Jacques Lévy

Jacques Lévy (1952-) is a geographer and an urbanist, full professor at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology, Lausanne (EPFL). He is the director of Chôros Laboratory and the director of the Architecture and Sciences of the City doctoral programme.

Topics

His major concerns are social theory of space, urbanity, globalisation, cartography, and the epistemology of social sciences. He has completed numerous research projects, including theoretical reflections, field studies on metropolises worldwide, and practical urban and territorial projects. He is working on the introduction of non-verbal, namely audio-visual languages, in all dimensions of academic research. He has been the director of a scientific film, Urbanity/ies (2013)

Positions and Activities

Formerly, he has been researcher at the French CNRS, then professor at the Paris Institut d’études politique (Sciences Po, F) and at Rheims University (F). He has been invited professor in various universities: UCLA, NYU, USP (São Paulo), L’Orientale (Naples), Macquarie (Sydney), and the Reclus Chair in Mexico City. He has been a fellow of the Wissenschaftskolleg zu Berlin (2003-2004). He has been invited as a keynote speaker in many congresses and conferences throughout the World.

He is the co-editor of EspacesTemps.net, a bilingual free-access journal of social sciences. He is the co-director of L’espace en société book series at PPUR/EPFL Press publisher. He is the scientific adviser of Pouvoirs Locaux journal. He is member of the international Grand Prix de l’Urbanisme (Paris). He has numerous collaborations with newspapers and radio channels in France and Switzerland.

Publications

He has published in French, English, Italian, German, Spanish, Portuguese, Russian and Hungarian. Among his 600 publications, the following ones can be particularly noted: Révolutions, fin et suite (with Patrick Garcia & Marie-Flore Mattei, EspacesTemps/Centre Georges Pompidou, 1991);

Géographies du politique (ed., Presses de Sciences Po/EspacesTemps, 1991); Le monde : espaces et systèmes (with Marie-Françoise Durand & Denis Retaillé, Presses de Sciences Po/Dalloz, 1992 ; 2nd edition 1993), L’espace légitime (Presses de la FNSP, 1994); Egogéographies (L’Harmattan, 1995); Le monde pour Cité (Hachette, 1996); ‘Nouvelles géographies’ (Le Débat journal, special issue Nov. 1996); Europe : une géographie (Hachette, 1997 ; new edition 2011); Mondialisation : les mots et les choses (with the ‘Mondialisation’ group, Karthala, 1999); Le tournant géographique (Belin, 1999); Logiques de l’espace, esprit des lieux (Belin, 2000, co-ed. Michel Lussault); Repenser le territoire : un dictionnaire critique (L’Aube, 2000, with Serge Wachter et al.); From Geopolitics to Global Politics (ed., Frank Cass, Londres, 2001); Dictionnaire de la géographie et de l’espace des sociétés (Belin, 2003, co-ed. with Michel Lussault); La carte, enjeu contemporain (La Documentation Photographique, 2004, with Patrick Poncet & Emmanuelle Tricoire); Les sens du mouvement (Belin, 2005, co-ed. with Sylvain Allemand & François Ascher); ‘Eine geographische Wende » (Geographische Zeitschrift journal, special issue, 2005); Penser l’espace pour lire la vieillesse (PUF, 2006, with Pierre Brunel, Claudine Attias-Donfut, & Jean Morval); Milton Santos, philosophe du mondial, citoyen du local (PPUR, 2007);

L’invention du Monde (ed., Presses de Sciences Po, 2008); The City (Ashgate, 2008); Échelles de l’habiter (ed., PUCA, 2008); Our Inhabited Space (ed., FNRS, 2009); Le sfide cartografiche (co-ed with Emanuela Casti, Il Lavoro Editoriale, 2010); Globalization of Urbanity (dir., avec Josep Acebillo et Chrisitan Schmid, iCUP, 2013); Réinventer la France (Fayard, 2013); Mondialisation : consommateur ou acteur ? (avec Jacques Cossart et Lucas Léger, Le Muscadier, 2013).