E.— GEOGRAPHY. 97 



to characterise la Blache's concept of human geography, but I find its 

 dominant note and one which brings it into salient contrast with the 

 Ratzelian School in the following paragraph : — 



' L'etre geographique d'une contree n'est point une chose donnee 

 d'avance par la nature, une ofErande du monde inanime ; elle est un 

 produit de I'activite de I'homme, conferant reunite a des materiaux qui, 

 par eux memes, ne Font point. ... Si une contree est une personne, 

 c'est par I'efiort de ceux qui I'habiterent.' The emphasis here and 

 throughout his work is not so much on the determinative influence of 

 the stage per se, although this is always presented as a vital factor, as on 

 the creative power of human groups to adapt themselves to and, within 

 limits, to mould the natural environment, to leave their impress upon it 

 and thus in the course of generations to transform it and give it a 

 personality which is the outcome of the interaction. This personality 

 is not constant. It may change with man's use or abuse of his habitat. 



In all this doctrine a certain power of choice is implied, a power of 

 choice which must increase with man's knowledge and control of the 

 forces of nature. It is Febvre, not himself a member of the Vidal de la 

 Blache school, but a friendly and by no means uncritical interpreter of 

 it, who in that fascinating and penetrating if somewhat elusive work, A 

 Geographical Introduction to History, flings down the gauntlet to geographical 

 determinism in the bold challenge ; ' There are no necessities, but every- 

 where possibilities ; and man, as master of the possibilities, is the judge 

 of their use.' However critical we may be of the validity or at any rate 

 the adequacy of this as a general statement, particularly if applied to the 

 historical evolution of various types of society, it does at least indicate 

 an objective with which the work of human geographers is closely con- 

 cerned. Von Engeln tells us in the Preface to his Inheriting the Earth 

 that he wrote his book ' not so much to show that human organisation 

 and development have been determined by geographic conditions as to 

 insist that in the future they should be,' the implication, of course, being 

 that man must study far more intimately the nature and possibilities of 

 his geographical environment in order to achieve the harmony with it 

 which lies within his power. This address is to be followed by a paper on 

 the regional planning of a district which includes a great urban complex, 

 separated by a belt still mainly rural and agricultural from a still vaster 

 but more amorphous industrial area. It will deal with the various schemes 

 of zoning, open spaces and land-utilisation by which it is proposed to 

 guide, in the interests of the communities as a whole, the economic and 

 in a sense also the social geography of a region which, in common with 

 many others, has suffered much from thoughtless exploitation in the past. 

 This is one of many examples of the present terribly belated movement 

 in Great Britain towards orderly regional planning, which is essentially a 

 conscious effort in constructive social geography, the attempt to utilise 

 all elements in the physical environment for social well-being (as distinct 

 from the ruthless exploitation of particular elements, e.g. coal, regard- 

 less of the wider social consequences which marked the earlier stages of 

 the industrial revolution) and to harmonise the interests of neighbour- 

 ing towns and countryside in a common scheme in which each has its 

 place. To this movement geographers, I think it may be claimed, have 

 1930 H 



