowing force generated by human activities within material buildings. The essence of social spatial production is an objective field existence of force relations, associations, and contests that are constantly being constructed, constantly emerging and constantly disappearing. It is precisely in this special intentionality of ordering that Lefebvre, with a stroke of insight, says that the mode of existence of social space can be viewed through the lens of fluid dynamics: “It seems to me that a more effective analogy can be found in the field of fluid dynamics. The principle of superposition of small motions tells us the importance of the role of scale, direction, and rhythm. Large motions, grand rhythms, and great waves—these motions are in conflict and ‘interfere’ with each other; while smaller motions interpenetrate.” [8]8 Ibid., p. 89.

这又涉及到社会空间中空间实践与物质设施的关系。在今天的一座现代化城市中，有公司商用的大楼，有银行和商业中心的建筑，但是，它们只是经济交换市场和商业市场的物性载体，当代社会空间生产的本质是在这些物性设施发生的空间实践活动。其实，这也是最难理解的历史唯物主义中的非实体的物的新例证。实际上，列斐伏尔是想让我们知道，社会空间生产的关系性互动，就像一种由物性建筑中人的活动生成的流动的力量，社会空间生产的本质就一种是不断发生不断消失的当下建构起来的力量关系关联和角逐的客观场境存在。也正是在这个特殊的构序意向中，列斐伏尔脑洞大开地说，可以用流体动力学的方式来透视社会空间存在的样态：“在我看来，可以在流体力学领域（dynamiquedesfluides）找到一种更有效的类比，小型运动的迭加原理（Leprincìpedelasuperposition）告诉我们规模、方向与节奏的作用的重要性。大型运动，宏大的节奏与巨大的波浪——这些运动是相互冲突与‘相互干扰’的；而较小型的运动则是相互渗透的。”

Clearly, Lefebvre did not actually engage with the scientific content of fluid dynamics; he merely enumerated the superposition of small-scale fluid force relations and the mutual interference of large-scale motions. Lefebvre was of course aware that this was a metaphor to describe the fluid essence of the relational field of social space, and he explicitly stated that this fluid dynamics “if applied too far, would also lead to serious errors.” We need not fault the incomplete application of this scientific principle here, but rather grasp the metaphor within it: the non-substantial relational existence of the production of social space and the dynamic force relations in a kinetic sense. This is precisely the latest mode of expression of that non-substantial, non-intuitive “thing” which is difficult to comprehend within the historical materialist conceptual edifice.

显然，列斐伏尔并没有真正去涉及流体动力学的科学内容，而只是列举了小型流体力量关系的迭加性和大型运动的相互干涉性。列斐伏尔当然知道这是一个形容社会空间关系场境流动性本质的比喻，他也明确说，这个流体动力学“如果运用得过头了也会引起严重的错误”。我们不必去责难这一科学原理在此的不完全运用，而要去体会其中的隐喻，即社会空间生产的非实体性关系存在和动力学意义上的流动力量关系。这正是历史唯物主义构境中那个难以理解的非实体、非直观的“物”的最新表现方式。

III. Fundamental Principles of the Study of Social Space

三、社会空间研究的基本原则

Following the discussion above, Lefebvre felt it possible to summarize a few fundamental principles for the study of social space: First, methodologically, one must shift from the old problematic of things to a relational perspective. This is the aspect of relational ontology he repeatedly emphasizes. Hence he says that, on the question of production in the field of social space study, a historical situation of transformation has emerged, namely “a new problematic is in the process of supplanting the old problematic, replacing the old problematic and superimposing itself upon it without entirely eliminating the old problematic.” According to Lefebvre’s explanation, this is a shift from the old problematic, i.e., “the study of the logic of the production of things in the usual sense—the production of goods and commodities,” to a problematic of the production of social relations in space. For this is the methodological entry point into Lefebvre’s theory of the production of social space. Of course, he also says that for academia this is an ongoing and incomplete process of methodological transformation. The implication is that he has already taken a few more steps than Marx.

经过上面的讨论，列斐伏尔觉得可以再归纳出一些社会空间研究基本原则：第一，在方法论上必须从物的旧问题式中转换到关系视域上来。这是他反复强调的关系存在论的方面。所以他说，在社会空间研究领域中的生产问题上，出现了一个历史性的转换情境（situation），即“新的问题式（problèmatique），正处在夺取旧问题的地位的过程中，新问题替代了旧问题并将自己叠加在旧问题之上，却没有完全消灭旧问题”。依列斐伏尔的说明，这是一种从旧的问题式，即“通常意义上的物的生产（productiondechoses）即货物与商品生产逻辑研究”，转换到空间中社会关系的生产的问题式上来。因为，这是进入列斐伏尔社会空间生产理论的方法论入口。当然，他也说，这对于学术界来说是一个正在发生且没有完成的方法论转变过程。言下之意，他已经比马克思要多走了几步。

Second, Lefebvre reminds us that the focus of his new problematic here is space within the relational field, which is of course different from the macro-social being and temporal historical process discussed in Marx’s historical materialism. This is another point of difference between him and Marx. At the same time, the real basis for the emergence of the new problematic of the production of social space is the transition from the capitalist industrial era to urbanized life. Hence, “the problematic of space—which encompasses the urban domain (the city and its sprawl) and the domain of everyday life (programmed consumption)—has replaced the problematic of industrialization.” This indicates that, unlike Marx in the 19th century, who focused more on the economic perspective within the problematic of capitalist industrialization, Lefebvre, starting from his long-standing concern with the micro-critique of everyday life and the newly discovered urban problematic, redefines a field of social space study, whose core issues are the sprawl of bourgeois urban space and the controlled, false consumption of everyday life. It can be noted that in *The Production of Space*, Lefebvre does not discuss in great detail the issue of programmed consumption and the alienation of needs from his own theory of the critique of everyday life.

第二，列斐伏尔提醒我们，他这里新问题式聚焦的焦点是关系场境中的空间，这当然与马克思历史唯物主义讨论的宏观社会定在和时间性的历史进程不同。这又是他与马克思的不同点。同时，社会空间生产新问题式发生的现实基础是从资本主义的工业时代向都市化生活的转变。所以，“空间的问题式——包含了都市领域（l'urbain,城市及其蔓延）和日常生活领域（被计划的消费，laconsommationprogrammèe）的问题——取代了工业化问题式（laproblématiquedel'indusrialisatïon）”。这是表明，与马克思在19世纪更多地关注资本主义工业化问题式中的经济学视角不同，列斐伏尔从自己长期关注的日常生活微观批判和新发现的都市问题入手，重新定义了一个社会空间研究域，这里的核心问题是资产阶级城市空间的蔓延和被控制起来的虚假日常生活消费。可以注意到，在《空间的生产》一书中，列斐伏尔并没有过多讨论他自己日常生活批判理论中这个laconsommationprogrammèe（被编程的消费）和需要异化问题。

Third, the production of social space is a study focused on people’s actual activities. Lefebvre says that in Marx’s era, the bourgeois “economic science (or rather, the attempt to elevate political economy to the rank of a science) was submerged in a vast ocean of enumeration and description of products (i.e., objects, things).” In this science of “things” as wealth, the game of “pseudo-concepts” was based on quantitative bookkeeping. Marx’s historical materialism, by contrast, penetrates this false economic phantasmagoria. “Marx, through a critical analysis of productive activity itself (social labor, relations of production, and mode of production), replaced in a confrontational manner the study of things as ‘things-in-themselves.’ He revived and renewed the theories initiated by the so-called founders of economic science (Smith and Ricardo) and integrated these into his fundamental critique of capitalism, thereby achieving a higher level of knowledge.”

第三，社会空间生产是着眼于人的现实活动的研究。列斐伏尔说，在马克思的时代，资产阶级的“经济科学（或毋宁说，是想把政治经济学提升到一门科学的行列中来）被淹没在对产品（即客体、物，objets,choses）的列举与描述的汪洋大海之中”，在这种作为财富的“物”的科学中，“伪概念”的游戏基于量化的簿记方式（dénombrement）。而马克思的历史唯物主义则是透视这种虚假的经济物像，“马克思通过对生产性活动（l'aclivileproductive）本身（社会劳动，生产关系与生产方式，modedeproduclion）的批判性分析，以一种分庭抗礼的方式取代了那种把物当作“物自体”（ensoi）的研究。他复活并更新了所谓经济科学奠基者们（斯密与李嘉图）首创的理论，并将这些融合进他对资本主义的根本性批判，从而实现了更高水平的知识”。

This is an extremely important methodological clarification by Lefebvre for understanding his own original theory of space. In 1845, Marx, in the germ of his new worldview—the *Theses on Feuerbach*—began by criticizing the intuitive object-thing of philosophical materialism, and after opposing the deviation of Hegelian subjective initiative, he proposed the philosophical methodological starting point of active objective material practice and the important positioning of the relational field of social life. Lefebvre firmly grasps the methodological essence of the critical dual perspective of Marx’s new worldview, explicitly identifying that Marx, in the political economy of Smith and Ricardo, further revived and renewed this scientific critical perspective: starting from the currently occurring labor objectification-shaping and ordering activity (utility-use value) and exchange relations (alienability-value) to deconstruct bourgeois economic fetishism. Thus, Lefebvre, in his study of social space, directly eliminates the illusion of the thing-in-itself and the fetishism of space, grasping the essence of the relational field production activity of social space.

这是列斐伏尔对理解他自己原创性空间理论的一个极其重要的方法论交待。1845年马克思在新世界观的萌芽——《关于费尔巴哈的提纲》中从批评哲学唯物主义的直观客体-对象物开始，在反对黑格尔式的主观能动性偏差之后，提出了对能动的客观物质实践活动的哲学方法论起点和社会生活关系场境论的重要定位。列斐伏尔紧紧抓住马克思新世界观的批判性双重透视的方法论本质，明确指认马克思在斯密和李嘉图的政治经济学中，进一步复活和更新了这种科学的批判性透视法：从当下发生的劳动物相化塑形-构序活动（用在性-使用价值）和交换关系（可变卖性-价值）出发去解构资产阶级的经济拜物教。这样，列斐伏尔才会在社会空间研究中，直接消除物自体式的幻象和空间拜物教，把握住社会空间的关系场境生产活动本质。

Fourth, the core of social space research is to unveil the production and reproduction of social relations concealed within spatial production. This corresponds to the first principle above, but further highlights the complexity of contemporary bourgeois spatial production research. First, “the dominant ideology today tends to divide space into fragmented parts according to the division of social labor. Space is understood as a passive container, in which various forces occupy it as impressions.” [13]13 Henri Lefebvre, *La production de l’espace*, 4th ed. (Paris: Anthropos, 2000), p. 117. Here, Lefebvre’s critique of the conception of space is that it divides space into different “passive containers” according to the pattern of social division of labor. This approach, which confines spatial research to the fragmented state of empty sites, is merely a variation of the old conception of space. Second, “the dominant trend in bourgeois spatial research cuts and fragments space, and merely inventories the things contained in space—various kinds of objects. The process of specialization cuts space into different parts and erects intellectual barriers (barrières) or practical-social fences (clôtures) over these parts.” [14]14 Ibid., p. 118. Thus, architects study only “architectural space problems” such as streets and houses; economists see only visible “economic spaces” such as commodity trading centers and banks; and geographers see “sunlit territories” such as rivers and grasslands. Lefebvre explicitly states that these are all pseudo-conceptual games of the fetishistic spatial research that remains stuck in intuitive objects. His own spatial research is “not an analysis of objects in space but an analysis of space itself, in order to expose the social relations embedded in space!” [15]15 Ibid., p. 119. Social space is by no means an empty site plus objects; it is a relational field constructed by human activities. It is only in the economic reification of space under bourgeois conditions that these social relations are once again concealed. Lefebvre says that if, when confronting today’s bourgeois social space, “we do not uncover the social relations (including class relations) latent in space, do not attend to spatial production and its inherent social relations—relations that introduce a particular contradiction into production, thereby echoing the contradiction between the private ownership of the means of production and the socialization of productive forces—but instead fall into the intellectual trap of treating space merely as ‘space’ itself (i.e., discussing space in terms of space alone), then we begin to use ‘spatiality’ to think, which may fetishize (fétichisme) space and revert to the old path of commodity fetishism (fétichisme de la marchandise). The cost is that traps have long been set, leading people into the erroneous thinking of viewing things in isolation and discussing them on their own terms.” [16]16 Ibid., p. 120.

第四，社会空间研究的核心是解蔽空间生产中被隐匿起来的社会关系的生产与再生产。这与上述第一条原则是相应的，但进一步突显了当代资产阶级空间生产研究中的复杂性。一是今天“占主流地位的意识形态趋向于按照社会分工的要求把空间分割成支离破碎的部分。空间是一个被动的容器这样的思想来理解印象中各种力量对于空间的占领”。这里列斐伏尔所批判的空间观，是把空间按社会分工的样式分隔为不同的“被动的容器”，这种将空间研究停留在空场所的破碎状态中的做法，不过是旧式空间观的某种变形而已。二是资产阶级空间研究中的“主导趋势将空间割裂和切成碎片，并且只是对空间中容纳的事物-各种各样的物-进行清点。专业化过程将空间裁截成不同的部分，并在这些部分之上竖起思想的栅栏（barrières）或实践-社会的界桩（clôtures）”。于是，建筑学家只研究街道、房屋一类“建筑空间问题”，经济学家眼中只有可见的商品贸易中心、银行一类的“经济空间”，而地理学家则看到了河流、草原一类“阳光下的地盘”。列斐伏尔明确说，这都是上述那个停留在直观对象物的拜物教空间研究的伪概念游戏，他自己的空间研究，绝“不是对空间中的物而是对空间本身进行分析，以便揭穿镶嵌在空间中的社会关系”！社会空间绝不是空场加物，而就是由人的活动建构起来的关系场境，只是在资产阶级的经济物相化空间中，这些社会关系被再一次遮蔽起来。列斐伏尔说，如果在面对今天的资产阶级社会空间时，“我们没去揭开空间中潜在的社会关系（包括阶级关系），没去关注空间生产及其所固有的社会关系——这种关系将一种特殊矛盾引入生产，因此在生产资料的私有制与生产力的社会化之间回响着矛盾而是掉进了把空间仅仅当作‘空间’自身（即就空间论空间）的思想陷阱。我们开始使用‘空间性’来思考，这就可能把空间‘拜物教’（fètichisme）化，走回陈旧的商品拜物教（fètichismedelamerchandise）的老路。其代价是中间早就设置了圈套，把人引向一种孤立地看待事物、就事论事的错误思想上去了”。

Lefebvre’s social space research, grounded in historical materialism, aims to critically penetrate and expose the social relations behind the reified appearances of “spatial fetishism,” especially the class struggle relations concealed in capitalist social spatial production, and particularly the “contradiction between the private ownership of the means of production and the socialized character of productive forces.” It is precisely the production and reproduction of these non-intuitive social relations that construct the bourgeois social space specific to it. This critical method, originating from Marx’s *Capital*, is fundamentally heterogeneous to the bourgeois fetishistic logic of materiality found in traditional spatial research.

列斐伏尔基于历史唯物主义的社会空间研究，就是要批判性地透视和揭露在“空间拜物教”的物像背后的社会关系，特别是要透视资本主义社会空间生产中隐匿起来的阶级斗争关系，特别是“生产资料私有制与生产力的社会化特征之间的矛盾”关系，正是这些不可直观的社会关系的生产与再生产，构筑起资产阶级特有的社会空间生产。这种源自马克思《资本论》的批判方法是与传统空间研究中的资产阶级拜物教式的物性逻辑根本异质的。

Fifth, one must be vigilant against the invisible shadow of ideology in spatial research. Lefebvre acknowledges that a certain development of productive forces (croissance des forces productives) determines the historical essence of the problematic of spatial research. However, it must be recognized that the transformation of academic problematics is always caused by specific “dominant modes of production and relations of production.” [17]17 Ibid., p. 121. This dominant relation of production inevitably generates a dominant system of ideas—ideology. Therefore, we must critically perceive the concealed role of ideology (idéologies) in spatial research. For example, “productive forces and technology, developed alongside the capitalist industrial process, now allow intervention at any level of space: local, regional, national, global.” [18]18 Ibid., p. 122. Space as a whole was originally geographical or historical space, but bourgeois industrial productive forces, science and technology, and commodity production practices have profoundly changed the nature and form of today’s social spatial production. At the substrate of spatial production, “natural space (l’espace-nature) is replaced by a space that is a product. In this way, reflective thinking moves from produced space, from the space of production (things in space, des choses dans l’espace), to the production of space itself.” [19]19 Ibid., p. 123. This is a historical process: the natural space of works is replaced by the production space of industrial products; further, the production of spatial products is replaced by the production and reproduction of social relational fields—this is the production of space itself. At the same time, this leads to the dominant bourgeois relations of production transforming the nature of all spatial practices, and it is also a historical process of the deployment of a new ideology. In this ideological deployment of spatial production, the blood-kinship patriarchal relational fields and divine ideology of former historical spaces have been replaced by a bourgeois ideology flying the banners of “Enlightenment, science, and the rule of law.” Moreover, Lefebvre keenly points out that bourgeois social spatial production always portrays itself as a democratic, fraternal, and just free space, deliberately concealing the ideological nature of its production of specific social relations serving class interests. Therefore, on the issue of spatial research, we “must expel ideology—which strives to conceal the role of productive forces in the general mode of production, especially in the dominant mode of production. We must first destroy that ideology which promotes abstract (abstraite) spatiality and fragments the representation of space. Naturally, ideology does not present its true face in its representations (représentations), but masquerades as already established knowledge.” [20]20 Ibid., p. 124.

第五，要警惕空间研究中的无形的意识形态阴影。列斐伏尔承认，一定的生产力发展（croissancedeforcesproductives）决定了空间研究问题式的历史性本质，然而必须意识到，学术研究问题式的转换总是由特定的“占主导性的生产方式与生产关系所造成的”，这种占统治地位的生产关系则必然生成占统治地位的观念体系——意识形态。所以，我们必须批判性地看到空间研究中被遮蔽起来的意识形态（idéologies）作用。比如，今天伴随着资本主义工业进程发起来的“生产力与技术现在允许介入到任何一个层次的空间：地方的、区域的、国家的、全球的”。空间作为一个整体，原先是地理的或者历史性的空间，而资产阶级的工业生产力、科学技术和商品生产实践深刻地改变了今天社会空间的生产性质和形式，在空间生产的基质上，“自然空间（l'espace-nature）被一种作为产品的空间所取代了。通过这种方式，反思性的思维从生产出来的空间，从生产的空间（空间中的物,deschosesdansl'espace）进入空间自身的生产”。这是一个历史过程，自然存在的作品空间被工业产品的生产空间所取代，进一步，空间产品的生产被社会关系场境的生产与再生产所取代，这也是空间本身的生产。同时，这也导致资产阶级占统治地位的生产关系改变全部空间实践性质，并且也是新型意识形态布展的历史过程。在空间生产的意识形态布展中，原先历史性空间中的血亲宗法关系场境和神性意识形态，已经被资产阶级打着“启蒙、科学和法制”旗号的意识形态所替代，并且，列斐伏尔敏锐地指出，资产阶级的社会空间生产总是将自己描绘成民主的、博爱的、公正的自由空间，故意遮蔽其服务于阶级利益的特定社会关系生产的意识形态性质。所以，在空间研究的问题上，我们“必须将意识形态——它竭力掩盖生产力在一般生产方式中的作用，特别是在占支配地位的生产方式中的作用——驱逐出去。我们首先要摧毁那种促进了抽象的（abstraite）空间性以及使空间的表象变得支离破碎的意识形态。很自然地，意识形态并不把自己的面目真实地表现（représentations）出来，而是假冒已经建立起来的知识”。

This is a very difficult task. In the study of contemporary bourgeois social spatial production, paying attention to eliminating the ideological factors of abstract spatial practice, spatial representation, and spatial experience is a fundamental requirement of historical materialism. Lefebvre also uses this to distinguish his own spatial theory from the fundamental difference of bourgeois spatial doctrines.

这是一件十分不容易的事情。在对当代资产阶级社会空间生产的研究中，注意剔除其中抽象空间实践、空间表象和体验的意识形态因素，这是历史唯物主义的根本要求。列斐伏尔也以此来区分自己的空间理论与资产阶级空间学说的根本不同。

Finally, Lefebvre discusses the boundary problem of a scientific theory of space in the sixth and seventh principles. In his view, traditional spatial research has “multiple perspectives within disciplinary fields: philosophy, epistemology, ecology, geography, systems theory (decision-making systems, cognitive systems), anthropology, ethnology, etc.”; in terms of specific research content, there also appear “geographical space, ethnological space, demographic space, information-science space,” “pictorial space, musical space, or plastic space,” and so on. However, scholars engaged in such spatial research are usually unaware that all these disciplinary and content-based classifications are precisely “accidentally integrated into the existing society, forced to operate within the framework of that society.” This also means that all seemingly independent spatial research is in fact inescapably constrained by the entire existing social relations of capitalism. Genuine spatial knowledge must possess this methodological self-awareness, thereby striving to “discover, through space, the time within space (first and foremost, the time of production).” At the same time, Lefebvre emphasizes the principle of “retrospective and also prospective” analysis in the study of social space. Retrospection is historical analysis; prospection is the anticipation of a wholly new, heterogeneous future. This is another formulation of his retrogressive-progressive method. “This prospect for the future, in other words, the project, is the planning of a heterogeneous space and a heterogeneous time (autre espace et d'un autre temps) in a heterogeneous (possible and impossible) society.” Autre (the other), in the French context, is already a heterogeneous, détourned existence; it is a longing for a new production of social space.

最后，列斐伏尔在第六、第七条原则中讨论了科学的空间理论边界问题。在他看来，传统的空间研究在学科领域有“多个角度：哲学、认识论、生态学、地理学、系统论（决策体系、认知体系）、人类学、民族学，等等”；在具体的研究内容上，也会出现“地理学的空间、民族学的空间、人口统计学的空间，信息科学的空间”，“图画的空间、音乐的空间或可塑的空间”等。但是，这种空间研究学者们通常意识不到，所有这些学科和内容上的分类恰恰都是“被意外地整合进现存的社会中，被迫在这种社会框架中运行”的。这也意味着，所有看起来独立运转的空间研究，实际上都难逃整个资本主义现存社会关系的制约。真正的空间知识必须要有这种方法论的自觉，从而去努力“通过空间而发现空间中的时间（首先是生产的时间）”。同时，列斐伏尔也强调了社会空间研究中的“回溯性的（rètrospective）、也是展望性（prospective）”原则。回溯，是历史性分析；而展望，则是对一个全新的异质性未来的期待。这是他那个回溯-前进法的另一种说法。“这种对未来的展望（prospect），换而言之，即规划（project），就是对他性的（可能与不可能的）社会中的他性的空间与他性的时间（autreespaceetd'unautretemps）的筹划”。autre（他者），在法语语境中已经是一个异质性的异轨存在，它是对新的社会空间生产的憧憬。

(The author is a senior tenured professor at Nanjing University, a research fellow at the Center for Studies of Marxist Social Theory, and a doctoral supervisor.)

（作者系南京大学文科资深教授，马克思主义社会理论研究中心研究员，博士生导师）

Online editor: Ma Jingren

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