This article was downloaded by: [Illinois State University Milner Library]On: 21 October 2014, At: 12:18Publisher: RoutledgeInforma Ltd Registered in England and Wales Registered Number: 1072954Registered office: Mortimer House, 37-41 Mortimer Street, London W1T 3JH,UK

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Globalized Freight Transport:Intermodality, E-Commerce,Logistics and SustainabilityRobert N. Martin aa Department of Geography , Kutztown University ,Kutztown, PAPublished online: 17 Sep 2008.

To cite this article: Robert N. Martin (2008) Globalized Freight Transport:Intermodality, E-Commerce, Logistics and Sustainability, The Professional Geographer,60:4, 586-588, DOI: 10.1080/00330120802239936

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demonstrate—to triumph. Key Words: con-spicuous consumption, eastern Europe, elites, pres-tige, Roma (Gypsies), urban vernacular domesticarchitecture.

ReferencesLockwood, W. G. 1985. Balkan Gypsies: An intro-

duction. In Papers from the Fourth and Fifth AnnualMeetings of the Gypsy Lore Society, North AmericanChapter, ed. J. Grumet, 91–99. New York: GypsyLore Society, North American Chapter.

Globalized Freight Transport: Intermodal-ity, E-Commerce, Logistics and Sustain-ability. Thomas R. Leinbach and CristinaCapineri, eds. Cheltenham, U.K.: EdwardElgar, 2007. 287 pp., maps, diagrams,and index. $130.00 hardcover (ISBN-13:9781845425029).

Reviewed by Robert N. Martin, Depart-ment of Geography, Kutztown University,Kutztown, PA.

The subtitle of this group of ten original essaysby fifteen authors provides the focus and or-ganization of the contents of this book editedby Thomas R. Leinbach and Cristina Cap-ineri. These essays developed out of severalmeetings of North American and Europeanscholars over the last five years. The purposeof the meetings was to identify the criticaltransport issues of an increasingly global econ-omy for international freight. Using the idealof seamlessness in freight movements, the es-says address efforts to and the limitations ofimproving the efficiency of transportation bylooking at intermodality, logistics, technology,sustainability, and the status of public policydevelopments within the North American andEuropean freight systems. As one reads theseessays, one should keep in mind the followingstatement by Leinbach and Capineri in theirconcluding essay: “The pattern of global freighttrade is highly concentrated on select routesand through a relatively small number of gate-ways. The implications of this spatial selectivityare enormous in terms of externality effects”(p. 259).

Intermodality is addressed by the first pairof essays. John Bowen and Brian Slack lookat the shift between modes and the patternsof spatial flows in North American. Their es-

say provides a very good background to thehistory and growth of intermodal freight inNorth America. Using U.S. and Canadian datasources, the authors document the growth andmodal shift in freight movements and its con-centration in a limited number of gateways.They also address the trends and problemswith intermodal freight and suggest solutions.I found their discussion to be informative, es-pecially the topic of air freight.

In the second essay, Michel Beuthe addressesthe topic of intermodal freight in Europe. Heprovides very good examples of how Europeanintermodal freight differs from the situationin North America, especially in the aspects ofdealing with many national and multinationalgovernment agencies. As with the first essay,the author provides excellent tables and dataproviding information on modal share and theirchanges over time.

European and North American logistics arediscussed in the pair of essays in the secondsection of this volume. Jean Paul Rodrigue andMarkus Hesse look at the North American per-spective on logistics. They discuss global prod-uct networks and the impact of informationtechnology on e-commerce as well as inter-modal freight. The problems of limited gate-ways and congestion are discussed along withthe limited rail network within North America.In the first half of this essay there are sev-eral problems a professor should point out tostudents who are studying this essay. Specifi-cally, Table 4.1 should be titled to indicate pro-jected freight tonnage and values. The map inFigure 4.1 is much too cluttered and the sym-bolization is difficult to read and understand. Ifthe students do not catch it, the professor willhave to point out that the Port of Los Angelesis not on the California–Arizona border. Giventhe discussion in the earlier essay by Bowenand Slack, students (as well as this reviewer)may question why Louisville and Memphis donot appear on this map as major air gateways.Three separate maps for the land, port, and airgateways would have been much more effec-tive and less distracting. The map in Figure 4.2should have Long Beach, California, as largeas Los Angeles based on Table 2.5. The mapin Figure 4.3 does not match the informationin Figure 4.1, or maybe it should be vice versa.Finally, Savanna, Georgia, has become Savan-nah, California, in the text. The conclusions of

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the first half of this essay are not supported bythe material. There is little or no discussion oflogistics and the changes in the area of logisticsin North America because of the globalizationof trade.

In contrast, the second part of this essay, en-titled “Challenges to North American FreightDistribution,” is quite good, especially its dis-cussion of trade imbalances with China. Thereis also a very good discussion of the lackof freight infrastructure transport planning asreflected by the freight transport congestionwithin metropolitan areas.

Chapter 5, dealing with logistics and inter-modality from a European perspective, by DirkHenstra, Cees Ruijgrok, and Lori Tavasszy,provides an excellent discussion of the changesin logistics and transportation over time.Problems and the unique characteristics ofEuropean transport are discussed. The authorspresent very good examples of logistics and in-termodal freight movements by mode. Gooduse is made of charts, maps, and graphs topresent the data. This is a refreshing read com-pared to the first part of chapter 4. The authorsprovided a fascinating discussion of the futureof EU logistics and the development of hybridnetworks.

In the third part of this volume, the two es-says focus on sustainability, e-commerce, andtechnology. In chapter 6, William Andersonand Thomas Leinbach look at the aspects ofe-commerce that result in the physical move-ment of commodities and therefore have animpact on freight transportation. They fo-cus in detail on business-to-business (B2B)e-commerce, which is very informative to astudent of transport and logistics. The spatialimplications of e-commerce are discussed in ageneral way. They have an interesting discus-sion on the debate about e-commerce’s impactson developing economies and logistics. Theyraise questions that are hard to answer at thistime but provide a guide as to where researchshould be going on this topic.

In chapter 7, William Black addresses theincreasingly important question of the sus-tainability of freight movement, especially ina period of increasing fuel costs and com-petition for petroleum resources. Black ad-dresses very clearly the central question, “Whyis transport unsustainable?” The sustainabilityof the various modes involved in global freight

is discussed. The author also addresses a varietyof solutions that have been proposed to improvethe sustainability of the modes. Black is able toprovide good arguments for why sustainabil-ity for freight transport is impossible but moresustainability is possible.

The three essays in the fourth part of thisvolume deal with globalized freight and publicpolicy. In chapter 8, Roger Vickerman looks atpublic transport policy and its role in efficientfreight transport in Europe. Examples from theEU are presented because the relative export–import ratios have remained constant. Thisallows changes in policy, growth of trade, im-pact on ports, and associated modes to be iden-tified and discussed. Vickerman points out thatan EU intermodal policy has been hindered bynational rail systems, unions, and governments.The seamlessness of freight transport is notpossible because of national policies that areanti-intermodal. Therefore, the modal sharefor rail has declined even though it wouldmake transport within the EU more sustain-able. Overall, this is a very well done and infor-mative essay.

Mark Maggio and Roger Stough discusspolicy and globalized freight within NorthAmerica in chapter 9. Their specific purpose isto provide insights into the nature and scopeof trade, global trade, international freight,and U.S. policies. Beginning with the topic oftrade theories and their evolution, the authorsmove to the policy aspects of U.S. trade overthe recent past, the growth of the U.S. tradegap, modal comparisons, and sustainability offreight transport. The authors compare andcontrast U.S. development with that in Europe.In addition, the authors address the impactsof deregulation and improvements in infor-mation technology and logistics that have im-proved productivity and efficiency. The authorspull together much of the material covered inthe previous essays within a policy framework.They conclude their essay with dealing withbarriers to seamlessness as “part illusion andpart reality” (p. 255).

The concluding essay by Capineri and Lein-bach pulls together the various papers in thisvolume and revisits the topic of seamlessnessin freight transport. The authors provide goodsummaries of the essays by relating them to thefour aspects of seamlessness identified in theirintroductory essay. The authors identify five

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major areas for further research: global supplychains and their networks, implementation ofintermodality at trade gateways, the impact ofe-commerce on small and medium businessesand their supply chains, strategies to deal withglobal risks within transportation, and institu-tional impediments to seamlessness in trade andtransport. The editors as well as the authors ofthese essays should be commended for bring-ing together and discussing within this volumemany of the important issues facing globalizedfreight movements. Key Words: e-commerce,intermodality, logistics, seamlessness, sustainability.

Invested Interests: Capital, Culture, andThe World Bank. Bret Benjamin. Min-neapolis: Minnesota University Press, 2007.274 pp., diagrams, notes, appendices, andindex. $22.50 paperback (ISBN-10: 0-8166-4873-5).

Reviewed by Eric Spears, Director of Inter-national Education and Senior Lecturer ofGeography, Mercer University, Macon, GA.

Whenever I hear that a new piece of researchis being released on the World Bank, I im-mediately conjure the idea that it is either onpolitical science or traditional economics. BretBenjamin, however, challenges us in the socialsciences to think beyond the boundaries of con-ventional academe and to see the World Bankfrom an interdisciplinary cultural perspective.The purpose of Invested Interests is to providean in-depth historical and cultural analysis ofthe premier international financial institutionthat has played a central role in the shaping ofpeople’s economic space, and their subsequentstruggle to control it. The author is interestedin the dialectics between a World Bank thatstruggles to maintain its hegemonic position inthe global economy and the political influencesfrom the right and the left that shape its policiesand rhetoric.

Being a political economist, I must admitthat I was somewhat uncertain whether Ben-jamin could convince me that an institution likethe World Bank could have a changing cul-tural identity that responds to and is shaped bymodern politics. I suppose I have been condi-tioned by years of conventional “systemic polit-ical thought.” This is not to say that I thoughtthe World Bank was devoid of cultural practice.

I naıvely assumed the World Bank has alwayshad a bureaucratic employee culture of sortsand knew that it had operated within a West-ern cultural norm, despite its relationships withnon-Western local economies. It is fair to sug-gest that I, like most people in academics, busi-ness, and government, see the World Bank asa one-dimensional institution of bureaucraticpolicymaking and econometric modeling.

Benjamin, however, urges us to view theWorld Bank as an active capitalist agent that hasmaintained its supremacy over local economiesin part through the literature it produces. Thelong-term acceptance of the World Bank’spractices, according to Benjamin, is the resultof its political rhetoric and corporate litera-ture, which has in turn been shaped by mod-ern and historical processes. For this reason,Benjamin pushes us into the sometimes un-comfortable but intriguing realm of interdis-ciplinary thought. His book suggests that anecotone of cultural studies and political econ-omy is the place where the World Bank is bestunderstood.

The book has seven chapters: “ImaginativeVentures (Cultivating Confidence at BrettonWoods),” “Imperial Burden (Selling Develop-ment to Wall Street),” “Uncomfortable Intima-cies (Managing Third World Nationalisms),”“Culture Underwritten (Radical Critique andthe Bank’s Cultural Turn),” “Success Stories(NGOs and the Banking Bildungsroman),”“Literary Movements (Impossible Collectivi-ties in The God of Small Things),” and “Min-imum Agendas (The World Social Forumand the Place of Culture).” Each chapter fo-cuses on a particular period within the WorldBank’s postwar existence, with special attentiongiven to the way it turns to literature in theform of success stories and public persuasion.The author also explores the degree to whichanti-imperialist intellectuals, such as RichardWright, Aime Caire, and Frantz Fanon, havegiven the World Bank a prominent position intheir writings and secured its hegemonic posi-tion in capitalism. In essence, Benjamin mapsthe debates and lexicon of culture study ontoa historical analysis of the World Bank as animperial expression of capitalism (p. xiii).

The last chapter in the book, therefore, isthe most compelling. Benjamin leans on hisearlier chapters to establish the cultural con-text of the World Bank and the current global

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